The American Vice President

In the nation's capital during the middle decades of the twentieth century, a joke was making the rounds––about a luckless mother who had two grown sons, neither of whom was ever heard from again.

二十世纪中叶，在这个国家的首都，流传着一个笑话——一位不幸的母亲有两个已成年的儿子，但两个儿子都杳无音讯。

One was lost at sea; the other became Vice President.

其中一艘在海上失踪；另一个成为副总统。

It's this weird situation with the vice presidency where you're the running mate, you're the other face on the political campaign button.

对于副总统来说，这是一种奇怪的情况，你是竞选伙伴，你是政治竞选按钮上的另一张脸。

But unless the President of the United States wants to give you something to do, you can basically sit around twiddling your thumbs.

但除非美国总统想让你有事可做，否则你基本上可以无所事事。

It's historically seen as a political death sentence.

这在历史上被视为政治死刑。

Nobody in the history of America, nobody in the history of the world, has ever looked at themselves in the mirror and said, if I do everything right, someday I'll be vice president.

美国历史上，世界历史上，没有人曾照过镜子说，如果我做对了，有一天我会成为副总统。

And yet.

然而。

The Vice President has been key to the continuity of government since the early years of the republic.

自共和国初期以来，副总统一直是政府连续性的关键。

And were a bookie to calculate the odds of a vice president succeeding to the presidency––rather than being elected to it––they would shake out at roughly one in five.

如果博彩公司计算副总统继任总统（而不是当选）的几率，他们会以大约五分之一的概率出局。

Eight times in history, a U.S. president has died in office.

历史上，美国总统有八次在任期间去世。

One time in history, a president has resigned.

历史上曾有过一位总统辞职的情况。

There were at least 19 times in history where the president of the United States was almost assassinated, almost died of illness, and almost died due to accident.

历史上至少有19次美国总统差点被暗杀、差点病死、差点因意外身亡。

So it's sort of shocking to me that, despite that history, we don't pay more attention to the seriousness of the office.

因此，令我感到震惊的是，尽管有这样的历史，但我们并没有更多地关注办公室的严肃性。

When the clock started on that infamous Friday, the 22nd of November 1963, no one could see what was coming, or the way the events of that morning would focus attention on the American vice presidency.

1963 年 11 月 22 日，那个臭名昭著的星期五，当时钟开始计时时，没有人能预见接下来会发生什么，也没有人能预见到那天早上发生的事件将如何将注意力集中到美国副总统身上。

But in the recollection of Lady Bird Johnson, the vice president's wife, it began with the clouds parting.

但在副总统夫人伯德·约翰逊夫人的回忆中，一切都是从云层散去开始的。

Pinned down in the back seat, Vice President Lyndon Johnson had no visual of what was happening, only the sensation of picking up speed.

副总统林登·约翰逊被困在后座上，看不到正在发生的事情，只感觉速度加快了。

As of that grim morning, Johnson had been Vice President of the United States for two years, ten months, and two days––and by his own account, he had "detested every minute of it."

截至那个阴沉的早晨，约翰逊已经担任美国副总统两年零十个月零两天——据他自己的说法，他“厌恶其中的每一分钟”。

With no shot at the top of the ticket, Johnson had settled for running mate, persuaded the Democrats could not win the election without him.

由于没有任何机会，约翰逊决定担任竞选搭档，并说服民主党没有他就无法赢得选举。

John Kennedy knew Johnson was a restless person, and he assigned him to some, you know, sort of mediocre commissions and different things, you know, just to kind of keep him busy.

约翰·肯尼迪知道约翰逊是一个焦躁不安的人，他给他分配了一些平庸的任务和不同的事情，只是为了让他忙碌。

And he also turned Johnson into a roving diplomat, traveling around the world and meeting with world leaders.

他还将约翰逊变成了一名流动外交官，周游世界并会见世界领导人。

I think Kennedy's attitude was that he didn't really need the vice president nearby.

我认为肯尼迪的态度是他并不真正需要副总统在身边。

He didn't need the vice president involved in the day-to-day business of the administration.

他不需要副总统参与政府的日常事务。

If Johnson gamely played his part, he did so knowing it was only a show.

如果约翰逊勇敢地扮演了自己的角色，他也知道这只是一场表演。

"The vice presidency is filled with trips around the world, chauffeurs, men saluting, people clapping, chairmanships of counsils [sic]," he once said, "but in the end it is nothing.”

“副总统的任期充满了世界各地的旅行、司机、男人敬礼、人们鼓掌、担任议会主席[原文如此]，”他曾经说过，“但最终什么也没有。”

I think LBJ is contemplating and trying to make sense of a lot of things that are happening very fast.

我认为林登·约翰逊正在思考并试图理解许多快速发生的事情。

He's about to get the job that he's always wanted, but this isn't how he wants it.

他即将得到他一直想要的工作，但这不是他想要的。

"I knew it was imperative that I grasp the reins of power and do so without delay," Johnson remembered.

“我知道我必须立即掌握权力，”约翰逊回忆道。

"The nation was in a state of shock and grief…

“整个国家处于震惊和悲伤的状态......

The entire world was watching us through a magnifying glass.…

全世界都在通过放大镜注视着我们......

I had to prove myself.”

我必须证明自己。”

It was a paradox of the vice presidency that the first to hold the office, John Adams, had been quick to grasp.

第一个担任副总统的约翰·亚当斯很快就认识到了副总统职位的一个悖论。

As he had put it: "I am the Vice President.

正如他所说：“我是副总统。

In this, I am nothing.

在这一点上，我什么都不是。

But I may be everything."

但我可能就是一切。”

The U.S. Constitution assigned precisely two responsibilities to the vice president––a job description so slight that a member of the first Congress suggested the position be compensated on a per diem basis.

美国宪法准确地为副总统分配了两项职责——职位描述非常琐碎，以至于第一届国会的一位议员建议该职位按日计酬。

The vice president really has two roles.

副总统实际上有两个角色。

To be there in case something happens to the president, to stand in for him, take his place, or cast a tie-breaking vote in the Senate.

以防万一总统出事，代替他，接替他的位置，或者在参议院投出决定性的一票。

The founding fathers really didn't give the vice presidency much thought.

开国元勋们确实没有过多考虑副总统职位。

They thought even less about succession.

他们更少考虑继承问题。

I think that's fascinating because people didn't live that long back then.

我认为这很有趣，因为那时人们的寿命并没有那么长。

The Constitution said, "in case of the removal of the president or his death, resignation or inability to discharge the duties of said office, the same shall devolve on the vice president." They left it very vague what "devolve" meant and what "same" meant, what they meant by "inability to discharge the duties." They didn't leave much of a blueprint.

宪法规定，“如果总统被免职、死亡、辞职或无法履行总统职责，则由副总统负责”。他们对“移交”的含义和“相同”的含义以及“无法履行职责”的含义非常模糊。他们没有留下太多的蓝图。

Under the framers' original scheme of election, the vice president was to be the literal runner-up, the winner of the second-most electoral votes for president.

根据制宪者最初的选举方案，副总统将成为名副其实的亚军，即获得第二多总统选举人票的获胜者。

But the rise of political parties––and the prospect of ideological opponents serving in tandem––made that approach untenable, and in 1804 helped to spur the 12th Amendment.

但政党的崛起 — — 以及意识形态对手联手服务的前景 — — 使得这种做法站不住脚，并在 1804 年促成了第十二条修正案的出台。

What the 12th Amendment did is it created a method whereby electors were to cast separate votes for president and separate votes for vice president.

第十二修正案的作用是创造了一种选举人单独投票选举总统和单独投票选举副总统的方法。

Under the original method, you had a field of candidates who were generally of presidential caliber.

按照最初的方法，候选人通常具有总统才能。

You were taking a shot and there was a good chance that you could end up president.

你正在尝试，并且很有可能最终成为总统。

After the 12th Amendment, because the vice presidency lacked any substantive powers, there began to be a decline in the number of and the quality of candidates who would stand for vice president.

第十二修正案之后，由于副总统缺乏任何实质性权力，副总统候选人的数量和质量开始下降。

You would be hard pressed to find very many Americans who could name vice presidents from the 19th century.

你很难找到很多美国人能够提名 19 世纪的副总统。

Vice presidents were really chosen by political party organizations.

副总统实际上是由政党组织选出的。

Many times the president was chosen because he was part of the winning faction, and the minority faction was given the vice presidency often as a way of keeping the party together.

很多时候，总统被选为获胜派系的一部分，而少数派则被授予副总统职位，这通常是作为保持政党团结的一种方式。

And that tradition continued even after it became much more of a presidentially-selected position because those presidential candidates themselves had an interest in some kind of balance.

即使在它更多地成为总统选举的职位之后，这一传统仍然继续存在，因为这些总统候选人本身对某种平衡感兴趣。

During the first half century of the new republic, no president died in office and the succession clause went untested.

在新共和国的前半个世纪里，没有一位总统在任期内去世，继承条款也没有经过考验。

His claim was controversial because many people read the Constitution, which was ambiguous, to say that, that if the president died, the vice president simply acted as president, that he simply exercised the powers and duties of the presidency while remaining vice president.

他的说法引起了争议，因为很多人读过的宪法含糊不清，规定如果总统去世，副总统只是代理总统，而他只是在保留副总统的同时行使总统的权力和职责。

But Tyler insisted that he was president, refused to be dealt with on any other basis.

但泰勒坚称自己是总统，拒绝以任何其他理由接受处理。

He was subsequently referred to as His Accidency, The Great Usurper.

他随后被称为他的意外，伟大的篡位者。

You know, the press had a field day with it.

你知道，媒体对此很感兴趣。

He would often get mail addressed to John Tyler, comma, Acting President of the United States.

他经常收到寄给美国代理总统约翰·泰勒（逗号）的邮件。

And he had a rule of thumb that he would return those unopened regardless of who they came from.

他有一条经验法则，那就是无论那些未开封的东西来自谁，他都会退回。

The Tyler Precedent took care of what happens when the president dies in office, albeit not formalized by the Constitution.

泰勒先例解决了总统在任期间去世后会发生什么，尽管宪法没有正式规定。

Seven subsequent presidents became President of the United States because of that precedent.

由于这个先例，随后的七位总统成为美国总统。

Millard Fillmore, Andrew Johnson.

米勒德·菲尔莫尔，安德鲁·约翰逊。

Chester Arthur, Theodore Roosevelt, Calvin Coolidge, Harry Truman, and Lyndon Johnson.

切斯特·亚瑟、西奥多·罗斯福、卡尔文·柯立芝、哈里·杜鲁门和林登·约翰逊。

The vice presidency, meanwhile, would remain vacant in each case for the duration of the term––there being no constitutional mechanism for filling such a vacancy.

与此同时，在每种情况下，副总统职位在任期内都将保持空缺——没有宪法机制来填补此类空缺。

There was a concern that if anyone acted to transfer power to Vice President Arthur, that it would displace Garfield from the presidency because Arthur, like Tyler, would become president.

有人担心，如果有人采取行动将权力移交给副总统阿瑟，就会取代加菲尔德的总统职位，因为阿瑟和泰勒一样，将成为总统。

And since the Constitution only envisions one president, that would mean that Garfield would be ousted.

由于宪法只规定了一位总统，这意味着加菲猫将被赶下台。

So this became sort of a cloud that hung over the country, really, whenever there was a presidential inability.

因此，每当总统无能时，这实际上就成为笼罩在全国上空的阴云。

When Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke in 1919, his V.P., Thomas Marshall, likewise refused to appear the usurper, and stood aside as Wilson's wife and his secretary kept the President's condition a secret for more than six months.

1919 年伍德罗·威尔逊 (Woodrow Wilson) 中风时，他的副总统托马斯·马歇尔 (Thomas Marshall) 同样拒绝以篡位者的身份出现，并站在一旁，威尔逊的妻子和他的秘书将总统的病情保密了六个多月。

So in 1955, General Eisenhower is very, very popular as a president, but he has a massive heart attack, which requires a very long convalescence.

1955年，艾森豪威尔将军作为总统非常非常受欢迎，但他患有严重的心脏病，需要很长时间的康复期。

Then in 1956, as he is standing for a reelection, he has emergency surgery, which also requires a very long convalescence.

然后在1956年，当他竞选连任时，他接受了紧急手术，这也需要很长的康复期。

And it opens up discussion around this black box, which was who was running the presidency while Ike was convalescing after his multiple serious health problems?

这引发了围绕这个黑匣子的讨论，即在艾克因多种严重健康问题康复期间，谁在担任总统？

There was no provision in the Constitution for dealing with a situation where the president is disabled.

宪法中没有规定处理总统残疾的情况。

There's actually no formal mechanism for discharging the duties of the president to an acting president, even the vice president.

实际上没有正式的机制可以将总统的职责交给代理总统，甚至副总统。

There was no clarity around who's in charge.

目前还不清楚谁负责。

People increasingly looked to the president to address both domestic and international problems and to handle an increasingly complicated global situation in a nuclear age.

人们越来越期待总统解决国内和国际问题，并处理核时代日益复杂的全球局势。

It made the president more powerful, more significant.

它使总统变得更加强大、更加重要。

And that meant that the vice president became more significant.

这意味着副总统变得更加重要。

And so ultimately the vice presidency gets pulled from Capitol Hill, where the vice presidents had presided over the Senate and done really little else, down Pennsylvania Avenue to the executive branch.

因此，副总统职位最终被从国会山撤下来，副总统在那里主持参议院，几乎没有做任何其他事情，沿着宾夕法尼亚大道到达行政部门。

President Eisenhower was cognizant and very transparent, really, that he had health issues.

艾森豪威尔总统确实认识到自己有健康问题，而且非常透明。

He had concerns about the lack of clarity in the Constitution in terms of inability or presidents being incapacitated for some period of time.

他对宪法在无能力或总统在一段时间内丧失行为能力方面缺乏明确性表示担忧。

And so he gave himself the authority to decide when an inability existed.

因此，他赋予自己在无能力时做出决定的权力。

And even more important than that, this same directive, he gave that authority to Vice President Nixon to decide if the president was incapacitated or unable to fulfill the duties of the office.

更重要的是，在同一指令中，他将权力授予副总统尼克松，以决定总统是否丧失行为能力或无法履行职责。

But it didn't have the force of law.

但它不具有法律效力。

It was polite and unstressful apparently between them, but it was really precarious for the country.

他们之间表面上很有礼貌，没有压力，但对于国家来说，这确实很不稳定。

What if there had been a dispute as to whether or not the president was disabled and the vice president thereby enabled?

如果对于总统是否被禁用而副总统是否被启用存在争议怎么办？

What if the president and the vice president disagreed about that?

如果总统和副总统对此意见不一致怎么办？

It did put the issue of when and how and whether the vice president is running the country front of mind.

它确实把副总统何时、如何以及是否管理国家的问题放在首位。

The gentlemen's agreement made between Eisenhower and Nixon had been replicated by John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.

艾森豪威尔和尼克松之间达成的君子协定已被约翰·肯尼迪和林登·约翰逊复制。

But there was little reason to think they would need to invoke it.

但没有理由认为他们需要调用它。

As Kennedy had put it to an aide during the campaign, "I'm forty-three years old.

正如肯尼迪在竞选期间对助手所说的那样：“我四十三岁了。

I'm the healthiest candidate for President...[and] I'm not going to die in office."

我是最健康的总统候选人……[而且]我不会死在办公室里。”

In 1963, I was a young lawyer.

1963年，我还是一名年轻的律师。

I had spent the previous two years writing an article for the Fordham Law Review.

过去两年我为《福特汉姆法律评论》写了一篇文章。

I started when I saw newspaper articles about disability during the Eisenhower administration and I took that on as my topic.

当我在艾森豪威尔政府期间看到有关残疾的报纸文章时，我开始了这一点，并将其作为我的主题。

And it was published a month before President Kennedy's assassination.

它是在肯尼迪总统遇刺前一个月出版的。

And I figured, well, it's probably going to go on a library shelf somewhere, but it's an important subject.

我想，好吧，它可能会出现在某个图书馆的书架上，但它是一个重要的主题。

When President Kennedy was assassinated, all of a sudden, I got all kinds of calls, can we get your article?

肯尼迪总统遇刺的时候，突然我接到了各种各样的电话，我们能得到你的文章吗？

Would you be on a program?

你会参加节目吗？

The assassination of John F.

约翰·F·肯尼迪遇刺事件

Kennedy and the subsequent elevation of Lyndon Johnson was different than any of the seven deaths in office that had happened before, in part because it was so dramatic.

肯尼迪和林登·约翰逊随后的升职与之前发生的七起任内死亡事件不同，部分原因是它是如此戏剧化。

The President of the United States was shot on live TV.

美国总统在电视直播中被枪杀。

And then the alleged assassin was shot just a couple days later also on live television.

几天后，涉嫌暗杀的人也在电视直播中被枪杀。

It traumatized an entire generation.

它给整整一代人带来了创伤。

President Kennedy was shot in the head.

肯尼迪总统头部中弹。

Had he survived but been disabled, was the country comfortable leaving it up to one man's say so, to his Vice President Johnson's say so, as to whether or not President Kennedy was able to continue in the office of the presidency?

如果他幸存下来但残疾了，国家是否愿意让一个人、他的副总统约翰逊来决定肯尼迪总统是否能够继续担任总统？

Back in the late 1700s and early 1800s, perhaps the question of succession didn't matter as much as it does in the age of nuclear weapons.

早在 1700 年代末和 1800 年代初，继承问题也许并不像核武器时代那么重要。

But we're in the height of the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis has happened.

但我们正处于冷战最激烈的时期，古巴导弹危机已经发生。

You just can't live in a world with ambiguity around succession.

你无法生活在一个继承问题含糊不清的世界里。

Vietnam was moving forward.

越南正在向前迈进。

There were civil rights protests.

出现了民权抗议活动。

You had civil rights leaders being assassinated.

民权领袖被暗杀。

And so there was a growing awareness, like, this is a dangerous world and mortality is a major factor here for presidents.

因此，人们越来越意识到，这是一个危险的世界，死亡率是总统的一个主要因素。

This is real, this happens, and it happens pretty frequently.

这是真实的，这种事发生过，而且发生得相当频繁。

When President Johnson delivered his special message to Congress on November 27th, 1963, five days after the assassination, there was more than usual interest in the politicians seated behind him on the dais: to the left, the Speaker of the House, a 72-year-old with very little international experience, and the 86-year-old president pro tem of the Senate on the right.

1963 年 11 月 27 日，也就是刺杀事件发生五天后，当约翰逊总统向国会传达他的特别信息时，讲台上坐在他身后的政治家们比平常更加感兴趣：左边是众议院议长，一位几乎没有国际经验的 72 岁老人，右边是 86 岁的参议院临时议长。

Should something untoward happen to the president now, these men were the next in line.

如果现在总统出了什么事，这些人就是下一个。

It was while taxiing toward the terminal at Chicago's O'Hare that Birch Bayh, the freshman Senator from Indiana, first heard that Kennedy had been shot.

来自印第安纳州的新参议员伯奇·贝赫（Birch Bayh）在滑行前往芝加哥奥黑尔机场航站楼时第一次听说肯尼迪被枪杀。

The pilot had come over the intercom.

飞行员通过对讲机过来了。

The fact that we had so many moments in history where there was a vacancy in the vice presidency tells you how little we thought about the importance of the vice presidency.

事实上，我们历史上有过很多副总统职位空缺的时刻，这一事实告诉你，我们对副总统职位的重要性思考得多么少。

But to not have a provision to replace the vice president creates a significant break in the line of succession.

但由于没有替代副总统的条款，导致继任顺序出现重大断裂。

As it happened, Senator Bayh recently had been made Chairman of the Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments–-an appointment now ripe with purpose.

碰巧的是，贝赫参议员最近被任命为宪法修正案小组委员会主席——这项任命现在的目的已经成熟。

Just twenty days after Kennedy's assassination, Bayh announced that his Subcommittee would hold hearings on the twinned problems of presidential succession and inability, and proposed a constitutional amendment

肯尼迪遇刺后仅二十天，拜赫宣布他的小组委员会将就总统继任和无能这两个孪生问题举行听证会，并提出宪法修正案

The American Bar Association played a very important role in the creation of the Amendment and I was given an opportunity to participate in that.

美国律师协会在修正案的制定过程中发挥了非常重要的作用，我有机会参与其中。

The issue boiled down to how do we deal with an involuntary inability, the president, there's something wrong, we have to address it and what should those provisions be?

问题归结为我们如何处理非自愿的无能力，总统，出了什么问题，我们必须解决它，这些规定应该是什么？

Presidential inability had been a preoccupation on Capitol Hill at least since the Eisenhower administration.

至少自艾森豪威尔政府以来，总统无能一直是国会山关注的焦点。

A raft of remedies had been proposed and hearings held, but consensus proved elusive.

人们提出了一系列补救措施并举行了听证会，但事实证明难以达成共识。

As the Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Emanuel Celler, put it: "when you had three Congressmen discussing [inability], you had 17 different opinions."

正如众议院司法委员会主席伊曼纽尔·塞勒 (Emanuel Celler) 所说：“当三名国会议员讨论[无能力]时，你们会提出 17 种不同的意见。”

When they were debating the circumstances in which a vice president would take over and become effectively acting president, it was like an imagination debate.

当他们争论副总统在什么情况下会接任并成为有效的代理总统时，这就像一场想象力的辩论。

Imagine all of the crazy things that might befall a president.

想象一下总统可能会遇到的所有疯狂的事情。

And once you start talking about things in those terms you're unlikely at any point for everybody to arrive at an idea that seems like something to handle all contingencies.

一旦你开始用这些术语谈论事情，你就不太可能在任何时候让每个人都达成一个似乎可以处理所有突发事件的想法。

It took Bayh eighteen months to push his resolution through both houses of Congress, and another sixteen for it be ratified by the states, before it was finally and formally proclaimed the 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

拜赫花了十八个月的时间才推动他的决议在国会参众两院获得通过，又花了十六个月的时间得到各州的批准，最后才最终正式宣布成为美国宪法第 25 条修正案。

Broad consensus at last had emerged on one crucial point: the nation needed a vice president at all times.

最终在一个关键点上达成了广泛共识：国家任何时候都需要一位副总统。

The 25th Amendment created a means of filling a vice presidential vacancy during a presidential term, also to transfer power to the vice president on a temporary basis if the president was unable to exercise presidential power.

第 25 条修正案创造了一种在总统任期内填补副总统空缺的方法，并在总统无法行使总统权力时将权力临时移交给副总统。

It really reflected a new vision of the vice presidency as a important officer in the executive branch, a close and compatible colleague of the President, someone who was familiar with the policy and committed to the policies of the administration so that a transfer of power would go smoothly.

这确实反映了副总统作为行政部门的重要官员、总统亲密且兼容的同事、熟悉政策并致力于政府政策以使权力交接顺利进行的人的新愿景。

Even if a president had to have a one-hour operation, as Senator Bayh would say, if missiles were flying at America at that point, you want to be sure that there's no gap in terms of where the executive power is, and the person that we have to look to in that situation is the vice president.

即使总统必须进行一小时的行动，正如参议员贝赫所说，如果导弹当时飞向美国，你也要确保行政权力的位置没有差距，而在这种情况下我们必须指望的人是副总统。

Few observers thought the Amendment perfect, but most agreed it was flexible enough to cover all manner of contingencies.

很少有观察家认为该修正案是完美的，但大多数人都认为它足够灵活，可以应对各种意外情况。

What no one could have guessed was just how––and how often––it soon would be called into play.

没有人能够猜到的是，它很快就会以何种方式以及以何种频率发挥作用。

They were trying to imagine everything, but truth is always stranger than fiction, right?

他们试图想象一切，但事实总是比小说更奇怪，对吧？

The real circumstances of how things come to pass are always wilder than the hypotheticals that you imagine.

事情发生的真实情况总是比你想象的假设更加疯狂。

And so it was with the vice presidency, and so it was with the 25th Amendment.

副总统职位如此，第二十五修正案也是如此。

When it was first reported in the late summer of 1972, the Watergate story might easily have escaped notice: an odd break-in at the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee involving five men, a bagful of sophisticated surveillance devices, and 230 crisp hundred-dollar bills.

当 1972 年夏末首次报道时，水门事件很容易就没有引起人们的注意：民主党全国委员会总部发生了一次奇怪的闯入事件，涉及五名男子、一袋先进的监控设备和 230 张清晰的百元大钞。

So in 1973, the Watergate political crisis is in full flower.

1973年，水门事件政治危机全面爆发。

Attorney General Elliot Richardson is worried not only that the president might have committed crimes, that the president might be removed from office, he's worried that the president might die, he's under so much stress.

司法部长埃利奥特·理查森不仅担心总统可能犯罪、总统可能被免职，他还担心总统可能会死，他承受的压力太大了。

And at the same time, in the summer of 1973, this U.S. Attorney's office in Maryland keeps calling and asking for a meeting, and they finally get the news through to him that this little public corruption investigation that they've been working on in Maryland has produced very good evidence that Vice President Agnew has been committing extortion and taking cash bribes in the White House.

与此同时，1973年夏天，美国马里兰州检察官办公室不断打电话要求会面，他们终于向他传达了消息，他们在马里兰州进行的这项小型公共腐败调查已经提供了非常好的证据，表明副总统阿格纽一直在白宫实施勒索和收受现金贿赂。

Imagine you're Richard Nixon in this moment.

想象一下此时此刻你是理查德·尼克松。

Watergate is spiraling and spiraling and getting worse and worse and threatening you more and more with each passing day.

水门事件愈演愈烈，情况越来越糟，对你的威胁也与日俱增。

Now, here's your vice president taking bribes, taking envelopes stuffed with hundred dollar bills during the time he was vice president.

现在，你们的副总统在担任副总统期间收受贿赂，收受塞满百元大钞的信封。

Spiro Agnew was chosen by Richard Nixon as his running mate in 1968, and it was a bewildering choice to most observers Spiro Agnew was the Governor of Maryland and he was not a high profile member of the Republican establishment in any way.

1968 年，理查德·尼克松 (Richard Nixon) 选择斯皮罗·阿格纽 (Spiro Agnew) 作为他的竞选搭档，对于大多数观察家来说，这是一个令人困惑的选择。 斯皮罗·阿格纽 (Spiro Agnew) 是马里兰州州长，无论如何他都不是共和党建制派的高调成员。

That said, during his vice presidency, he really established himself as a political force as a divisive, rabble-rousing figure who antagonized the press, who excited the right-wing base of the Republican Party.

也就是说，在担任副总统期间，他确实将自己确立为一支政治力量，成为一个分裂、煽动民众的人物，他与媒体对抗，而媒体激怒了共和党的右翼基础。

When Nixon and Agnew ran for reelection in 1972, that proved to be a really winning combination.

1972 年尼克松和阿格纽竞选连任时，事实证明这是一个真正获胜的组合。

It was a landslide when they won in 72.

当他们在72场比赛中获胜时，这是一场压倒性的胜利。

But Agnew had never been invited into Nixon's inner circle.

但阿格纽从未被邀请进入尼克松的核心圈子。

Though he'd been given an office in the West Wing––the first vice president to be so situated––he'd been made to understand that his proximity to the Oval was purely symbolic.

尽管他在西翼得到了一个办公室——他是第一位在西翼办公的副总统——但他却被告知，他靠近椭圆形大厅纯粹是象征性的。

"A little over a week ago, I took a rather unusual step for a Vice President," Agnew complained in his memoir.

“一个多星期前，我作为副总统迈出了相当不寻常的一步，”阿格纽在他的回忆录中抱怨道。

"I said something."

“我说了句话。”

Nixon refused to support Agnew or defend Agnew in any way.

尼克松拒绝以任何方式支持阿格纽或捍卫阿格纽。

He knew it was likely that he himself would be impeached or forced to resign, knew that it would be a disaster if Agnew were to succeed to the presidency.

他知道自己很可能会被弹劾或被迫辞职，也知道如果阿格纽继任总统，那将是一场灾难。

So Nixon's Justice Department was actively pursuing forcing Agnew from office.

因此尼克松的司法部正在积极寻求迫使阿格纽下台。

What Attorney General Elliot Richardson decided to do was allow these federal prosecutors to go ahead with a plan to bring federal criminal charges, dozens of felony charges, against the sitting Vice President of the United States.

司法部长埃利奥特·理查森决定允许这些联邦检察官继续实施一项计划，对现任美国副总统提出联邦刑事指控，包括数十项重罪指控。

And when Vice President Agnew was informed that that was what was going to happen to him, he entered into a plea deal discussion.

当副总统阿格纽得知这将发生在他身上时，他开始了认罪协议讨论。

Very unusually, it was supervised by the judge himself.

非常不寻常的是，这是由法官亲自监督的。

Even more unusually, the judge supervised the plea deal discussions at a motel.

更不寻常的是，法官在一家汽车旅馆监督了认罪协议的讨论。

I don't know.

我不知道。

That's what they did.

他们就是这么做的。

They met at a motel.

他们在一家汽车旅馆见面。

The two sides sat on opposite twin beds in a motel room with a judge.

双方和一名法官坐在汽车旅馆房间里相对的两张床上。

They worked it out.

他们解决了。

And what they worked out was that Vice President Agnew would not go to prison.

他们得出的结论是副总统阿格纽不会入狱。

He would be assured that he would not go to prison.

他可以放心，他不会进监狱。

He would have to plead essentially no contest to at least one charge, but as part of the agreement, he would resign the vice presidency.

他必须对至少一项指控基本上不提出任何异议，但作为协议的一部分，他将辞去副总统职务。

The existence of the 25th Amendment and the clarity around how a vacancy in the vice presidency is filled was, I think, part of the reason that Agnew's resignation was sort of an okay resolution to this crisis.

我认为，第 25 条修正案的存在以及副总统职位空缺如何填补的明确性是阿格纽的辞职是这场危机的一个不错解决方案的部分原因。

With the Watergate tapes still hostage to the president's claim of executive privilege, some in Congress now balked at the 25th Amendment and the prospect of having to confirm a vice president of Nixon's choice.

由于水门事件录音带仍然受到总统声称的行政特权的影响，国会中的一些人现在对第 25 条修正案和必须确认尼克松选择的副总统的前景犹豫不决。

"So long as the President himself is so clearly under the cloud of possible disclosures on the tapes," insisted Senator Edward Kennedy, "grave questions exist as to the propriety of the President's choosing his own successor...".

参议员爱德华·肯尼迪坚持认为，“只要总统本人如此明显地处于录音带中可能披露的内容的阴影之下，那么总统选择自己的继任者是否恰当就存在严重的问题……”。

Richard Nixon was an embattled president.

理查德·尼克松是一位四面楚歌的总统。

And yet the authority given to him in the 25th Amendment allowed him to exercise considerable influence on the political landscape.

然而，第 25 条修正案赋予他的权力使他能够对政治格局发挥相当大的影响力。

And so he immediately started looking for someone to fill the vacancy.

于是他立即开始寻找人来填补这个空缺。

In the end, his selection was a calculated one: the less overtly presidential the nominee, Nixon reasoned, the less controversial, the more likely a speedy confirmation by Congress.

最后，他的选择是经过深思熟虑的：尼克松认为，被提名人的总统身份越不公开，争议就越少，国会就越有可能迅速确认。

He picks Gerald Ford, this ex-football player, very affable, very likable, but not somebody who was going to run for president.

他选择了杰拉尔德·福特，这位前橄榄球运动员，非常和蔼可亲，非常讨人喜欢，但不是一个要竞选总统的人。

He was actually thinking of retiring.

他实际上正在考虑退休。

He was going to run one more time, he told his wife, and then hang it up.

他告诉妻子，他还想再跑一次，然后就挂掉了。

Gerald Ford was an obscure congressman from Michigan.

杰拉尔德·福特是一位来自密歇根州的无名国会议员。

Richard Nixon offered him an opportunity to have the second most powerful job in the country.

理查德·尼克松为他提供了担任美国第二大权力职位的机会。

There's not a lot of instances where somebody might view the vice presidency as an upgrade, but from Michigan's fifth district, I'd say it's an upgrade.

在很多情况下，有人可能会将副总统职位视为升级，但从密歇根州第五选区来看，我会说这是升级。

On October 20th, 1973, ten days after Agnew's resignation and two weeks before Ford's confirmation hearings were set to begin, President Nixon managed to hasten his own political demise.

1973 年 10 月 20 日，阿格纽辞职十天后，距离福特确认听证会开始还有两周，尼克松总统设法加速了自己的政治灭亡。

In a fit of pique, he demanded that Archibald Cox, the Special Prosecutor investigating Watergate, be dismissed, his office abolished, and his files sealed––an action that led, in turn, to the immediate resignation of first Attorney General Richardson, then his Deputy.

一怒之下，他要求解雇调查水门事件的特别检察官阿奇博尔德·考克斯，撤销他的办公室，并封存他的档案——这一行动反过来导致第一任司法部长理查森及其副手立即辞职。

Western Union reported that in the following three days more than 150,000 telegrams flooded Washington, "the heaviest concentrated volume on record." As one columnist noted, "Even Congress, which so often rolls on its back like a spaniel, is beginning to face the necessity of impeachment."

西联汇款报告称，在接下来的三天里，超过 15 万份电报涌入华盛顿，这是“有记录以来最集中的电报数量”。正如一位专栏作家指出的那样，“即使是经常像西班牙猎狗一样翻滚的国会，也开始面临弹劾的必要性。”

Here's Carl Albert, Democratic Speaker of the House, and two things land in his lap at the same time.

这是众议院民主党议长卡尔·艾伯特的讲话，有两件事同时落在了他的腿上。

First of all, the vice president has resigned, which means Carl Albert has responsibility in the House for confirming a new vice president.

首先，副总统已经辞职，这意味着卡尔·阿尔伯特有责任在众议院确认新的副总统。

Simultaneously, Richard Nixon, the president is going to be impeached, and Carl Albert has responsibility for dealing with the House side of the impeachment process.

与此同时，总统理查德·尼克松将被弹劾，而卡尔·艾伯特则负责处理众议院方面的弹劾程序。

And if there is no president and there is no vice president who becomes President?

如果没有总统，也没有副总统，谁会成为总统呢？

Carl Albert, Speaker of the House.

卡尔·艾伯特，众议院议长。

So if he wanted to, if he was of that kind of a mindset, Carl Albert in that moment could have engineered the ousting of the President of the United States, not filling the vice presidency of the United States, and thus installing himself as president.

因此，如果他愿意，如果他有这种心态，卡尔·阿尔伯特在那一刻就可以策划罢免美国总统，而不是填补美国副总统职位，从而让自己成为总统。

Which would have put the presidency in the hands of the Democratic Party, just months after the entire country had chosen the Republican Party to lead by a landslide.

这将使总统职位落入民主党手中，而就在几个月前，整个国家都以压倒性优势选择了共和党来领导。

It would've been a partisan coup.

这将是一场党派政变。

It would've been legal, it would've been procedurally sound, and it would've been a revolution.

这将是合法的，程序上是合理的，而且将是一场革命。

By the time Ford's confirmation hearings got underway, the likelihood that the vice presidential nominee ultimately would succeed to the presidency was on everyone's mind.

当福特的确认听证会开始时，每个人都在考虑这位副总统候选人最终成功当选总统的可能性。

Confirmed swiftly and by overwhelming majority, Ford was sworn in on December 6th, 1973, the 40th vice president of the United States.

1973 年 12 月 6 日，福特以压倒性多数票迅速确认就职，成为美国第 40 任副总统。

The Fords are the first family with the opportunity to live there, and they get this tour, and Betty Ford gets to pick out the China for the vice president.

福特一家是第一个有机会住在那里的家庭，他们得到了这次旅行，而贝蒂·福特则挑选了中国作为副总统。

And Gerald Ford turns to her and says, Betty, we're not going to ever live here.

杰拉尔德·福特转向她说，贝蒂，我们永远不会住在这里。

He saw the writing on the wall.

他看到了墙上的文字。

They were going to be moving into the White House.

他们要搬进白宫。

The transition went remarkably well.

过渡进行得非常顺利。

It was essentially seamless.

基本上是无缝的。

And I think in part that is because the 25th Amendment had allowed there to be a procedure for filling vacancies in the vice presidency.

我认为部分原因是第 25 条修正案允许制定填补副总统职位空缺的程序。

The president was able to choose someone from his own political party so there was no conflict that way.

总统可以从自己的政党中选择某人，因此不会发生冲突。

And at the end of the day, Ford was in fact prepared.

归根结底，福特实际上已经做好了准备。

He was in fact qualified.

他其实是有资格的。

Ford had never been on a presidential ticket.

福特从未参加过总统竞选。

He had never run for any office higher than this one little district in Michigan.

他从未竞选过比密歇根州这个小区更高的职位。

Suddenly here he was, the most powerful person in the world.

突然之间，他就出现了，成为了世界上最有权势的人。

It had all happened so quickly, the Nixon’s hadn't yet had the chance to move their belongings out of the White House.

这一切发生得太快了，尼克松一家还没有机会将他们的财物搬出白宫。

The Fords had this very sweet, middle class, you know, colonial house in Alexandria, Virginia.

福特夫妇在弗吉尼亚州亚历山大市拥有一栋非常温馨的中产阶级殖民地风格的房子。

Being the affable people they were, they gave the Nixon’s time to get their things out and make the transition and move.

作为和蔼可亲的人，他们给了尼克松时间把他们的东西拿出来，进行过渡和搬家。

And so there was a period of time there where the Fords were actually the President and First Lady, living in their house in Virginia.

因此，有一段时间，福特夫妇实际上是总统和第一夫人，住在弗吉尼亚州的房子里。

This was just a mere decade after JFK had been assassinated.

此时距肯尼迪遇刺仅十年。

So you have this president living in a quiet suburban community outside of D.C. So they had to put bulletproof glass in the master bedroom.

这位总统住在华盛顿特区外一个安静的郊区社区，所以他们不得不在主卧室安装防弹玻璃。

They had to reinforce the driveway with steel rods underneath for the president's motorcade cars to be parked.

他们必须在车道下方用钢棒加固，以便总统的车队停放。

They had Secret Service in the garage, setting up their post.

他们在车库里安排了特勤人员，设置了他们的哨所。

Ford said, "our poor neighbors went through hell."

福特说：“我们可怜的邻居经历了地狱。”

Once again, for the second time in just over a year, the vice presidency stood vacant––and the reality of the procedures outlined by the 25th Amendment had begun to sink in.

在短短一年多的时间里，副总统职位再次出现空缺——第 25 条修正案概述的程序的现实已经开始深入人心。

Gerald Ford was the first president in US history, and so far is the only president in US history to assume the office without ever having been elected president or vice president.

杰拉尔德·福特是美国历史上第一位总统，也是迄今为止美国历史上唯一一位从未当选总统或副总统就任总统的总统。

He had never faced a national electorate before, and yet he became President of the United States.

他以前从未面对过全国选民，但他却成为了美国总统。

Adding even more to the whole oddness of the situation, if you will, was that the first task Gerald Ford had as president was to choose a new vice president.

如果你愿意的话，更让整个情况变得奇怪的是，杰拉尔德·福特作为总统的首要任务是选择一位新的副总统。

Nelson Rockefeller had been a leader of what was then a very strong liberal to moderate faction in the Republican Party.

纳尔逊·洛克菲勒是当时共和党中一个非常强大的自由派到温和派的领导人。

He had made serious bids for the presidency, although he had not won a Republican nomination.

尽管他没有赢得共和党提名，但他还是认真地竞选了总统职位。

And he was somebody who as governor of New York, was a widely respected figure nationally.

作为纽约州州长，他在全国范围内广受尊敬。

By the end of that year, we have two of our national offices, first and only time in the history of the country, who were appointed, so to speak, under the 25th Amendment.

到那年年底，我们有了两个国家办公室，可以说是根据第 25 条修正案任命的，这在该国历史上是第一次也是唯一一次。

But it worked.

但它奏效了。

When Rockefeller took office on December 19th, 1974, he assumed a position newly imbued with stature and significance.

1974 年 12 月 19 日洛克菲勒上任后，他担任了一个新的具有地位和重要性的职位。

For if the 25th Amendment had side-stepped democratic ideals in laying a path to the office, it also had established––constitutionally, and once and for all––the importance of the second-in-command.

因为，如果说第 25 条修正案在铺设通往办公室的道路时回避了民主理想，那么它也从宪法上一劳永逸地确立了二号人物的重要性。

When Nelson Rockefeller assumed the vice presidency, it was a much changed institution, even from a few years prior, let alone historically.

当纳尔逊·洛克菲勒就任副总统时，即使与几年前相比，这个机构也发生了很大变化，更不用说历史了。

When Richard Nixon was vice president, he had a staff, a small staff, and a budget of under 48,000 dollars a year.

理查德·尼克松（Richard Nixon）担任副总统时，他有一名幕僚，而且规模很小，每年的预算不到 48,000 美元。

When Rockefeller became vice president, he had a staff of over 70 and a budget of two million dollars.

当洛克菲勒担任副总统时，他拥有70多名员工和200万美元的预算。

The office of the vice president began to mirror the office of the president.

副总统办公室开始模仿总统办公室。

The vice president had special assistants on domestic and foreign policy, had a press secretary, had a chief of staff.

副总统有国内和外交政策特别助理、新闻秘书和幕僚长。

Those things may seem just symbolic, but they're not.

这些东西可能看起来只是象征性的，但事实并非如此。

They imply power and they imply authority.

它们意味着权力，也意味着权威。

Whether the vice president then actually exercises power is a whole different story.

副总统是否真正行使权力则完全是另一回事。

Having that new constitutional amendment focused on the vice presidency, both implicitly acknowledging the importance of the vice presidency and also systematizing the nature of the office, I think did underscore for the country that the vice presidency is a thing, that it's not only a contingency, that it is an office that must be filled and that has an important role in the country.

新宪法修正案的重点是副总统职位，既含蓄地承认了副总统职位的重要性，又使该职位的性质系统化，我认为这确实向国家强调了副总统职位是一个东西，它不仅仅是一个偶然事件，它是一个必须填补的职位，并且在国家中发挥着重要作用。

The vice president has been a principle part of presidential decision-making in virtually every administration over the last 50 years.

过去 50 年来，副总统一直是几乎每一届政府总统决策的重要组成部分。

Being vice president gives you opportunities to operate as a governmental official in ways that most high executive officials never experience.

担任副总统让您有机会以大多数高级行政官员从未经历过的方式作为政府官员运作。

To take an office that for most of our history has been lampooned and to turn it into a consequential position is really one of the great modern successes of our system of government.

担任一个在我们历史上大部分时间都受到讽刺的职位并将其转变为一个重要职位，确实是我们政府制度现代的伟大成功之一。

The office that Vice President John Adams occupied at the dawn of American democracy would be largely unrecognizable to him now.

副总统约翰·亚当斯在美国民主初期所担任的职务现在对他来说基本上已经认不出来了。

More than two centuries on, it can no longer credibly be described as "nothing." But the Vice President is still––and always––a heartbeat away from being everything.

两个多世纪过去了，它已经不能再被可信地描述为“什么都没有”。但副总统仍然——并且始终——距离成为一切只有一步之遥。