Election Day is nearly upon us, but the only Michigan politician who reached the highest levels of the Executive Branch never got voted into that seat. Most historians focus on Gerald Ford’s eventual path to the presidency, but since we’re nearly a half-century removed from the process that quickly installed him as vice president, we’re looking back at how a Michigan Congressman found himself the #2 person behind America’s only president to resign the office.
Vice President Spiro Agnew resigned from office in October 1973, clearing the way for Gerald R. Ford to be confirmed as veep by Congress in early December. He would become President just nine months later, following the resignation of Richard Nixon. Ford began September with a Traverse City connection. “TC girl wins state rodeo queen crown” read a headline from September 6th, reporting on Rondi Sue Wuerfel’s victory. “A succession of honors and awards culminated in the crown of Michigan Rodeo Queen to add to her collection of about 150 trophies,” the Traverse City Record-Eagle reported. “The event was a highlight of last weekend’s rodeo in Sparta.”
Ford was on hand for the event and “crowned the brown-eyed queen mounted on her Arabian gelding, Lil Zar.” Wuerfel was then qualified to compete for Miss Rodeo USA in Albuquerque, and eight weeks later, Ford would be Vice President.
A few weeks later, Ford was urging Congress to adopt Agnew’s late-breaking request to be tried by Congress itself instead of in the court over allegations of corruption and bribery. ““The vice president is being tried in the news media due to the many leaks concerning the charges ataings time,” The Record-Eagle quoted Ford as saying. “It would seem impossible that he could get a fair hearing in the courts under the circumstances. I therefore think the House should grant his request for a full investigation of the charges against him.” They didn’t, and Agnew eventually pled no contest to the charge against him.
On the day Ford was nominated to take the Vice Presidency, the local paper headlined their October 12 edition with a man-on-the-street piece discussing Agnew’s plea deal and resignation with TC residents. One woman who was interviewed, Marion Smith (described simply as “a housewife”) was particularly prescient when she said, “Personally, I think Nixon has got away with more than Agnew.” That day’s reporting barely mentioned Ford as a potential VP pick, focusing instead on the chatter that former Democrat John Connelly would most likely be named to the position.
When news broke of Ford’s nomination that night, the local response on the next day’s editorial page was more than favorable. “[Nixon]’s choice of Rep. Gerald Ford of Michigan, Republican leader of the House, seems to us an excellent one,” wrote the Record-Eagle. “The disclosure to the nation Friday night … brought quick and favorable response from leaders of both parties,” foreshadowing history’s view of the unity candidate who would decree America’s “long national nightmare” to be over less than a year later.
Jockeying for Ford’s seat in Congress was immediate as well. Two Republican state senators, Robert VanderLaan and Milton Zaagman, were immediately deemed the top candidates, with one unnamed political insider quoted as saying “[VanderLaan] wants the job so bad he can taste it…he’s been waiting for years as the accepted heir-apparent.”
In what The New York Times described as “the political bombshell of the year,” it was another “Vander” who eventually took the seat: Richard Vander Veen. Ford’s former district had delivered more than 60 percent of the vote to the Republican candidate, making it a shock when a Democrat took it over following Ford’s ascension. Vander Veen was the first candidate to run on a platform of demanding Nixon’s resignation, and went on to beat the previously named state senator in…
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