The Presidential Void Moon: The Final Word! :)

Void Moons are somewhat controversial. I think it is because their meaning has not been properly dragged out of medieval astrology and put into a modern context. So they come across as fated events – or non-events – with little psychological explanation behind them, neither of which suit our modern tastes. I’m not going to try to drag the Void Moon idea up to date here. I’m just going to say a bit more about US Presidents being inaugurated under a Void Moon.


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Lynn posted a piece last week which she promised would be her final look at the Presidential Void Moon. Does this mean I get the last word? Anyway, she quoted research done by Rodney Smith, showing that an inaugural Void Moon has no noticeable effect on whether a President completes his term.

His premise, however, is that VOC (Void of Course) Moon is a medieval concept, and since they did not then have the outer planets, we should not use them when considering whether the Moon is VOC. Now I don’t know medieval astrology, but we have plenty of astrological concepts that go back to then and beyond. Such as the Ascendant. But we don’t say Oh no, the Ascendant is a medieval concept, and they didn’t have outer planets then, so we can’t consider it in conjunction to Pluto, for example.

And the same in my mind goes for the VOC. It would be inconsistent not to consider the outer planets. In my previous post I just looked at Presidents over the last 100 years. I thought I’d better do the lot.

There have been 64 Inaugurations. 9 of those did not complete their term. That is 14%.

There have been 9 inaugurations under VOC (excluding Obama). 3 of those did not complete their term. That is 33%.

The number of VOCs is probably too small to be statistically significant. But the numbers so far point towards there being something in it, rather than there not being something in it.

We can broaden the meaning of the VOC to include a major disruption of the Presidency like debilitating health, impeachment or something that threatens to disrupt like a serious assassination attempt i.e. one that could have worked. (This is Void Moon also, but not in a deterministic, ‘has-to-happen’ sense).

What we find then is that out of 64 Inaugurations, 18 corresponded to this broader definition i.e. 28%

Out of those inaugurated on a VOC, there were 7 correspondences, giving us 78%.

This is still a small sample size, but it’s starting to look quite significant to me.

This is my list of VOC inaugurations (where there are private and public inaugurations, I choose the public).

James Polk – debilitating health
Andrew Jackson – assassination attempt
James Monroe – nothing
Tyler – nothing
Roosevelt – died
Kennedy – died
Nixon – resigned
Ford - assassination attempt
Clinton – impeached

The non VOC Presidents who meet the criteria are:

Died in office: Harrison, Taylor, Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Harding
Impeached: Johnson
Debilitating health: Wilson and Arthur
Credible Assassination attempts: Reagan, Truman

So I tend to come down on the side of there being something in the idea of VOC in mundane astrology. And in the case of Obama, I think there is therefore a fair chance that there will be a disruption, or a serious attempt to disrupt, his current term as President.