A visitor from afar not habituated to our institutions might find it odd that the strongest government on earth, having elected a new national leader, must wait ten weeks before installing him in office, leaving the old chief bereft of political power and perhaps personally repudiated, but nevertheless fully responsible for the nation’s destiny in the interval. This year President Lyndon B. Johnson, who would have risked becoming a “lame duck” in the most classical sense had he sought re-election, took himself out of consideration early. His hope has been to increase his influence over events by putting himself above the campaign battle, freeing himself from fear of Election Day consequences, and eliminating suspicion of selfish political motives. It remains to be seen whether this lofty effort will be judged a success; but the complaints over his late Supreme Court appointments have already added to the generally contentious history of lame-duckery.
Among the many blessings the American people derive from our venerable constitutional arrangements, the lame-duck phenomenon stands out as a curious and possibly dangerous exception. By way of contrast, consider the British practice. If a parliamentary election changes the majority party in the House of Commons, the Prime Minister’s resignation is in the sovereign’s hands in a matter of hours, and within a week the leader of the new majority will be installed as Prime Minister and functioning with a cabinet of his own choice. A dramatic example occurred in 1946 during the Potsdam Conference. On July 25, Winston Churchill left the conference to go home for an election—which, to his surprise, the Tories lost. On July 28, Clement Attlee, leader of the new Labor majority, fully invested with authority, had already taken Churchill’s place at Potsdam. The parliamentary system is not guaranteed trouble-free, as the history of France and Italy attests, but when it is working in conjunction with a party and electoral system that produces a strong majority, it manages changes of governments with remarkable facility.
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