Case problem with 'whoever/whomever'

I'm a native speaker and the other day it suddenly dawned on me that I couldn't work out which would be correct out of the following examples:

'You should ask whoever is responsible'

'You should ask whomever is responsible''

Of course it isn't much of an issue normally as the 'who/whom' distinction is increasingly redundant. But if you really want to be grammatically correct, which IS gramatically correct?

The problem I see is that the 'who/whomever' functions as both subject and object. You are asking the person so they are the object, but you are saying the person is responsible, so they are are also the subject simultaneously, all within the space of one sentence. So they become the object of the verb, but a finite verb is also linked to them.

I know that if you said something like 'You should speak to who requested it', it couldn't be replaced by 'whom', but here you can see it should really be 'You should speak to THE PERSON who requested it', so it's a bit different.

Having learnt German, with its greater use of cases, this especially interests me. This could never happen in German, as it would always use some kind of subordinate clause, with both an object and subject form.

What do you think?

"'You should ask whoever is responsible" is correct because "whoever" is the subject of the clause "whoever is responsible". You would only use "whomever" if it were the object of the clause, as it would be in this sentence: "You should ask whomever you want."

I think you're probably right, but still it leaves the issue of the 'You should ask' dangling without any kind of real object.

Presuming that you want to maintain the case distinction, I think the correct form would be "whomever", because it's definitely the object of the verb "ask". The fact that it's also the subject of another clause doesn't matter. dictionary.com defines "whoever" in part as "whatever person; anyone that", so consider it equivalent to "You should ask anyone [obj.] that is responsible."

http://www.grammarbook.com/grammar/whoever.asp

Fair enough.

In spoken language I always use "who/whoever" but whenever writing I try to use "whom/whomever." It always sounds weird to me when spoken... Like the speaker is trying too hard. I'm sure formal situations (like, for example, meeting Her Royal Highness) would require the objective case, but aside from that...

"I'm a native speaker and the other day it suddenly dawned on me that I couldn't work out which would be correct out of the following examples:

'You should ask whoever is responsible'

'You should ask whomever is responsible'''

That you couldn't work it out is just another indication of how weak the whole who/whom distinction has become in English.

(This was in no way meant to criticize you but rather to point out the obvious: whom is withering away.)

whomever

You've got a point, Amabo. If the distinction were really resilient, we'd all know the correct answer intuitively.

<it suddenly dawned on me that I couldn't work out which would be correct>

One test is to replace the pronoun with "the person who(m)", e.g.

1. You should ask whoever is responsible =
2. You should ask the person who is responsible.

and not

3. You should ask the person whom is responsible.

Thus "whoever" is the correct choice.

<I think you're probably right, but still it leaves the issue of the 'You should ask' dangling without any kind of real object.>

The object of "ask" is the clause "whoever is responsible".

(If "whomever" were the correct choice, we would then be left with the problem of "is" dangling without any kind of real subject, and no grammatical solution.)

Best wishes,

MrP

I see that this issue has been taken up by Language Log: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=16 . Zwicky;s posts support the idea that it's not simply "who(m)ever", but rather the whole phrase, that would be the object of the verb in Guest #1's example. Therefore, "You should ask whoever is responsible."

Agh, typos:

<Zwicky's post supports>