No. of Recommendations: 2
Oh - and plus, I think the judge got it right.
The Appointments Clause of the Constitution says:
and [the President] shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.
....and the Disqualification Clause says:
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.
Reading them together, "offices" of the United States are the positions that the President appoints people to - either directly, or that are appointed to those offices by his appointees. A Senator is not an officer of the United States. Neither is a Representative. Neither is an Elector, since those are given their offices by State processes.
Which is why the DQ clause reads the way it does. It separately enumerates Senator, Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President distinctly from "any office, civil or military, under the United States" - because the drafters of the DQ Clause knew that the term "any office, civil or military" didn't apply to those positions. A Senator doesn't hold an office under the United States, because they weren't appointed by the President. A U.S. Rep. doesn't hold an office under the United States for the same reason, and so too the electors. Which is why they had to be listed separately from the "any office" description.
The President similarly doesn't hold "any office, civil or military, under the United States." Nor the Vice-President. Since those are elected, not appointed, positions they don't fall within that term.
