Were women eligible before 1920 to serve as prez/VP?

[Sir Mohamed]

Were women constitutionally eligible to be elected prez or VP before they got the right to vote in 1920? (I know some states adopted women's suffrage before 1920). But was a woman eligible to appear on presidential ballots? The Constitution only provides for someone to be a natural-born citizen, 35 years of age and 14 years of US residence. It doesn't say women can't be elected for some reason. But it's actually weirs someone can be prez without having the right to vote.

[Fuzzy Bear]

Yes.

Women did have the right to vote in some states prior to the 19th Amendment.  Wyoming gave women full voting rights.  Kentucky and Kansas gave widows with school-age children the right to vote in school elections. 

There is no reason the Electoral College could not choose a person convicted of a felony as President today.  Eugene Debs would have served as President if the EC had picked him. 

The Kentucky Legislature elected Henry Clay to the Senate even though he was 29 years old, under the age of 30.  It would be interesting if AOC were elected VP at 32.

[Anna Komnene]

Belva Lockwood ran for president in 1884 and she was on the ballot in at least 6 states. While the votes weren't officially counted for her at the time, she submitted a petition to congress that had the exact numbers that she received. She also claimed that in NY her votes weren't just not counted but counted instead for Grover Cleveland. If that's the case, he wouldn't have won the election without fraudulently counting her votes for himself.

NH: 379
NY: 1336
MI: 374
IL: 1008
MD: 318
CA: 734

Source: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23154072?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

[brucejoel99]

The Kentucky Legislature elected Henry Clay to the Senate even though he was 29 years old, under the age of 30.  It would be interesting if AOC were elected VP at 32.

Well, Clay's ineligibility when he was first elected to the Senate wasn't overlooked (& unconstitutionally so, I might add) so much as nobody knew of Clay's age, not to mention that during that period Clay's right to a seat in the Senate was never even challenged, let alone did the question even arise at all.

Thus, it's erroneous to assume that, b/c Clay was first elected to (& sat in) the Senate when he was under age, a precedent has been established under which we can reasonably act in the future, not least due to the fact that a newer, more relevant precedent has already been set since the days of Clay: in November 1934, at age 29, Rush Holt Sr. was elected to the Senate, but he didn't take his seat until after his 30th birthday in June 1935.

So, if AOC were (somehow) elected VP in 2020, she'd definitely be prohibited from taking office until her 35th birthday, nearly at the end of the term in 2024.

[Del Tachi]

The Kentucky Legislature elected Henry Clay to the Senate even though he was 29 years old, under the age of 30.  It would be interesting if AOC were elected VP at 32.

Well, Clay's ineligibility when he was first elected to the Senate wasn't overlooked (& unconstitutionally so, I might add) so much as nobody knew of Clay's age, not to mention that during that period Clay's right to a seat in the Senate was never even challenged, let alone did the question even arise at all.

Thus, it's erroneous to assume that, b/c Clay was first elected to (& sat in) the Senate when he was under age, a precedent has been established under which we can reasonably act in the future, not least due to the fact that a newer, more relevant precedent has already been set since the days of Clay: in November 1934, at age 29, Rush Holt Sr. was elected to the Senate, but he didn't take his seat until after his 30th birthday in June 1935.

So, if AOC were (somehow) elected VP in 2020, she'd definitely be prohibited from taking office until her 35th birthday, nearly at the end of the term in 2024.

It's happened more recently.  Joe Biden (born November 1942) was 29 when elected to the Senate but turned 30 before he was sworn in on January 5.  The Constitution is explicit that the House and Senate are the judges of their respective members' qualifications, so I think as long as the member was in the majority party, there'd be nothing to stop the seating of an underage member of Congress.

[brucejoel99]

The Kentucky Legislature elected Henry Clay to the Senate even though he was 29 years old, under the age of 30.  It would be interesting if AOC were elected VP at 32.

Well, Clay's ineligibility when he was first elected to the Senate wasn't overlooked (& unconstitutionally so, I might add) so much as nobody knew of Clay's age, not to mention that during that period Clay's right to a seat in the Senate was never even challenged, let alone did the question even arise at all.

Thus, it's erroneous to assume that, b/c Clay was first elected to (& sat in) the Senate when he was under age, a precedent has been established under which we can reasonably act in the future, not least due to the fact that a newer, more relevant precedent has already been set since the days of Clay: in November 1934, at age 29, Rush Holt Sr. was elected to the Senate, but he didn't take his seat until after his 30th birthday in June 1935.

So, if AOC were (somehow) elected VP in 2020, she'd definitely be prohibited from taking office until her 35th birthday, nearly at the end of the term in 2024.

It's happened more recently.  Joe Biden (born November 1942) was 29 when elected to the Senate but turned 30 before he was sworn in on January 5.  The Constitution is explicit that the House and Senate are the judges of their respective members' qualifications, so I think as long as the member was in the majority party, there'd be nothing to stop the seating of an underage member of Congress.

That's different, though, in that Biden wasn't underage when the term began, so he was fully eligible. If it came to it, as 1934 shows, Congress (even as the judge of its own qualifications) won't seat an underage elected-member 'til they're eligible.

[Orser67]

Nothing in the Constitution says they can't/couldn't. But it would have been interesting to see what the Supreme Court would have done. The fact that nothing in the Constitution says that African-Americans couldn't be citizens didn't stop the Supreme Court from ruling in Dred Scott that black people couldn't be citizens.