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In 1968 after the Democrat Convention in Chicago, Lyndon Johnson faced the possibility that the election might not be held in a state of domestic tranquility. His greatest fear was that the antiwar movement and the Black Panthers would unite to bury the election in violence. Johnson asked the lawyers of the National Security Council for a menu of options. Remember that Johnson was a schoolteacher before entering politics, not an attorney.

The NSC attorneys reported that state legislatures could choose presidential electors, and no popular vote was required by the Constitution. Election of senators and representatives was another matter. A lot of the procedure of presidential elections is hard-coded in legislation and even the Constitution itself.

One of the options was the annulment of the Constitution and a declaration of martial law, something even Lincoln had not dared. Annulment would permit Johnson to remain president until domestic tranquility was restored and the mechanics of a presidential election could go forward in peace.

Johnson knew he was not trusted anymore by the electorate, so he asked the NSC lawyers if getting Chief Justice Earl Warren to cosign would make a difference. The lawyers responded that Warren's signature would have no legal effect but might be useful for political cover.

The final finding remained secret until after Nixon's resignation when the Post and the Times reported the story under the category "White House Horrors." Fortunately, the antiwar movement and Black Panthers could not organize.

One of the findings covered what would happen if the military encountered organized resistance. This involved use of camps for which land had been purchased under the provisions of the McCarran Act of 1950 but for which only one camp had been built, that in a remote section of the Pennsylvania mountains. Its existence was a secret until Robert Mardian, one of Nixon's people, revealed it in congressional testimony in 1971.

I bring this up only because during the Rodney King insurrection in South Central Los Angeles, when the military arrived on the scene, a 48 hour clock started to tick. Had organized resistance appeared and continued for 48 hours, FEMA camps would have been put on alert to receive the inhabitants of that section of the city. Fortunately, once the Army arrived, everybody decided to behave. The things to remember is that contingency plans have been prepared since 1968 to handle multiple insurrections should they occur.