Could you merge the positions of Senate Majority Leader + President Pro Tempore?

[Vega]

Seems like doing so would create a bonafide leader of the Senate just like the House of Representatives has the Speaker.

What would the impact of doing this be? Would you see more of a boosting of the unified office rather than now?

[hurricanehink]

Considering our current President Pro Tempore (and 3rd in line to presidency) is 82-year old Orrin Hatch, I am all for this.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

I believe in some State Senates (most notably New York) those position are merged.

If we have Speaker, who's still his/her party leader in the House, in the line of succession, why not have the Majority Leader as well?

[NeverAgain]

We did it in Atlasia. Therefore it would work perfectly in real life.

No, but they really should. PPT holds no purpose except to like be 4th in line for the President. They should either do something with it or get rid of it.

[CatoMinor]

I suppose they like having the flexability to have one person be the de facto leader and allowing someone older to be the honorary "leader" out of respect.

[Vega]

If you were to merge the two, would the combined office just be called President Pro Tempore? Or something else?

[CatoMinor]

Both could be merged and called "Vice President".

I think ideally presidential races would only have the one person on the ballot and whichever party controlled the Senate would elect the Vice President, who would actually have a legitimate purpose and job aside from breaking ties, as the leader of the majority party.

[Associate Justice PiT]

Both could be merged and called "Vice President".

I think ideally presidential races would only have the one person on the ballot and whichever party controlled the Senate would elect the Vice President, who would actually have a legitimate purpose and job aside from breaking ties, as the leader of the majority party.

     The Vice President as is is a fairly pointless position. I would have few qualms about replacing that person with someone who has actual responsibilities.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Both could be merged and called "Vice President".

I think ideally presidential races would only have the one person on the ballot and whichever party controlled the Senate would elect the Vice President, who would actually have a legitimate purpose and job aside from breaking ties, as the leader of the majority party.

There was a time the Vice Presidency was almost universally recognized as a legislative post, which had one huge downside: VPs were isolated from the executive and, when something happened, utterly uninformed.

[politicallefty]

Of course (neither of defined constitutional offices), and I think they should be on account of the President Pro Tempore being in the line of succession just under the Speaker of the House.

[Gary J]

President pro tempore is an office provided for in the Constitution.

Before 1890 the Senate practice was only to name a President pro tempore when the Vice President was absent or that office was vacant. Thereafter the Presidency pro tempore was held continuously, even when the Vice President was actually performing the duties of President of the Senate.

Now, with the President pro tempore having been given additional constitutional functions in connection with the presidential disability provisions of the 25th Amendment, it seems to be required that there always be a President pro tempore.

There would be no constitutional problem about the Majority Leader also being President pro tempore, if the Senate changed its rules and practice to permit the duplication.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

We did it in Atlasia. Therefore it would work perfectly in real life.

I would note that a game doesn't necessarily equate with real life.

As for the game, neither chamber has partisan caucuses in an organized fashion that have lasted so neither has majority/minority leader positions to being with. There have been attempts at different points to create these caucuses but they usually fell by the way side from lack of interest after their primary driving force stepped away or moved on to other things.