Vice President of the United States the Twenty-fifth Amendment established a procedure for filling such a vacancy: This procedure has been implemented twice since the amendment came into force. The first instance occurred in 1973 following the October 10 resignation of Spiro Agnew, when Gerald Ford was nominated by President Richard Nixon and confirmed by Congress. The second occurred 10 months later following Ford's August 9, 1974 accession to the presidency upon Nixon's resignation, when Nelson Rockefeller was nominated by President Ford and confirmed by Congress. Had it not been for this new constitutional mechanism, the vice presidency would have remained vacant after Agnew's resignation and
Spiro Agnew France as a replacement officer. After briefly serving as a rifle platoon leader, Agnew commanded the battalion's service company. The battalion became part of 10th Armored Combat Command "B", which saw action in the Battle of the Bulge, including the siege of Bastogne – in all, "thirty-nine days in the hole of the doughnut", as one of Agnew's men put it. Thereafter, the 54th battalion fought its way into Germany, seeing action at Mannheim, Heidelberg and Crailsheim, before reaching Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria as the war concluded. Agnew returned home for discharge in November 1945, having been awarded the Combat Infantryman