Tony Horwitz ponders the vice-presidency's long history of irrelevance:
The Constitution … failed to specify the powers and status of vice presidents who assumed the top office. In fact, the second job was such an afterthought that no provision was made for replacing VPs who died or departed before finishing their terms. As a result, the office has been vacant for almost 38 years in the nation’s history. Until recently, no one much cared. [Some] number-twos were alive but absentee, preferring their own homes or pursuits to an inconsequential role in Washington, where most VPs lived in boardinghouses (they had no official residence until the 1970s). Thomas Jefferson regarded his vice presidency as a "tranquil and unoffending station," and spent much of it at Monticello. George Dallas (who called his wife "Mrs. Vice") maintained a lucrative law practice, writing of his official post: "Where is he to go? What has he to do?—no where, nothing." Daniel Tompkins, a drunken embezzler described as a “degraded sot,” paid so little heed to his duties that Congress docked his salary.
They weren't all feckless, though. Take John C. Calhoun, for instance:
In 1824, Calhoun was a political star, and there was an agreement among all the presidential candidates that no matter who won the presidential race, Calhoun would be the vice president. But John Quincy Adams defeated Andrew Jackson in a contested election that was decided in the House of Representatives. Than angered Calhoun, who dedicated much of his first term as vice president to undercutting President Adams. By 1828, Calhoun was on the ticket as Andrew Jackson’s vice president when Jackson easily defeated Adams in a rematch of the 1824 election. Calhoun kept his job as vice president but he soon turned on a second president, as Calhoun fought with Jackson over states’ rights and fiscal issues. After Jackson decided to drop Calhoun from the 1832 ticket, Calhoun became first U.S. vice president to resign from office.
And then there's Andrew Johnson, whom THE VEEP blog hails as the "Original Badass":
On his train’s stop in Liberty, Virginia, a mob rushed up to his car. "Are you Andy Johnson?" a man yelled. "I am," Johnson said. The man shouted, "Then I am going to pull your nose!" He reached out to attack, but Johnson quickly pulled out his revolver and told him sternly, "I am a Union man!" Johnson wasn’t so quick at the draw in Lynchburg, where an unruly mob dragged him out of his train car and proceeded to kick him, spit on him, and slip a rope around his neck for public execution. He only narrowly escaped when an old man interrupted by stating, "His neighbors in Greenville have made arrangements to hang their Senator on his arrival. Virginians have no right to deprive them of that privilege!" He was hanged and shot in effigy everywhere from Knoxville to Memphis…. Despite the raging sentiments against him, Johnson kept his cool. Usually, he placed his revolver on the podium where he was speaking to avoid any trouble.
Horwitz points out that it was during FDR's tenure that the office finally gained some formal clout:
As government rapidly expanded during the Depression, Franklin Roosevelt used "Cactus Jack" Garner, a veteran legislator, as his arm-twister in Congress. During World War II, Roosevelt made his second VP, Henry Wallace, a globe-trotting ambassador and head of wartime procurement. Harry Truman, by contrast, served FDR for only 82 days and wasn’t consulted or prepared for the top job, a deficit he set out to correct as president. His VP, Alben Barkley, joined the National Security Council and cabinet meetings. Truman raised the salary of the office and gave it a seal and flag. Barkley’s tenure also bestowed an enduring nickname on the job. A folksy Kentuckian who disliked the formal "Mr. Vice President," Barkley took his grandson’s suggestion and added two e’s between the title’s initials. Hence "Veep."
The Dish 