Presidential Succession

[Peter]

The question essentially boils down to:

Is it possible to be an Officer of one of the Houses of the United States Congress (see Article I, Section 2, Clause 5 and Section 3, Clause 5) without being an Officer of the United States (Article II, Section 1, Clause 6 and Article I, Section 6, Clause 2). As if to add to the confusion, the Framers also gave us yet another type of officer:

The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors. - Article II, Section 4

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office. - Article I, Section 6, Clause 2

Quite what the distinction (if any) is between a "civil Officer[] of the United States" and an "Officer of the United States" is totally unclear. Since it is generally recognised that legislators are not liable to impeachment, they are thusly not "civil Officers"; This view is re-inforced by the fact that the Constitution specifically makes provision for getting rid of naughty legislators in Article I, Section 5, Clause 2, especially in regard of the Senate with the two-thirds requirement being identical. The interpretation that legislators are not civil Officers is yet more re-inforced by the fact that they cannot be appointed to "civil Office<s>", which is contradictory if we were to suppose that the Speakership were a civil Office - it clearly cannot be.

Yet the fact is that the phrase "civil Officer [...]" and "Officer [...]" are used in the same clause no less. No word in the text is worthy of less weight than any other, and thus I must conclude that a civil Officer and an Officer are different things. Given that a civil Officer expressly cannot have a legislator amongst its ranks, then I certainly see constitutional possibility that the Officers might have them amongst their ranks.

In conclusion, I would have to say that it is constitutional.