I don't think there is a pure situation, although I may have something of an outrageous, mostly hypothetical response. When the Nazis gained control of Germany, they were the best organized minority in the Reichstag, the German parliament.

A weakness of the German system of the time was the ability to give emergency powers to the head of state using Emergency Decrees of Article 48 of their Constitution. The head of state and President, Hindenburg, then delegated his authority to Hitler as chancellor (head of government). Hitler then consolidated the roles of head of state and head of government as Fuehrer.

It may be that a constitutional monarchy, where the head of state has little or no operational authority other than to accept or reject a government may be such a check and balance. Note that in 1943, Mussolini ignored the vote against him of the Fascist Grand Council, but lost authority when King Victor Emmanuel stripped him of office. Of course, the Fascist political system had to accept his arrest, but I would not dismiss the role of the monarch as ultimate guarantor of rights in several European and Asian nations. In Thailand, for example, while there certainly have been military coups, the Monarch remains a symbol of national unity beyond criticism and with tremendous moral authority. To varying extents, the Danish and Belgian monarchs are seen as an ultimate safeguard against authoritarianism.

I recognize this is a bit provocative, but may serve as a basis for an interesting discussion.

--

Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]

For a rapidly changing country, such as the US was 200 years ago, the stability of the political system was no doubt extremely valuable. In an established democracy, such as the US is today, a more flexible political system could be a good thing. Also, four years now is a lot longer time than it used to be a few centuries back.

Hmm, interesting points.

Anyone thought of presidential recall election as a possibility in the US?

Well that's actually where I was going with this post, but I didn't get there until the very end of a whole lot of writing.  Actually, you could probably replace the whole post with just that sentence :-)

And BTW, I don't think recall elections can be abused so easily. Even if a recall was easy to trigger (which it shouldn't be), a majority of the voters still has to vote for the recall. There is no way a truly popular president could be recalled.

Just googling some grist for the mill...

The Constitution, then, spells out four paths for an amendment:

• Proposal by convention of states, ratification by state conventions (never used)
• Proposal by convention of states, ratification by state legislatures (never used)
• Proposal by Congress, ratification by state conventions (used once)
• Proposal by Congress, ratification by state legislatures (used all other times)

And here's an excellent overview of recall procedures at the state level.

And, not that I'm a fan of the leadership in Venezuela, but...

Article 72 of the 1999 Constitution of Venezuela enables a recall of any elected representative, including the president, and has been used in the Venezuelan recall referendum, 2004:

Article 72: All [...] offices filled by popular vote are subject to revocation.Once one-half of the term of office to which an official has been elected has elapsed, a number of voters representing at least 20% of the registered voters in the affected constituency may petition for the calling of a referendum to revoke that official's mandate.When a number of voters equal to or greater than the number of those who elected the official vote in favour of the recall, provided that a number of voters equal to or greater than 25% of the total number of registered voters vote in the recall referendum, the official's mandate shall be deemed revoked and immediate action shall be taken to fill the permanent vacancy as provided for by this Constitution and by law.

Here's a description of options at the state level:

The recall election is generally conducted in one of two ways. In some states, the recall election is held simultaneously with an election for the official's successor. In others, the recall ballot simply asks voters if the official in question should be recalled, and if a majority of voters vote "yes," the office is declared vacant.

In the six states where the election for a successor is held simultaneously with the recall election, the election is handled in two ways. In California and Colorado, the first question on the ballot is whether the official should be recalled. Voters are then asked to vote for a candidate for the office; the official who is the subject of the recall may not be listed among these candidates candidate. In the other states using the simultaneous model, the submission and certification of the recall petition essentially triggers a special election for the office, and the recall ballot consists of a list of candidates for the office. The name of the official who is the subject of the recall may appear on the ballot along with other nominees. In fact, in Arizona and Wisconsin, the name of the official being recalled is automatically placed on the recall ballot for reelection.

In the remaining 12 states, the recall ballot contains only the question of whether or not the official should be recalled. If the majority vote is "yes" for recall, the office is declared vacant and is filled at a special election or as otherwise provided by law, which in some states is by appointment for the remainder of the term. The chart below details how the recall election is conducted in each state.

I like the idea of a special election of some sort, rather than an appointment, or the next in line automatically filling the seat. I figure the VP would have the advantage of sorta-kinda-incumbency if he wanted to throw his hat into the ring... as long as the public didn't hate him too. If the public *did* hate him though (just speaking hypothetically, of course), then they could vote somebody else in.