What formal steps has Congress taken historically when a significant number of lawmakers demand a president’s resignation?
Executive summary
When large numbers of lawmakers call for a president’s resignation, Congress has two formal constitutional tools that matter: resignation itself is a private, written act by the president that must be delivered to the Secretary of State (not a congressional decision) [1], and Congress has doctrinally backed mechanisms for filling a vacancy or removing a president—principally the Twenty-Fifth Amendment’s succession and disability procedures and the impeachment-removal power described in the Constitution and by congressional analysis [2] [3].
1. Resignation is a unilateral, written act — not imposed by Congress
The law treating presidential resignation is bluntly simple: the only legally effective evidence of a president’s resignation is an instrument in writing, signed by the president and delivered to the Secretary of State (3 U.S.C. § 20) [1]. That statutory rule means Congress cannot, by vote or resolution, technically “force” a resignation; resignation as a legal fact occurs when the president executes and transmits the written instrument specified by statute [1].
2. Congress’s formal alternative: impeachment and removal
Congress’s clearest constitutional counterweight to an unwilling president is the impeachment power — removal following conviction by the Senate — a mechanism the Twenty-Fifth Amendment summary materials explicitly contrast with resignation as a pathway by which a presidency ends and the vice president succeeds [3]. The Twenty-Fifth Amendment and constitutional commentary frame removal by impeachment as a distinct, congressional-driven route to vacancy: if a president is removed following impeachment, succession rules apply and the vice president becomes president [3].
3. The Twenty‑Fifth Amendment institutionalized succession and congressional roles
Congress proposed the Twenty‑Fifth Amendment and the states ratified it to clarify succession and processes for presidential inability; Section 1 confirms that the vice president becomes president upon removal, death, or resignation, while Section 2 requires congressional confirmation of a presidential nominee for vice president should that office become vacant [2] [3]. The amendment also created procedures — including a role for the vice president, Cabinet, and ultimately congressional actors in disputes over presidential incapacity — that Congress and the executive have used and debated since ratification [4] [5].
4. How history has combined political pressure, constitutionality, and process
The most consequential modern instance where congressional pressure, criminal exposure, and the formal succession system intersected was the Watergate era: the resignation of President Nixon followed intense congressional investigation and looming impeachment considerations, and Congress’s institutional design under the Twenty‑Fifth Amendment and statutory succession then played out when Gerald Ford became vice president and later president, illustrating how resignation, vice‑presidential appointment, and congressional confirmation operate in sequence [4] [5]. That episode underscores that while Congress can create pressure through investigations and impeachment proceedings, the formal transfer of power after resignation follows constitutional and statutory succession rules [4].
5. Political demands versus legal mechanisms — what Congress actually does
When significant numbers of lawmakers demand resignation, their tools fall into two categories in the record: political instruments (public resolutions, calls from committees, and petitions organized outside Congress) and formal constitutional/legislative instruments (initiating impeachment, conducting oversight investigations, or confirming a vice‑presidential nominee after a vacancy) [6] [3]. Sources provided do not catalogue every incident of non‑binding congressional demands; advocacy campaigns and public petitions demonstrate political mobilization but do not change the legal mechanics that require a written resignation, impeachment removal, or invocation of succession and disability rules [6] [1] [3].
6. Limits of the congressional role and open questions
Congress’s formal leverage is therefore conditional: it can investigate, impeach, hold hearings that increase pressure, and — through statutory and constitutional mechanisms — fill an executive vacancy, but it cannot substitute its voice for the statutorily required signed resignation nor unilaterally declare a president resigned; removal short of voluntary resignation requires impeachment conviction or an invoked Twenty‑Fifth Amendment transfer, matters governed by constitutional text and legislative procedures [1] [2] [3]. The sources consulted document these formal paths and historical application (notably Watergate) but do not provide a comprehensive list of every time congressional demand led to resignation through political pressure alone, a gap in the available reporting [4] [6].