For being so brief, it’s deeply effective. His portrait of Henry Clay, who consistently lost out on the presidency through various circumstances, also deserves special mention. The latter section is particularly startling. He breaks the book up by listing the various ways a president can be removed, ranging from losing an election to being declared unable to serve. Reading about the more famous stories are fascinating, but Priess excels when he gets deep into the research of less obvious cases. Bush was knocked aside during his reelection bid-the most democratic was of removing a president. After all, Richard Nixon resigned over the pressure from growing bipartisan calls for his impeachment. Impeachment remains the most obvious way of removing a president, but it remains one of the least used methods. The result is a compendium of vignettes suggesting the typical transition of power in the United States has been anything but peaceful. For each person who assumes the great position, it’s much less a question of when they’ll leave, but, rather, how they’ll leave.Īuthor David Priess explores this expertly, considering how each of the previous forty-four presidents have ultimately left the highest office in the land.
William Henry Harrison wasn’t so lucky, becoming the first president to die in office after a mere thirty-one days. After two terms, President George Washington, the original, happily stepped aside upon the election of John Adams. This briskly paced, darkly humorous voyage proves that while the pomp and circumstance of presidential elections might draw more attention, the way that presidents are removed teaches us much more about our political order.Įvery president’s time in office is fleeting and, willingly or not, they’ve each had to turn power over to the next person. How to Get Rid of a President showcases the political dark arts in a stew of election dramas, national tragedies, and presidential departures mixed with party intrigue, personal betrayal, and backroom shenanigans. The American presidency has seen it all, from rejecting a sitting president's renomination bid and undermining their authority in office to the more drastic methods of impeachment, and, most brutal of all, assassination. Even so, Americans have often resorted to more dramatic paths to disempower the chief executive. To limit executive power, the founding fathers created fixed presidential terms of four years, giving voters regular opportunities to remove their leaders.
A vivid political history of the schemes, plots, maneuvers, and conspiracies that have attempted - successfully and not - to remove unwanted presidents
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