Kurt Godel Found Dictatorship Loophole

In 1947, Austrian-American logician Kurt Godel prepared for his US citizenship exam and claimed he had found an inconsistency in the US Constitution that could allow the country to become a dictatorship. Albert Einstein and economist Oskar Morgenstern accompanied him to the hearing as witnesses and worried that he might derail his own application by explaining it. When Judge Phillip Forman asked whether a Nazi-style dictatorship could happen in America, Godel began to explain the loophole, but the judge cut him off and moved the hearing to a routine conclusion.

Previous Fact Next Fact