Some pundits have referred to Vice President Kamala Harris presiding over the certification on Monday of her own defeat in the race for president in 2024 as awkward or difficult.
But, while the task might not be pleasant, this is not an accurate description. Her position was hardly unique in American history. A better description for it would be a glorious manifestation of America’s strength and its trust in institutions and laws rather than personalities.
Long may it continue as an American tradition.
The peaceful transfer of power should never be taken for granted nor treated lightly. It was severely tarnished four years ago as a mob entered the Capitol and tried to disrupt the proceedings of Joe Biden’s certification as the winner of the 2020 election. That displayed how fragile it is.
The nation owes a debt of gratitude to then-Vice President Mike Pence, who calmly carried on with that certification, even though the building had just been cleared of angry protesters, some of whom had chanted that he should be hanged.
That decision was not awkward. It was courageous.
In a speech in 2021, Pence said some in his own party suggested “that I possessed the authority to reject or return electoral votes certified by the states.”
“But the Constitution provides the vice president with no such authority before the joint session of Congress,” he said. “And the truth is, there’s almost no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American president. The presidency belongs to the American people and the American people alone.”
Various members of Congress had objected to election results in previous elections. Vice President Al Gore had ruled as “out of order” objections from some members of his own party to the contested count in Florida in 2000. But none of these had previously been made under the threat of mob violence.
Since 2020, the Electoral Count Act has been changed to require one-fifth of Congress, not just one member, to raise objections to election results. But that wasn’t necessary on Monday. We hope it never will be again.
George Washington deserves credit for establishing the peaceful transfer of power as a part of the American tradition. While he wasn’t on the ballot in 1796, Washington had decided to voluntarily step aside after two terms as chief executive, a notion virtually unheard of at the time.
The American painter Benjamin West told America’s minister to Great Britain of Britain’s King George III’s reaction to Washington’s decision. He said the king told him this decision “placed (Washington) in a light the most distinguished of any man living, and that he thought him the greatest character of the age.”
That magnanimous decision has since become a key part of America’s greatness in the world.
American politicians have, at times, struggled with this notion of placing country above self-interest. Even in the most recent election, some candidates for lesser offices have refused to concede.
We hope this never becomes commonplace. As we have said before, without trust in elections, democracy is in peril.
In a video message before Monday’s certification, Harris said her duty to preside over the electoral count on Monday was “a sacred obligation” and one she will “uphold guided by love of country, loyalty to our Constitution, and my unwavering faith in the American people.”
She should be applauded for doing so, and Americans should be grateful to Mike Pence for ensuring that her act was not reinstating a tradition, but carrying it on in an unbroken line to the earliest days of the republic.