Generated summaryHamilton defends the presidency against inflated fears of monarchy, showing its powers are limited, its method of selection sound, and its structure, a single officer serving a renewable four-year term, built for energy and accountability rather than royal grandeur.
Federalist 67
Generated summaryOpponents dress the President in royal trappings to frighten the people. Their boldest charge, that he could fill Senate vacancies, is plainly false: the Constitution gives that power to the State executives. The charge is deliberate deception, not honest error.Key points
The proposed Executive has been attacked with least candor, caricatured as a monarch by opponents exploiting the people’s hatred of kings.
His real powers scarcely exceed a New York governor’s, yet they are inflated into royal prerogatives, crown and purple.
As a sample of the fraud, one writer falsely ascribes to the President the power to fill casual Senate vacancies.
The clauses refute it, granting that power expressly to the State executives, not the President.
So gross an error could only have sprung from a deliberate intent to deceive the people.
The executive comes next. Perhaps no part has been attacked with less candor or judged with less care. Here the writers against the Constitution show their talent for misrepresentation. They count on the people’s hatred of monarchy, so they treat the President as the full-grown offspring of that detested parent, drawing even on fiction. Powers in few cases greater, in some less, than a governor of New York’s they have magnified into more than royal prerogatives.
OriginalTHE constitution of the executive department of the proposed government, claims next our attention. There is hardly any part of the system which could have been attended with greater difficulty in the arrangement of it than this; and there is, perhaps, none which has been inveighed against with less candor or criticised with less judgment. Here the writers against the Constitution seem to have taken pains to signalize their talent of misrepresentation.
Calculating upon the aversion of the people to monarchy, they have endeavored to enlist all their jealousies and apprehensions in opposition to the intended President of the United States; not merely as the embryo, but as the full-grown progeny, of that detested parent. To establish the pretended affinity, they have not scrupled to draw resources even from the regions of fiction. The authorities of a magistrate, in few instances greater, in some instances less, than those of a governor of New York, have been magnified into more than royal prerogatives. He has been decorated with attributes superior in dignity and splendor to those of a king of Great Britain. He has been shown to us with the diadem sparkling on his brow and the imperial purple flowing in his train. He has been seated on a throne surrounded with minions and mistresses, giving audience to the envoys of foreign potentates, in all the supercilious pomp of majesty. The images of Asiatic despotism and voluptuousness have scarcely been wanting to crown the exaggerated scene. We have been taught to tremble at the terrific visages of murdering janizaries, and to blush at the unveiled mysteries of a future seraglio.
Such attempts to transform the office make its real nature worth fixing, and the counterfeits worth exposing. The devices used to corrupt public opinion here are as weak as they are wicked. They far exceed the usual license of party trickery. To pretend a likeness between a king of Great Britain and a magistrate like the President is deliberate fraud.
OriginalAttempts so extravagant as these to disfigure or, it might rather be said, to metamorphose the object, render it necessary to take an accurate view of its real nature and form: in order as well to ascertain its true aspect and genuine appearance, as to unmask the disingenuity and expose the fallacy of the counterfeit resemblances which have been so insidiously, as well as industriously, propagated.
In the execution of this task, there is no man who would not find it an arduous effort either to behold with moderation, or to treat with seriousness, the devices, not less weak than wicked, which have been contrived to pervert the public opinion in relation to the subject. They so far exceed the usual though unjustifiable licenses of party artifice, that even in a disposition the most candid and tolerant, they must force the sentiments which favor an indulgent construction of the conduct of political adversaries to give place to a voluntary and unreserved indignation. It is impossible not to bestow the imputation of deliberate imposture and deception upon the gross pretense of a similitude between a king of Great Britain and a magistrate of the character marked out for that of the President of the United States. It is still more impossible to withhold that imputation from the rash and barefaced expedients which have been employed to give success to the attempted imposition.
Take one instance as a sample. A writer applauded by his party assigns the President a power the Constitution expressly gives the State executives. I mean filling chance vacancies in the Senate. On that false suggestion he has built a train of equally false observations. Let him face the evidence and justify the outrage if he can.
OriginalIn one instance, which I cite as a sample of the general spirit, the temerity has proceeded so far as to ascribe to the President of the United States a power which by the instrument reported is EXPRESSLY allotted to the Executives of the individual States. I mean the power of filling casual vacancies in the Senate. This bold experiment upon the discernment of his countrymen has been hazarded by a writer who (whatever may be his real merit) has had no inconsiderable share in the applauses of his party; and who, upon this false and unfounded suggestion, has built a series of observations equally false and unfounded. Let him now be confronted with the evidence of the fact, and let him, if he be able, justify or extenuate the shameful outrage he has offered to the dictates of truth and to the rules of fair dealing.
The second clause of the second section of the second article lets the President nominate officers and appoint them with the Senate’s advice and consent. It reaches only those “not in the Constitution otherwise provided for” and to be “established by law.” The next clause lets him fill vacancies that happen in the Senate’s recess, by commissions expiring at its next session. From this last the alleged power over Senate vacancies is drawn. The connection of the clauses and the plain words make that deduction not even plausible. The first clause cannot reach senators, whom the Constitution itself provides for and establishes.
OriginalThe second clause of the second section of the second article empowers the President of the United States "to nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other OFFICERS of United States whose appointments are NOT in the Constitution OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR, and WHICH SHALL BE ESTABLISHED BY LAW." Immediately after this clause follows another in these words: "The President shall have power to fill up all VACANCIES that may happen DURING THE RECESS OF THE SENATE, by granting commissions which shall EXPIRE AT THE END OF THEIR NEXT SESSION." It is from this last provision that the pretended power of the President to fill vacancies in the Senate has been deduced. A slight attention to the connection of the clauses, and to the obvious meaning of the terms, will satisfy us that the deduction is not even colorable.
The first of these two clauses, it is clear, only provides a mode for appointing such officers, "whose appointments are NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR in the Constitution, and which SHALL BE ESTABLISHED BY LAW"; of course it cannot extend to the appointments of senators, whose appointments are OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR in the Constitution, and who are ESTABLISHED BY THE CONSTITUTION, and will not require a future establishment by law. This position will hardly be contested.
Nor can the last clause reach Senate vacancies. First, it merely supplements the general appointment clause. The ordinary power belongs to the President and Senate jointly, so it works only while the Senate sits. It would be improper to keep that body always in session. Vacancies in its recess may need filling at once. So the clause lets the President alone make temporary appointments.
OriginalThe last of these two clauses, it is equally clear, cannot be understood to comprehend the power of filling vacancies in the Senate, for the following reasons: First. The relation in which that clause stands to the other, which declares the general mode of appointing officers of the United States, denotes it to be nothing more than a supplement to the other, for the purpose of establishing an auxiliary method of appointment, in cases to which the general method was inadequate. The ordinary power of appointment is confined to the President and Senate JOINTLY, and can therefore only be exercised during the session of the Senate; but as it would have been improper to oblige this body to be continually in session for the appointment of officers and as vacancies might happen IN THEIR RECESS, which it might be necessary for the public service to fill without delay, the succeeding clause is evidently intended to authorize the President, SINGLY, to make temporary appointments "during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session."
Second, if it supplements the clause before it, its “vacancies” must be the “officers” of that clause. Senators are not among them. Third, the timing confirms this. The power works during the Senate’s recess, and the appointments end at its next session. Had senators been meant, the clause would have tied the power and the term to the State legislatures. Those legislatures make the permanent appointments. Only the national Senate’s situation is considered here, so these vacancies mean only officers it helps the President appoint.
OriginalSecond. If this clause is to be considered as supplementary to the one which precedes, the VACANCIES of which it speaks must be construed to relate to the "officers" described in the preceding one; and this, we have seen, excludes from its description the members of the Senate. Third. The time within which the power is to operate, "during the recess of the Senate," and the duration of the appointments, "to the end of the next session" of that body, conspire to elucidate the sense of the provision, which, if it had been intended to comprehend senators, would naturally have referred the temporary power of filling vacancies to the recess of the State legislatures, who are to make the permanent appointments, and not to the recess of the national Senate, who are to have no concern in those appointments; and would have extended the duration in office of the temporary senators to the next session of the legislature of the State, in whose representation the vacancies had happened, instead of making it to expire at the end of the ensuing session of the national Senate. The circumstances of the body authorized to make the permanent appointments would, of course, have governed the modification of a power which related to the temporary appointments; and as the national Senate is the body, whose situation is alone contemplated in the clause upon which the suggestion under examination has been founded, the vacancies to which it alludes can only be deemed to respect those officers in whose appointment that body has a concurrent agency with the President.
Last, the third section of the first article destroys the pretext. The Senate is two Senators from each State, chosen by its legislature. If a vacancy happens in that legislature’s recess, the State’s executive may make temporary appointments. They last until the legislature next meets and fills the vacancies. So the power over chance Senate vacancies goes in clear terms to the State executives. That proves the contrary reading sprang from an intent to deceive the people.
OriginalBut last, the first and second clauses of the third section of the first article, not only obviate all possibility of doubt, but destroy the pretext of misconception. The former provides, that "the Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen BY THE LEGISLATURE THEREOF for six years"; and the latter directs, that, "if vacancies in that body should happen by resignation or otherwise, DURING THE RECESS OF THE LEGISLATURE OF ANY STATE, the Executive THEREOF may make temporary appointments until the NEXT MEETING OF THE LEGISLATURE, which shall then fill such vacancies." Here is an express power given, in clear and unambiguous terms, to the State Executives, to fill casual vacancies in the Senate, by temporary appointments; which not only invalidates the supposition, that the clause before considered could have been intended to confer that power upon the President of the United States, but proves that this supposition, destitute as it is even of the merit of plausibility, must have originated in an intention to deceive the people, too palpable to be obscured by sophistry, too atrocious to be palliated by hypocrisy.
I have taken pains to set this instance in a clear, strong light. It is plain proof of the arts used to prevent a fair judgment of the Constitution. In so flagrant a case I have allowed myself unusual sharpness. I leave the verdict to any candid and honest opponent of the proposed government. Can language furnish terms harsh enough for so shameless an attempt to impose on the citizens of America?
OriginalI have taken the pains to select this instance of misrepresentation, and to place it in a clear and strong light, as an unequivocal proof of the unwarrantable arts which are practiced to prevent a fair and impartial judgment of the real merits of the Constitution submitted to the consideration of the people. Nor have I scrupled, in so flagrant a case, to allow myself a severity of animadversion little congenial with the general spirit of these papers. I hesitate not to submit it to the decision of any candid and honest adversary of the proposed government, whether language can furnish epithets of too much asperity, for so shameless and so prostitute an attempt to impose on the citizens of America. PUBLIUS
Federalist 68
Generated summaryElectors chosen for this one purpose, voting apart in their own States and closed to officeholders, guard the choice of President against tumult, cabal, and foreign corruption. The method makes it likely that only men of proven ability and broad esteem reach the office.Key points
The mode of electing the President is excellent, uniting the people’s will with a deliberate, well-guarded choice.
Electors chosen by the people for this sole occasion let their will shape the choice without any standing body.
A small number drawn from the mass is likeliest to weigh the office’s qualities wisely.
Voting within their own States, the electors give little opening to tumult or violent movements.
The design blocks cabal, intrigue, and above all foreign influence, barring federal officeholders from serving as electors.
Should no candidate gain a majority of the whole, the House chooses from the five highest.
The arts of popularity may raise a man in one State, but only rarer merit wins the whole Union, making able Presidents morally certain.
The mode of choosing the Chief Magistrate is almost the only important part of the plan to escape censure. The ablest opponent in print grants that the election is pretty well guarded. I go further: if not perfect, it is excellent. The people’s will should shape so great a trust. So the choice falls to no standing body, but to men the people pick for this purpose, at this moment. A small number drawn from the general mass, free to deliberate, is likeliest to have the judgment it needs.
OriginalTHE mode of appointment of the Chief Magistrate of the United States is almost the only part of the system, of any consequence, which has escaped without severe censure, or which has received the slightest mark of approbation from its opponents. The most plausible of these, who has appeared in print, has even deigned to admit that the election of the President is pretty well guarded. I venture somewhat further, and hesitate not to affirm, that if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent. It unites in an eminent degree all the advantages, the union of which was to be wished for.
It was desirable that the sense of the people should operate in the choice of the person to whom so important a trust was to be confided. This end will be answered by committing the right of making it, not to any preestablished body, but to men chosen by the people for the special purpose, and at the particular conjuncture. It was equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice. A small number of persons, selected by their fellow-citizens from the general mass, will be most likely to possess the information and discernment requisite to such complicated investigations.
It was also desirable to give tumult little opening. That danger is much dreaded in choosing so weighty a magistrate. An intermediate body of several electors is far less apt to convulse the community than one man who is himself its final object. Voting within their own States, they are less exposed to heats a single assembly might spread to the people.
OriginalIt was also peculiarly desirable to afford as little opportunity as possible to tumult and disorder. This evil was not least to be dreaded in the election of a magistrate, who was to have so important an agency in the administration of the government as the President of the United States. But the precautions which have been so happily concerted in the system under consideration, promise an effectual security against this mischief. The choice of SEVERAL, to form an intermediate body of electors, will be much less apt to convulse the community with any extraordinary or violent movements, than the choice of ONE who was himself to be the final object of the public wishes. And as the electors, chosen in each State, are to assemble and vote in the State in which they are chosen, this detached and divided situation will expose them much less to heats and ferments, which might be communicated from them to the people, than if they were all to be convened at one time, in one place.
Every practicable obstacle was to be set against cabal, intrigue, and corruption, republican government’s deadliest enemies. The danger comes chiefly from foreign powers seeking sway in our councils. Their best means is to raise a creature of their own to the chief magistracy. So the appointment rests on no standing body open to tampering, but on an immediate act of the people, choosing electors for one temporary purpose. The convention also barred all who might be suspected of too great devotion to the sitting President. No senator, representative, or federal officeholder may be an elector. The immediate agents thus enter free of sinister bias. Corrupting so many across thirteen States takes time as well as means.
OriginalNothing was more to be desired than that every practicable obstacle should be opposed to cabal, intrigue, and corruption. These most deadly adversaries of republican government might naturally have been expected to make their approaches from more than one quarter, but chiefly from the desire in foreign powers to gain an improper ascendant in our councils. How could they better gratify this, than by raising a creature of their own to the chief magistracy of the Union? But the convention have guarded against all danger of this sort, with the most provident and judicious attention. They have not made the appointment of the President to depend on any preexisting bodies of men, who might be tampered with beforehand to prostitute their votes; but they have referred it in the first instance to an immediate act of the people of America, to be exerted in the choice of persons for the temporary and sole purpose of making the appointment.
And they have excluded from eligibility to this trust, all those who from situation might be suspected of too great devotion to the President in office. No senator, representative, or other person holding a place of trust or profit under the United States, can be of the numbers of the electors. Thus without corrupting the body of the people, the immediate agents in the election will at least enter upon the task free from any sinister bias. Their transient existence, and their detached situation, already taken notice of, afford a satisfactory prospect of their continuing so, to the conclusion of it. The business of corruption, when it is to embrace so considerable a number of men, requires time as well as means. Nor would it be found easy suddenly to embark them, dispersed as they would be over thirteen States, in any combinations founded upon motives, which though they could not properly be denominated corrupt, might yet be of a nature to mislead them from their duty.
Another aim: the Executive should depend for continuance on none but the people. Otherwise he might sacrifice duty to those whose favor keeps his office. So his re-election turns on a body deputed for that single choice. Each State’s people choose electors equal to its senators and representatives. They meet within the State and vote for a fit person as President. The votes go to the seat of government; a majority of the whole makes a President. A majority may not fall on one man, and less than a majority might be unsafe. Then the House picks, from the five highest, the man it judges best qualified.
OriginalAnother and no less important desideratum was, that the Executive should be independent for his continuance in office on all but the people themselves. He might otherwise be tempted to sacrifice his duty to his complaisance for those whose favor was necessary to the duration of his official consequence. This advantage will also be secured, by making his re-election to depend on a special body of representatives, deputed by the society for the single purpose of making the important choice.
All these advantages will happily combine in the plan devised by the convention; which is, that the people of each State shall choose a number of persons as electors, equal to the number of senators and representatives of such State in the national government, who shall assemble within the State, and vote for some fit person as President. Their votes, thus given, are to be transmitted to the seat of the national government, and the person who may happen to have a majority of the whole number of votes will be the President. But as a majority of the votes might not always happen to centre in one man, and as it might be unsafe to permit less than a majority to be conclusive, it is provided that, in such a contingency, the House of Representatives shall select out of the candidates who shall have the five highest number of votes, the man who in their opinion may be best qualified for the office.
The process makes it morally certain that only eminently qualified men reach the office. Low intrigue and popular arts may raise a man to first honors in one State. The esteem of the whole Union, or the large part a candidate needs, takes another merit. So the office will constantly tend to be filled by men preeminent for ability and virtue. Those who can weigh the executive’s share in good or ill administration will think this no small recommendation. We reject the poet’s heresy that whatever is best administered is best. Still, the true test of good government is its tendency to produce good administration.
OriginalThe process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States. It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue.
And this will be thought no inconsiderable recommendation of the Constitution, by those who are able to estimate the share which the executive in every government must necessarily have in its good or ill administration. Though we cannot acquiesce in the political heresy of the poet who says: "For forms of government let fools contest--That which is best administered is best,"--yet we may safely pronounce, that the true test of a good government is its aptitude and tendency to produce a good administration.
The Vice-President is chosen as the President is, with the Senate playing the House’s part. Some call a separate officer needless, even harmful, and would have the Senate elect one of its own. First, so the Senate can always reach a definite decision, its presiding officer has only a casting vote. Drawing a senator there would trade his State a constant vote for an occasional one. Second, the Vice-President may stand in for the President. So the reasons for the President’s mode of election apply with great, if not equal, force to his.
OriginalThe Vice-President is to be chosen in the same manner with the President; with this difference, that the Senate is to do, in respect to the former, what is to be done by the House of Representatives, in respect to the latter. The appointment of an extraordinary person, as Vice-President, has been objected to as superfluous, if not mischievous. It has been alleged, that it would have been preferable to have authorized the Senate to elect out of their own body an officer answering that description. But two considerations seem to justify the ideas of the convention in this respect. One is, that to secure at all times the possibility of a definite resolution of the body, it is necessary that the President should have only a casting vote. And to take the senator of any State from his seat as senator, to place him in that of President of the Senate, would be to exchange, in regard to the State from which he came, a constant for a contingent vote.
The other consideration is, that as the Vice-President may occasionally become a substitute for the President, in the supreme executive magistracy, all the reasons which recommend the mode of election prescribed for the one, apply with great if not with equal force to the manner of appointing the other. It is remarkable that in this, as in most other instances, the objection which is made would lie against the constitution of this State. We have a Lieutenant-Governor, chosen by the people at large, who presides in the Senate, and is the constitutional substitute for the Governor, in casualties similar to those which would authorize the Vice-President to exercise the authorities and discharge the duties of the President. PUBLIUS
Federalist 69
Generated summaryPoint by point, from his four-year term and impeachment to the veto, war command, pardons, treaties, and appointments, the President’s real powers fall far below the British king’s. Against a New York governor they stand about even, sometimes below.Key points
The real President is nothing like a British king; point by point he resembles an elected State governor.
He is elected for four years and impeachable, where the king is hereditary and his person sacred.
His veto is only qualified, overridden by two-thirds; the king’s negative over Parliament is absolute.
He commands the forces but cannot declare war or raise armies, powers the Constitution gives Congress.
He shares the treaty power with the Senate; the king treats with foreign nations alone.
He shares appointments with the Senate; the king is the fountain of honor, creating offices and conferring nobility.
He has no spiritual jurisdiction; the king heads the national church.
On the whole his power rivals a New York governor’s, not a king’s.
I trace the Executive as the convention’s plan marks it out, against the unfair pictures of it. The executive power rests, with few exceptions, in one magistrate. That settles nothing. It likens him to the king of Great Britain, but as much to the Grand Seignior, the khan of Tartary, or a New York governor.
OriginalI PROCEED now to trace the real characters of the proposed Executive, as they are marked out in the plan of the convention. This will serve to place in a strong light the unfairness of the representations which have been made in regard to it. The first thing which strikes our attention is, that the executive authority, with few exceptions, is to be vested in a single magistrate. This will scarcely, however, be considered as a point upon which any comparison can be grounded; for if, in this particular, there be a resemblance to the king of Great Britain, there is not less a resemblance to the Grand Seignior, to the khan of Tartary, to the Man of the Seven Mountains, or to the governor of New York.
He is elected for four years and may stand again as often as people wish. A king inherits his crown and passes it to his heirs. Nearer is the New York governor: three years, no limit on re-election. Dangerous influence grows far faster in one State than across the Union, so his four years are less to be feared than the governor’s three.
He may also be impeached, tried, and removed for treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors, then prosecuted at law. A king’s person is sacred; no court reaches him, and only a national revolution could punish him. Here he stands no better than New York’s governor, and worse than Maryland’s and Delaware’s.
OriginalThat magistrate is to be elected for four years; and is to be re-eligible as often as the people of the United States shall think him worthy of their confidence. In these circumstances there is a total dissimilitude between him and a king of Great Britain, who is an hereditary monarch, possessing the crown as a patrimony descendible to his heirs forever; but there is a close analogy between him and a governor of New York, who is elected for three years, and is re-eligible without limitation or intermission. If we consider how much less time would be requisite for establishing a dangerous influence in a single State, than for establishing a like influence throughout the United States, we must conclude that a duration of four years for the Chief Magistrate of the Union is a degree of permanency far less to be dreaded in that office, than a duration of three years for a corresponding office in a single State.
The President of the United States would be liable to be impeached, tried, and, upon conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors, removed from office; and would afterwards be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law. The person of the king of Great Britain is sacred and inviolable; there is no constitutional tribunal to which he is amenable; no punishment to which he can be subjected without involving the crisis of a national revolution. In this delicate and important circumstance of personal responsibility, the President of Confederated America would stand upon no better ground than a governor of New York, and upon worse ground than the governors of Maryland and Delaware.
He may return a bill; two thirds of both houses can pass it anyway. The British king’s negative on acts of Parliament is absolute. The President’s qualified negative matches our council of revision, in which the governor sits. He thus exceeds New York’s governor, holding alone what that governor shares with the chancellor and judges. Here he equals the governor of Massachusetts, whose constitution the convention seems to have copied.
OriginalThe President of the United States is to have power to return a bill, which shall have passed the two branches of the legislature, for reconsideration; and the bill so returned is to become a law, if, upon that reconsideration, it be approved by two thirds of both houses. The king of Great Britain, on his part, has an absolute negative upon the acts of the two houses of Parliament. The disuse of that power for a considerable time past does not affect the reality of its existence; and is to be ascribed wholly to the crown's having found the means of substituting influence to authority, or the art of gaining a majority in one or the other of the two houses, to the necessity of exerting a prerogative which could seldom be exerted without hazarding some degree of national agitation. The qualified negative of the President differs widely from this absolute negative of the British sovereign; and tallies exactly with the revisionary authority of the council of revision of this State, of which the governor is a constituent part. In this respect the power of the President would exceed that of the governor of New York, because the former would possess, singly, what the latter shares with the chancellor and judges; but it would be precisely the same with that of the governor of Massachusetts, whose constitution, as to this article, seems to have been the original from which the convention have copied.
He commands the army and navy, and the State militias when called into actual service. He may pardon federal offenses except in impeachment; urge measures on Congress; convene or adjourn the houses; see the laws faithfully executed; and commission all federal officers. In most of this he resembles both king and governor. The material differences are these.
First, he commands only the militia actually called out; king and governor command all militia always, so he is below both. Second, his command of the army and navy is the king’s in name but far less in fact: supreme command as first General and admiral. The king may also declare war and raise fleets and armies; the Constitution gives that to the legislature.
OriginalThe President is to be the "commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several States, when called into the actual service of the United States. He is to have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment; to recommend to the consideration of Congress such measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; to convene, on extraordinary occasions, both houses of the legislature, or either of them, and, in case of disagreement between them with respect to the time of adjournment, to adjourn them to such time as he shall think proper; to take care that the laws be faithfully executed; and to commission all officers of the United States." In most of these particulars, the power of the President will resemble equally that of the king of Great Britain and of the governor of New York. The most material points of difference are these:--First. The President will have only the occasional command of such part of the militia of the nation as by legislative provision may be called into the actual service of the Union. The king of Great Britain and the governor of New York have at all times the entire command of all the militia within their several jurisdictions. In this article, therefore, the power of the President would be inferior to that of either the monarch or the governor. Second. The President is to be commander-in-chief of the army and navy of the United States. In this respect his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces, as first General and admiral of the Confederacy; while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies--all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature. The governor of New York, on the other hand, is by the constitution of the State vested only with the command of its militia and navy. But the constitutions of several of the States expressly declare their governors to be commanders-in-chief, as well of the army as navy; and it may well be a question, whether those of New Hampshire and Massachusetts, in particular, do not, in this instance, confer larger powers upon their respective governors, than could be claimed by a President of the United States.
Third, he may pardon all cases but impeachment. A New York governor may pardon even impeachment, save treason and murder. In political effect, is not the governor’s power the greater? A governor heading a plot not yet ripened into treason could promise his accomplices impunity. A President may pardon treason tried at law, but shelters no one from impeachment. A full pardon for every early step tempts further than a bare escape from death if arms fail. Fourth, he may adjourn the legislature only when the houses disagree on the time. The British monarch may prorogue Parliament, or dissolve it. The New York governor may also prorogue this State’s legislature for a limited time.
OriginalThird. The power of the President, in respect to pardons, would extend to all cases, except those of impeachment. The governor of New York may pardon in all cases, even in those of impeachment, except for treason and murder. Is not the power of the governor, in this article, on a calculation of political consequences, greater than that of the President? All conspiracies and plots against the government, which have not been matured into actual treason, may be screened from punishment of every kind, by the interposition of the prerogative of pardoning. If a governor of New York, therefore, should be at the head of any such conspiracy, until the design had been ripened into actual hostility he could insure his accomplices and adherents an entire impunity. A President of the Union, on the other hand, though he may even pardon treason, when prosecuted in the ordinary course of law, could shelter no offender, in any degree, from the effects of impeachment and conviction. Would not the prospect of a total indemnity for all the preliminary steps be a greater temptation to undertake and persevere in an enterprise against the public liberty, than the mere prospect of an exemption from death and confiscation, if the final execution of the design, upon an actual appeal to arms, should miscarry? Would this last expectation have any influence at all, when the probability was computed, that the person who was to afford that exemption might himself be involved in the consequences of the measure, and might be incapacitated by his agency in it from affording the desired impunity? The better to judge of this matter, it will be necessary to recollect, that, by the proposed Constitution, the offense of treason is limited "to levying war upon the United States, and adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort"; and that by the laws of New York it is confined within similar bounds. Fourth. The President can only adjourn the national legislature in the single case of disagreement about the time of adjournment. The British monarch may prorogue or even dissolve the Parliament. The governor of New York may also prorogue the legislature of this State for a limited time; a power which, in certain situations, may be employed to very important purposes.
He makes treaties with the Senate’s consent, two thirds of those present agreeing. The British king is the sole and absolute voice of the nation abroad, making treaties of peace, trade, alliance, and every other kind on his own. The treaty power rests wholly in the crown, and royal compacts bind without any other sanction.
So the king does alone what the President can do only with a branch of the legislature. This power does exceed any State Executive’s, I admit, but that follows from the sovereign nature of treaties. He also receives ambassadors and other public ministers. Much has been made of this, but it is more dignity than power.
OriginalThe President is to have power, with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the senators present concur. The king of Great Britain is the sole and absolute representative of the nation in all foreign transactions. He can of his own accord make treaties of peace, commerce, alliance, and of every other description. It has been insinuated, that his authority in this respect is not conclusive, and that his conventions with foreign powers are subject to the revision, and stand in need of the ratification, of Parliament. But I believe this doctrine was never heard of, until it was broached upon the present occasion. Every jurist of that kingdom, and every other man acquainted with its Constitution, knows, as an established fact, that the prerogative of making treaties exists in the crown in its utmost plentitude; and that the compacts entered into by the royal authority have the most complete legal validity and perfection, independent of any other sanction. The Parliament, it is true, is sometimes seen employing itself in altering the existing laws to conform them to the stipulations in a new treaty; and this may have possibly given birth to the imagination, that its co-operation was necessary to the obligatory efficacy of the treaty. But this parliamentary interposition proceeds from a different cause: from the necessity of adjusting a most artificial and intricate system of revenue and commercial laws, to the changes made in them by the operation of the treaty; and of adapting new provisions and precautions to the new state of things, to keep the machine from running into disorder. In this respect, therefore, there is no comparison between the intended power of the President and the actual power of the British sovereign. The one can perform alone what the other can do only with the concurrence of a branch of the legislature. It must be admitted, that, in this instance, the power of the federal Executive would exceed that of any State Executive. But this arises naturally from the sovereign power which relates to treaties. If the Confederacy were to be dissolved, it would become a question, whether the Executives of the several States were not solely invested with that delicate and important prerogative.
The President is also to be authorized to receive ambassadors and other public ministers. This, though it has been a rich theme of declamation, is more a matter of dignity than of authority. It is a circumstance which will be without consequence in the administration of the government; and it was far more convenient that it should be arranged in this manner, than that there should be a necessity of convening the legislature, or one of its branches, upon every arrival of a foreign minister, though it were merely to take the place of a departed predecessor.
He nominates and, with the Senate’s consent, appoints ambassadors, public ministers, Supreme Court judges, and all other federal officers set up by law. The British king is truly the fountain of honor: he fills all offices, creates them, and confers nobility at pleasure. The President is plainly far below him here.
He is not even equal to the New York governor, judged by practice. Appointment there lies with a council of the governor and four senators. The governor claims, and often uses, the right of naming, with a casting vote. If he truly names, he equals the President and exceeds him by that vote. A divided Senate makes no appointment; a divided council lets the governor confirm his own choice.
OriginalThe President is to nominate, and, with the advice and consent of the Senate, to appoint ambassadors and other public ministers, judges of the Supreme Court, and in general all officers of the United States established by law, and whose appointments are not otherwise provided for by the Constitution. The king of Great Britain is emphatically and truly styled the fountain of honor. He not only appoints to all offices, but can create offices. He can confer titles of nobility at pleasure; and has the disposal of an immense number of church preferments. There is evidently a great inferiority in the power of the President, in this particular, to that of the British king; nor is it equal to that of the governor of New York, if we are to interpret the meaning of the constitution of the State by the practice which has obtained under it. The power of appointment is with us lodged in a council, composed of the governor and four members of the Senate, chosen by the Assembly. The governor claims, and has frequently exercised, the right of nomination, and is entitled to a casting vote in the appointment. If he really has the right of nominating, his authority is in this respect equal to that of the President, and exceeds it in the article of the casting vote. In the national government, if the Senate should be divided, no appointment could be made; in the government of New York, if the council should be divided, the governor can turn the scale, and confirm his own nomination.
The President appoints in the open, before a whole branch of the legislature; the New York governor in private, with at most four men. So small a council is far easier to work on than the national Senate. In handing out offices this State’s magistrate is in practice the stronger. Setting aside the treaty power, it is hard to say whether he holds more or less power than the governor. The parallel with a British king plainly has no ground.
OriginalIf we compare the publicity which must necessarily attend the mode of appointment by the President and an entire branch of the national legislature, with the privacy in the mode of appointment by the governor of New York, closeted in a secret apartment with at most four, and frequently with only two persons; and if we at the same time consider how much more easy it must be to influence the small number of which a council of appointment consists, than the considerable number of which the national Senate would consist, we cannot hesitate to pronounce that the power of the chief magistrate of this State, in the disposition of offices, must, in practice, be greatly superior to that of the Chief Magistrate of the Union.
Hence it appears that, except as to the concurrent authority of the President in the article of treaties, it would be difficult to determine whether that magistrate would, in the aggregate, possess more or less power than the Governor of New York. And it appears yet more unequivocally, that there is no pretense for the parallel which has been attempted between him and the king of Great Britain. But to render the contrast in this respect still more striking, it may be of use to throw the principal circumstances of dissimilitude into a closer group.
He is elected by the people for four years; the king is hereditary and perpetual. He may be punished and disgraced; the king is sacred. His negative is qualified; the king’s absolute. He commands the forces; the king also declares war and raises fleets and armies. Treaties and appointments he shares with a branch of the legislature; the king holds both alone.
He can confer no privileges; the king makes denizens of aliens, nobles of commoners, and erects corporations. He sets no rules of trade or currency; the king rules markets, weights, measures, embargoes, and coin. He has no spiritual power; the king heads the national church. What shall we answer those who say things so unlike are alike? The same we owe those who call a government of the people’s elected servants an aristocracy, a monarchy, and a despotism.
OriginalThe President of the United States would be an officer elected by the people for four years; the king of Great Britain is a perpetual and hereditary prince. The one would be amenable to personal punishment and disgrace; the person of the other is sacred and inviolable. The one would have a qualified negative upon the acts of the legislative body; the other has an absolute negative. The one would have a right to command the military and naval forces of the nation; the other, in addition to this right, possesses that of declaring war, and of raising and regulating fleets and armies by his own authority. The one would have a concurrent power with a branch of the legislature in the formation of treaties; the other is the sole possessor of the power of making treaties. The one would have a like concurrent authority in appointing to offices; the other is the sole author of all appointments. The one can confer no privileges whatever; the other can make denizens of aliens, noblemen of commoners; can erect corporations with all the rights incident to corporate bodies. The one can prescribe no rules concerning the commerce or currency of the nation; the other is in several respects the arbiter of commerce, and in this capacity can establish markets and fairs, can regulate weights and measures, can lay embargoes for a limited time, can coin money, can authorize or prohibit the circulation of foreign coin. The one has no particle of spiritual jurisdiction; the other is the supreme head and governor of the national church! What answer shall we give to those who would persuade us that things so unlike resemble each other? The same that ought to be given to those who tell us that a government, the whole power of which would be in the hands of the elective and periodical servants of the people, is an aristocracy, a monarchy, and a despotism. PUBLIUS
Federalist 70
Generated summaryEnergy in government needs one Executive, not several men or a council. One man decides and acts with the speed, secrecy, and responsibility that divided authority weakens, and that lets blame slip away.Key points
Energy in the Executive is a leading feature of good government, and its first ingredient is unity, a single President.
A vigorous executive is not hostile to republican government but essential to defense, steady law, and liberty.
Energy needs unity, duration, support, and competent powers; safety needs dependence on the people and responsibility.
Unity yields decision, activity, secrecy, and dispatch, all of which fade as the numbers grow.
A plural executive, whether equal magistrates or a binding council, breeds dissension that weakens and divides the government.
Worst of all, plurality conceals faults and destroys responsibility, as blame shifts until no author can be found.
A single magistrate is more closely watched and more surely held to account.
Some say a vigorous Executive clashes with republican government. Its friends must at least hope that is false, since to admit it condemns their own principles. Energy in the Executive is a leading part of what defines good government. It guards the country against foreign attack, enforces the laws steadily, and shields property from high-handed combinations that break in on justice. It secures liberty against ambition, faction, and anarchy. A feeble Executive means a feeble execution, and a feeble execution is only a bad one. A government badly run, whatever it is in theory, must in practice be bad.
OriginalTHERE is an idea, which is not without its advocates, that a vigorous Executive is inconsistent with the genius of republican government. The enlightened well-wishers to this species of government must at least hope that the supposition is destitute of foundation; since they can never admit its truth, without at the same time admitting the condemnation of their own principles. Energy in the Executive is a leading character in the definition of good government. It is essential to the protection of the community against foreign attacks; it is not less essential to the steady administration of the laws; to the protection of property against those irregular and high-handed combinations which sometimes interrupt the ordinary course of justice; to the security of liberty against the enterprises and assaults of ambition, of faction, and of anarchy.
Every man the least conversant in Roman history, knows how often that republic was obliged to take refuge in the absolute power of a single man, under the formidable title of Dictator, as well against the intrigues of ambitious individuals who aspired to the tyranny, and the seditions of whole classes of the community whose conduct threatened the existence of all government, as against the invasions of external enemies who menaced the conquest and destruction of Rome. There can be no need, however, to multiply arguments or examples on this head. A feeble Executive implies a feeble execution of the government. A feeble execution is but another phrase for a bad execution; and a government ill executed, whatever it may be in theory, must be, in practice, a bad government.
Granting we need an energetic Executive, three questions remain. What makes this energy? How far does it fit republican safety? How far does the convention’s plan reflect it? The parts of energy are four: unity, duration, adequate support, and competent powers. The parts of safety are two: due dependence on the people, and due responsibility. The soundest statesmen have favored a single Executive and a numerous legislature. Energy is the Executive’s first quality, best in one hand; the legislature is fitter for debate and for winning the people’s trust.
OriginalTaking it for granted, therefore, that all men of sense will agree in the necessity of an energetic Executive, it will only remain to inquire, what are the ingredients which constitute this energy? How far can they be combined with those other ingredients which constitute safety in the republican sense? And how far does this combination characterize the plan which has been reported by the convention? The ingredients which constitute energy in the Executive are, first, unity; secondly, duration; thirdly, an adequate provision for its support; fourthly, competent powers. The ingredients which constitute safety in the republican sense are, first, a due dependence on the people, secondly, a due responsibility.
Those politicians and statesmen who have been the most celebrated for the soundness of their principles and for the justice of their views, have declared in favor of a single Executive and a numerous legislature. They have with great propriety, considered energy as the most necessary qualification of the former, and have regarded this as most applicable to power in a single hand, while they have, with equal propriety, considered the latter as best adapted to deliberation and wisdom, and best calculated to conciliate the confidence of the people and to secure their privileges and interests.
That unity helps energy is not disputed. Decision, activity, secrecy, and dispatch mark one man far more than any number. Unity may be destroyed two ways: by giving power to several magistrates of equal rank, or to one man bound to counsellors. Rome’s two Consuls show the first, several State constitutions the second. Both have backers, and both meet like objections. Other nations teach little here, but as far as they teach anything they warn against plurality. Roman history records much harm from quarrels between the Consuls, and no gain from their number.
OriginalThat unity is conducive to energy will not be disputed. Decision, activity, secrecy, and despatch will generally characterize the proceedings of one man in a much more eminent degree than the proceedings of any greater number; and in proportion as the number is increased, these qualities will be diminished. This unity may be destroyed in two ways: either by vesting the power in two or more magistrates of equal dignity and authority; or by vesting it ostensibly in one man, subject, in whole or in part, to the control and co-operation of others, in the capacity of counsellors to him. Of the first, the two Consuls of Rome may serve as an example; of the last, we shall find examples in the constitutions of several of the States. New York and New Jersey, if I recollect right, are the only States which have intrusted the executive authority wholly to single men. Both these methods of destroying the unity of the Executive have their partisans; but the votaries of an executive council are the most numerous. They are both liable, if not to equal, to similar objections, and may in most lights be examined in conjunction.
The experience of other nations will afford little instruction on this head. As far, however, as it teaches any thing, it teaches us not to be enamoured of plurality in the Executive. We have seen that the Achaeans, on an experiment of two Praetors, were induced to abolish one. The Roman history records many instances of mischiefs to the republic from the dissensions between the Consuls, and between the military Tribunes, who were at times substituted for the Consuls. But it gives us no specimens of any peculiar advantages derived to the state from the circumstance of the plurality of those magistrates. That the dissensions between them were not more frequent or more fatal, is a matter of astonishment, until we advert to the singular position in which the republic was almost continually placed, and to the prudent policy pointed out by the circumstances of the state, and pursued by the Consuls, of making a division of the government between them. The patricians engaged in a perpetual struggle with the plebeians for the preservation of their ancient authorities and dignities; the Consuls, who were generally chosen out of the former body, were commonly united by the personal interest they had in the defense of the privileges of their order. In addition to this motive of union, after the arms of the republic had considerably expanded the bounds of its empire, it became an established custom with the Consuls to divide the administration between themselves by lot--one of them remaining at Rome to govern the city and its environs, the other taking the command in the more distant provinces. This expedient must, no doubt, have had great influence in preventing those collisions and rivalships which might otherwise have embroiled the peace of the republic.
Leaving history for reason, the case against plurality in any form is far stronger. Wherever two or more share an undertaking, difference of opinion threatens. Where they hold equal rank in a public trust, rivalry and even hatred are peculiar dangers. The bitterest quarrels spring from these causes, weakening authority and wrecking the plans of those they divide. In an executive of several men they might defeat the gravest measures in a crisis. Worse, they might split the community into factions attached to different men. Men often oppose a measure because they had no hand in it. Once consulted and overruled, they feel bound in honor to defeat what was resolved against them.
OriginalBut quitting the dim light of historical research, attaching ourselves purely to the dictates of reason and good sense, we shall discover much greater cause to reject than to approve the idea of plurality in the Executive, under any modification whatever. Wherever two or more persons are engaged in any common enterprise or pursuit, there is always danger of difference of opinion. If it be a public trust or office, in which they are clothed with equal dignity and authority, there is peculiar danger of personal emulation and even animosity. From either, and especially from all these causes, the most bitter dissensions are apt to spring. Whenever these happen, they lessen the respectability, weaken the authority, and distract the plans and operation of those whom they divide. If they should unfortunately assail the supreme executive magistracy of a country, consisting of a plurality of persons, they might impede or frustrate the most important measures of the government, in the most critical emergencies of the state. And what is still worse, they might split the community into the most violent and irreconcilable factions, adhering differently to the different individuals who composed the magistracy.
Men often oppose a thing, merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike. But if they have been consulted, and have happened to disapprove, opposition then becomes, in their estimation, an indispensable duty of self-love. They seem to think themselves bound in honor, and by all the motives of personal infallibility, to defeat the success of what has been resolved upon contrary to their sentiments. Men of upright, benevolent tempers have too many opportunities of remarking, with horror, to what desperate lengths this disposition is sometimes carried, and how often the great interests of society are sacrificed to the vanity, to the conceit, and to the obstinacy of individuals, who have credit enough to make their passions and their caprices interesting to mankind. Perhaps the question now before the public may, in its consequences, afford melancholy proofs of the effects of this despicable frailty, or rather detestable vice, in the human character.
Such evils must be borne in the legislature, but building them into the Executive is needless and unwise. In the legislature, quick decision is oftener an evil than a good. The clash of parties may block sound plans, yet it often promotes deliberation and checks the majority. Once a resolution passes it is law, and opposition ends. Nothing offsets quarrels in the Executive; there the harm is pure and never stops. They weaken every measure and blunt the vigor and dispatch it most needs. In war, where executive energy is the bulwark of national safety, plurality is all to be feared.
OriginalUpon the principles of a free government, inconveniences from the source just mentioned must necessarily be submitted to in the formation of the legislature; but it is unnecessary, and therefore unwise, to introduce them into the constitution of the Executive. It is here too that they may be most pernicious. In the legislature, promptitude of decision is oftener an evil than a benefit. The differences of opinion, and the jarrings of parties in that department of the government, though they may sometimes obstruct salutary plans, yet often promote deliberation and circumspection, and serve to check excesses in the majority. When a resolution too is once taken, the opposition must be at an end. That resolution is a law, and resistance to it punishable.
But no favorable circumstances palliate or atone for the disadvantages of dissension in the executive department. Here, they are pure and unmixed. There is no point at which they cease to operate. They serve to embarrass and weaken the execution of the plan or measure to which they relate, from the first step to the final conclusion of it. They constantly counteract those qualities in the Executive which are the most necessary ingredients in its composition--vigor and expedition, and this without any counterbalancing good. In the conduct of war, in which the energy of the Executive is the bulwark of the national security, every thing would be to be apprehended from its plurality.
These points bear most on the first case, magistrates of equal rank. Against a council whose consent the Constitution would require they bear less heavily, but still with weight. A cunning cabal there could sap the whole administration, and without one, mere difference of views would breed weakness and delay. The weightiest objection holds against both: plurality hides faults and destroys responsibility. Responsibility is of two kinds, to censure and to punishment. The first matters more in an elective office, since a man in public trust will oftener make himself unworthy than liable to punishment. Multiplying the Executive makes either harder to fix. Amid mutual charges, blame shifts so smoothly that opinion cannot find the real author.
OriginalIt must be confessed that these observations apply with principal weight to the first case supposed--that is, to a plurality of magistrates of equal dignity and authority a scheme, the advocates for which are not likely to form a numerous sect; but they apply, though not with equal, yet with considerable weight to the project of a council, whose concurrence is made constitutionally necessary to the operations of the ostensible Executive. An artful cabal in that council would be able to distract and to enervate the whole system of administration. If no such cabal should exist, the mere diversity of views and opinions would alone be sufficient to tincture the exercise of the executive authority with a spirit of habitual feebleness and dilatoriness.
But one of the weightiest objections to a plurality in the Executive, and which lies as much against the last as the first plan, is, that it tends to conceal faults and destroy responsibility. Responsibility is of two kinds--to censure and to punishment. The first is the more important of the two, especially in an elective office. Man, in public trust, will much oftener act in such a manner as to render him unworthy of being any longer trusted, than in such a manner as to make him obnoxious to legal punishment. But the multiplication of the Executive adds to the difficulty of detection in either case. It often becomes impossible, amidst mutual accusations, to determine on whom the blame or the punishment of a pernicious measure, or series of pernicious measures, ought really to fall. It is shifted from one to another with so much dexterity, and under such plausible appearances, that the public opinion is left in suspense about the real author. The circumstances which may have led to any national miscarriage or misfortune are sometimes so complicated that, where there are a number of actors who may have had different degrees and kinds of agency, though we may clearly see upon the whole that there has been mismanagement, yet it may be impracticable to pronounce to whose account the evil which may have been incurred is truly chargeable.
“I was overruled by my council.” Such pretexts are always at hand, true or false. Who will take the trouble, or the odium, of probing further? Our governor shares only appointments with a council, and there we have seen the mischief. Scandalous appointments were made; the governor blamed the council, the council his nomination. The people could not tell whose influence gave their interests to such unfit hands.
Original"I was overruled by my council. The council were so divided in their opinions that it was impossible to obtain any better resolution on the point." These and similar pretexts are constantly at hand, whether true or false. And who is there that will either take the trouble or incur the odium, of a strict scrutiny into the secret springs of the transaction? Should there be found a citizen zealous enough to undertake the unpromising task, if there happen to be collusion between the parties concerned, how easy it is to clothe the circumstances with so much ambiguity, as to render it uncertain what was the precise conduct of any of those parties?
In the single instance in which the governor of this State is coupled with a council--that is, in the appointment to offices, we have seen the mischiefs of it in the view now under consideration. Scandalous appointments to important offices have been made. Some cases, indeed, have been so flagrant that ALL PARTIES have agreed in the impropriety of the thing. When inquiry has been made, the blame has been laid by the governor on the members of the council, who, on their part, have charged it upon his nomination; while the people remain altogether at a loss to determine, by whose influence their interests have been committed to hands so unqualified and so manifestly improper. In tenderness to individuals, I forbear to descend to particulars.
Plurality thus tends to strip the people of their two greatest securities for any delegated power. The first is the restraint of public opinion, which loses force when censure is divided, and uncertain where it falls. The second is the chance to see wrongdoing plainly, and so remove those men, or punish them where the case admits.
OriginalIt is evident from these considerations, that the plurality of the Executive tends to deprive the people of the two greatest securities they can have for the faithful exercise of any delegated power, first, the restraints of public opinion, which lose their efficacy, as well on account of the division of the censure attendant on bad measures among a number, as on account of the uncertainty on whom it ought to fall; and, second, the opportunity of discovering with facility and clearness the misconduct of the persons they trust, in order either to their removal from office or to their actual punishment in cases which admit of it.
In England the king rules for life, is not answerable, and his person is sacred. Nothing there could be wiser than a council answerable to the nation for its advice. Without one the executive would bear no responsibility, which no free government can admit. In a republic every magistrate ought to answer for his own conduct, so that reason turns against a council. In Britain the council supplies the responsibility forbidden the king. Here it would destroy, or greatly lessen, the responsibility meant for the Chief Magistrate.
OriginalIn England, the king is a perpetual magistrate; and it is a maxim which has obtained for the sake of the public peace, that he is unaccountable for his administration, and his person sacred. Nothing, therefore, can be wiser in that kingdom, than to annex to the king a constitutional council, who may be responsible to the nation for the advice they give. Without this, there would be no responsibility whatever in the executive department an idea inadmissible in a free government. But even there the king is not bound by the resolutions of his council, though they are answerable for the advice they give. He is the absolute master of his own conduct in the exercise of his office, and may observe or disregard the counsel given to him at his sole discretion.
But in a republic, where every magistrate ought to be personally responsible for his behavior in office the reason which in the British Constitution dictates the propriety of a council, not only ceases to apply, but turns against the institution. In the monarchy of Great Britain, it furnishes a substitute for the prohibited responsibility of the chief magistrate, which serves in some degree as a hostage to the national justice for his good behavior. In the American republic, it would serve to destroy, or would greatly diminish, the intended and necessary responsibility of the Chief Magistrate himself.
The executive council rests on the republican jealousy that power is safer in many hands than one. Even granting the maxim, the gain would not outweigh the losses. But I do not think the rule applies to executive power at all. I agree with a writer whom Junius calls “deep, solid, and ingenious”: executive power is more easily confined when it is one. Watchfulness is safer with a single object, and all multiplying of the Executive is dangerous rather than friendly to liberty.
OriginalThe idea of a council to the Executive, which has so generally obtained in the State constitutions, has been derived from that maxim of republican jealousy which considers power as safer in the hands of a number of men than of a single man. If the maxim should be admitted to be applicable to the case, I should contend that the advantage on that side would not counterbalance the numerous disadvantages on the opposite side. But I do not think the rule at all applicable to the executive power. I clearly concur in opinion, in this particular, with a writer whom the celebrated Junius pronounces to be "deep, solid, and ingenious," that "the executive power is more easily confined when it is ONE"; that it is far more safe there should be a single object for the jealousy and watchfulness of the people; and, in a word, that all multiplication of the Executive is rather dangerous than friendly to liberty.
The security sought by multiplying the Executive cannot be had. Numbers must be great enough to make combination hard, or they breed danger instead of safety. The joint credit of several men is more formidable to liberty than one man’s. Where an artful leader can unite so few, power grows more open to abuse than in one man. He, being alone, is watched more closely and suspected more readily. The Decemvirs of Rome, whose name records their number, were more dreaded in usurpation than any one of them.
OriginalA little consideration will satisfy us, that the species of security sought for in the multiplication of the Executive, is unattainable. Numbers must be so great as to render combination difficult, or they are rather a source of danger than of security. The united credit and influence of several individuals must be more formidable to liberty, than the credit and influence of either of them separately. When power, therefore, is placed in the hands of so small a number of men, as to admit of their interests and views being easily combined in a common enterprise, by an artful leader, it becomes more liable to abuse, and more dangerous when abused, than if it be lodged in the hands of one man; who, from the very circumstance of his being alone, will be more narrowly watched and more readily suspected, and who cannot unite so great a mass of influence as when he is associated with others. The Decemvirs of Rome, whose name denotes their number, were more to be dreaded in their usurpation than any ONE of them would have been.
None would propose more; six to a dozen are named for a council. Even a dozen combine easily, and America has more to fear from that than from one man’s ambition. To a magistrate who is himself responsible, a council is generally nothing better than a clog on his good intentions. It is often an instrument of his bad ones, and almost always a cloak for his faults. I say nothing of expense. A council large enough for its purpose would cost too much for a doubtful object. Before the Constitution appeared, I rarely met a sensible man from any State who denied, from experience, that our executive’s unity was among this State’s best features.
OriginalNo person would think of proposing an Executive much more numerous than that body; from six to a dozen have been suggested for the number of the council. The extreme of these numbers, is not too great for an easy combination; and from such a combination America would have more to fear, than from the ambition of any single individual. A council to a magistrate, who is himself responsible for what he does, are generally nothing better than a clog upon his good intentions, are often the instruments and accomplices of his bad and are almost always a cloak to his faults.
I forbear to dwell upon the subject of expense; though it be evident that if the council should be numerous enough to answer the principal end aimed at by the institution, the salaries of the members, who must be drawn from their homes to reside at the seat of government, would form an item in the catalogue of public expenditures too serious to be incurred for an object of equivocal utility. I will only add that, prior to the appearance of the Constitution, I rarely met with an intelligent man from any of the States, who did not admit, as the result of experience, that the UNITY of the executive of this State was one of the best of the distinguishing features of our constitution. PUBLIUS
Federalist 71
Generated summaryA four-year term gives the President enough security to resist passing public passions and legislative pressure. It is long enough to make him firm, and not long enough to alarm anyone for liberty.Key points
A term of considerable length, four years, is the Executive’s second source of energy, giving him firmness and independence.
A man values what he holds by a firm tenure, so too short a term breeds feebleness and irresolution.
The Executive should serve the community’s deliberate sense, not every gust of popular passion, and must sometimes resist temporary delusion.
He owes no deference to the legislature’s humors, and must dare to act on his own judgment.
Real separation requires that each branch be independent, for the legislature tends to absorb every other power.
Four years gives useful firmness without endangering liberty, given the President’s confined powers.
A long term is the second thing the Executive needs for energy. It bears on two things: his own firmness, and his administration’s steadiness. The longer the term, the surer that firmness. Men value a safe hold above a shaky one, and risk more to keep it. A magistrate who must soon step down has too little stake to risk blame by acting on his own. Nor will he stand up to passing ill-humors in society, or in a ruling faction of the legislature. If he might stay by a new election and wants to, hope joins fear to corrupt his integrity or sap his courage. Weakness and wavering mark the office either way.
OriginalDURATION in office has been mentioned as the second requisite to the energy of the Executive authority. This has relation to two objects: to the personal firmness of the executive magistrate, in the employment of his constitutional powers; and to the stability of the system of administration which may have been adopted under his auspices. With regard to the first, it must be evident, that the longer the duration in office, the greater will be the probability of obtaining so important an advantage. It is a general principle of human nature, that a man will be interested in whatever he possesses, in proportion to the firmness or precariousness of the tenure by which he holds it; will be less attached to what he holds by a momentary or uncertain title, than to what he enjoys by a durable or certain title; and, of course, will be willing to risk more for the sake of the one, than for the sake of the other.
This remark is not less applicable to a political privilege, or honor, or trust, than to any article of ordinary property. The inference from it is, that a man acting in the capacity of chief magistrate, under a consciousness that in a very short time he MUST lay down his office, will be apt to feel himself too little interested in it to hazard any material censure or perplexity, from the independent exertion of his powers, or from encountering the ill-humors, however transient, which may happen to prevail, either in a considerable part of the society itself, or even in a predominant faction in the legislative body. If the case should only be, that he MIGHT lay it down, unless continued by a new choice, and if he should be desirous of being continued, his wishes, conspiring with his fears, would tend still more powerfully to corrupt his integrity, or debase his fortitude. In either case, feebleness and irresolution must be the characteristics of the station.
Some would count the Executive’s servile pliancy to any prevailing current its best recommendation. Such men mistake what government is for. The republican principle asks that the community’s deliberate sense govern its agents. It does not ask compliance with every gust of passion, nor with flatterers who court the people’s prejudices and betray them. The people commonly intend the public good, even in their errors. But they do not always reason rightly about the means. Schemers beset them, and the wonder is they err so seldom. When their interests cross their wishes, the guardians they chose must resist the delusion and win them time for cooler thought.
OriginalThere are some who would be inclined to regard the servile pliancy of the Executive to a prevailing current, either in the community or in the legislature, as its best recommendation. But such men entertain very crude notions, as well of the purposes for which government was instituted, as of the true means by which the public happiness may be promoted. The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they intrust the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion, or to every transient impulse which the people may receive from the arts of men, who flatter their prejudices to betray their interests.
It is a just observation, that the people commonly INTEND the PUBLIC GOOD. This often applies to their very errors. But their good sense would despise the adulator who should pretend that they always REASON RIGHT about the MEANS of promoting it. They know from experience that they sometimes err; and the wonder is that they so seldom err as they do, beset, as they continually are, by the wiles of parasites and sycophants, by the snares of the ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate, by the artifices of men who possess their confidence more than they deserve it, and of those who seek to possess rather than to deserve it. When occasions present themselves, in which the interests of the people are at variance with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have appointed to be the guardians of those interests, to withstand the temporary delusion, in order to give them time and opportunity for more cool and sedate reflection. Instances might be cited in which a conduct of this kind has saved the people from very fatal consequences of their own mistakes, and has procured lasting monuments of their gratitude to the men who had courage and magnanimity enough to serve them at the peril of their displeasure.
Whatever deference the Executive owes the people, we cannot claim the like for the legislature’s humors. The legislature may cross the people, or the people may be neutral. Either way, he should dare act his own opinion, with vigor and decision. The rule that divides power also requires each branch to stand free of the others. Why separate the executive or the judiciary from the legislature if both lie at its mercy? To be subordinate to the laws is one thing, to depend on the legislature another. The first agrees with good government. The second breaks it, and puts all power in one hand, whatever the Constitution’s forms.
OriginalBut however inclined we might be to insist upon an unbounded complaisance in the Executive to the inclinations of the people, we can with no propriety contend for a like complaisance to the humors of the legislature. The latter may sometimes stand in opposition to the former, and at other times the people may be entirely neutral. In either supposition, it is certainly desirable that the Executive should be in a situation to dare to act his own opinion with vigor and decision.
The same rule which teaches the propriety of a partition between the various branches of power, teaches us likewise that this partition ought to be so contrived as to render the one independent of the other. To what purpose separate the executive or the judiciary from the legislative, if both the executive and the judiciary are so constituted as to be at the absolute devotion of the legislative? Such a separation must be merely nominal, and incapable of producing the ends for which it was established. It is one thing to be subordinate to the laws, and another to be dependent on the legislative body. The first comports with, the last violates, the fundamental principles of good government; and, whatever may be the forms of the Constitution, unites all power in the same hands.
Earlier papers showed how the legislature tends to absorb every other power. In purely republican governments it is almost impossible to stop. Its members sometimes fancy that they are the people themselves, and often seem ready to rule the other branches. The people are commonly on their side, and their momentum makes it very hard for the others to keep the constitutional balance.
OriginalThe tendency of the legislative authority to absorb every other, has been fully displayed and illustrated by examples in some preceding numbers. In governments purely republican, this tendency is almost irresistible. The representatives of the people, in a popular assembly, seem sometimes to fancy that they are the people themselves, and betray strong symptoms of impatience and disgust at the least sign of opposition from any other quarter; as if the exercise of its rights, by either the executive or judiciary, were a breach of their privilege and an outrage to their dignity. They often appear disposed to exert an imperious control over the other departments; and as they commonly have the people on their side, they always act with such momentum as to make it very difficult for the other members of the government to maintain the balance of the Constitution.
How can a short term affect the Executive’s independence, unless one branch could appoint or remove the other? One answer we have already: a man cares little for a short-lived gain, and will risk little for it. Another is the legislature’s sway over the people. It might block the re-election of a man who resisted its sinister projects. Does four years answer the end? If not, a shorter term at least guards better against ambition. It may beat a longer one still too short to inspire firmness.
OriginalIt may perhaps be asked, how the shortness of the duration in office can affect the independence of the Executive on the legislature, unless the one were possessed of the power of appointing or displacing the other. One answer to this inquiry may be drawn from the principle already remarked that is, from the slender interest a man is apt to take in a short-lived advantage, and the little inducement it affords him to expose himself, on account of it, to any considerable inconvenience or hazard. Another answer, perhaps more obvious, though not more conclusive, will result from the consideration of the influence of the legislative body over the people; which might be employed to prevent the re-election of a man who, by an upright resistance to any sinister project of that body, should have made himself obnoxious to its resentment.
It may be asked also, whether a duration of four years would answer the end proposed; and if it would not, whether a less period, which would at least be recommended by greater security against ambitious designs, would not, for that reason, be preferable to a longer period, which was, at the same time, too short for the purpose of inspiring the desired firmness and independence of the magistrate.
We cannot claim that any fixed term fully answers the end, yet four years shapes the character of the government. It always leaves a long interval. In it the prospect of losing office is far enough off not to unsettle a man of ordinary courage. He may reasonably expect time to win the community to his measures. As the election nears, his firmness would likely decline, yet it would draw on the esteem his earlier service had won.
OriginalIt cannot be affirmed, that a duration of four years, or any other limited duration, would completely answer the end proposed; but it would contribute towards it in a degree which would have a material influence upon the spirit and character of the government. Between the commencement and termination of such a period, there would always be a considerable interval, in which the prospect of annihilation would be sufficiently remote, not to have an improper effect upon the conduct of a man indued with a tolerable portion of fortitude; and in which he might reasonably promise himself, that there would be time enough before it arrived, to make the community sensible of the propriety of the measures he might incline to pursue.
Though it be probable that, as he approached the moment when the public were, by a new election, to signify their sense of his conduct, his confidence, and with it his firmness, would decline; yet both the one and the other would derive support from the opportunities which his previous continuance in the station had afforded him, of establishing himself in the esteem and good-will of his constituents. He might, then, hazard with safety, in proportion to the proofs he had given of his wisdom and integrity, and to the title he had acquired to the respect and attachment of his fellow-citizens.
A four-year term makes the Executive firm enough to matter, not enough to alarm anyone for public liberty. The British House of Commons began with the mere power to grant or refuse a tax. From that it cut down the crown’s prerogatives and once abolished royalty and aristocracy. If that body did so much, what is to be feared from an elected magistrate of four years, with a President’s confined powers? Only that he might prove unequal to the task the Constitution gives him. I add only this: a term that leaves doubt of his firmness cannot square with fear of his encroachments.
OriginalAs, on the one hand, a duration of four years will contribute to the firmness of the Executive in a sufficient degree to render it a very valuable ingredient in the composition; so, on the other, it is not enough to justify any alarm for the public liberty. If a British House of Commons, from the most feeble beginnings, FROM THE MERE POWER OF ASSENTING OR DISAGREEING TO THE IMPOSITION OF A NEW TAX, have, by rapid strides, reduced the prerogatives of the crown and the privileges of the nobility within the limits they conceived to be compatible with the principles of a free government, while they raised themselves to the rank and consequence of a coequal branch of the legislature;
if they have been able, in one instance, to abolish both the royalty and the aristocracy, and to overturn all the ancient establishments, as well in the Church as State; if they have been able, on a recent occasion, to make the monarch tremble at the prospect of an innovation attempted by them, what would be to be feared from an elective magistrate of four years' duration, with the confined authorities of a President of the United States? What, but that he might be unequal to the task which the Constitution assigns him? I shall only add, that if his duration be such as to leave a doubt of his firmness, that doubt is inconsistent with a jealousy of his encroachments. PUBLIUS
Federalist 72
Generated summaryLetting the President stand for reelection, rather than forcing him out at a fixed term, keeps him working to govern well. It also discourages a departing officeholder from corruption or clinging to power, and lets the country keep an experienced hand at a critical moment.Key points
The President should be re-eligible; barring him after a set term would harm the government far more than help it.
Re-eligibility lets the people keep a proven magistrate, securing the permanence of a wise administration.
Exclusion weakens the inducements to good behavior, since the hope of reward is the strongest spur to fidelity.
It tempts an avaricious or ambitious man to make the most of his brief tenure, even by corrupt or usurping means.
It robs the community of the experience the magistrate has gained, experience being the parent of wisdom.
It banishes men whose service might be indispensable in a war or similar emergency.
It forbids stability, forcing a change of men and so a change of measures.
Its promised gains, independence and security, are speculative, and outweighed by these more certain harms.
The administration of government, broadly, covers all the body politic does. In its exact sense it means executive details. Think of foreign negotiations, plans of finance, spending money the legislature has appropriated, running the army and navy, directing war. The men who manage these matters are the chief magistrate’s deputies. They should hold office by his appointment and answer to his oversight. So his term is tied closely to a stable administration. A new President often proves his worth by undoing his predecessor’s work. He replaces the lower officers, and the result is disgraceful, ruinous instability.
OriginalTHE administration of government, in its largest sense, comprehends all the operations of the body politic, whether legislative, executive, or judiciary; but in its most usual, and perhaps its most precise signification. it is limited to executive details, and falls peculiarly within the province of the executive department. The actual conduct of foreign negotiations, the preparatory plans of finance, the application and disbursement of the public moneys in conformity to the general appropriations of the legislature, the arrangement of the army and navy, the directions of the operations of war--these, and other matters of a like nature, constitute what seems to be most properly understood by the administration of government. The persons, therefore, to whose immediate management these different matters are committed, ought to be considered as the assistants or deputies of the chief magistrate, and on this account, they ought to derive their offices from his appointment, at least from his nomination, and ought to be subject to his superintendence.
This view of the subject will at once suggest to us the intimate connection between the duration of the executive magistrate in office and the stability of the system of administration. To reverse and undo what has been done by a predecessor, is very often considered by a successor as the best proof he can give of his own capacity and desert; and in addition to this propensity, where the alteration has been the result of public choice, the person substituted is warranted in supposing that the dismission of his predecessor has proceeded from a dislike to his measures; and that the less he resembles him, the more he will recommend himself to the favor of his constituents. These considerations, and the influence of personal confidences and attachments, would be likely to induce every new President to promote a change of men to fill the subordinate stations; and these causes together could not fail to occasion a disgraceful and ruinous mutability in the administration of the government.
To a long fixed term I join re-eligibility, the chance to be re-elected. A long term gives the officer the will to play his part well. It gives the community time to judge where his measures tend. Re-eligibility lets the people keep a man they approve, and secures permanence in a wise administration. No plan seems more plausible at first glance, or more ill-founded on inspection. Respectable men urge holding the chief magistrate a set time, then shutting him out, for a period or forever. Temporary or permanent, the effects are nearly the same, and mostly harmful.
OriginalWith a positive duration of considerable extent, I connect the circumstance of re-eligibility. The first is necessary to give to the officer himself the inclination and the resolution to act his part well, and to the community time and leisure to observe the tendency of his measures, and thence to form an experimental estimate of their merits. The last is necessary to enable the people, when they see reason to approve of his conduct, to continue him in his station, in order to prolong the utility of his talents and virtues, and to secure to the government the advantage of permanency in a wise system of administration.
Nothing appears more plausible at first sight, nor more ill-founded upon close inspection, than a scheme which in relation to the present point has had some respectable advocates--I mean that of continuing the chief magistrate in office for a certain time, and then excluding him from it, either for a limited period or forever after. This exclusion, whether temporary or perpetual, would have nearly the same effects, and these effects would be for the most part rather pernicious than salutary.
One ill effect of exclusion would be to weaken the inducements to good behavior. Zeal falls when the office’s rewards must end on a fixed date. It rises when a man may still earn his place by merit. Reward is among the strongest spurs to conduct, and fidelity is best secured by making interest agree with duty. Even the love of fame would turn against great undertakings. A man who must leave a long work to unequal successors will not begin it. From most men we could expect only the merit of doing no harm.
OriginalOne ill effect of the exclusion would be a diminution of the inducements to good behavior. There are few men who would not feel much less zeal in the discharge of a duty when they were conscious that the advantages of the station with which it was connected must be relinquished at a determinate period, than when they were permitted to entertain a hope of obtaining, by meriting, a continuance of them. This position will not be disputed so long as it is admitted that the desire of reward is one of the strongest incentives of human conduct; or that the best security for the fidelity of mankind is to make their interests coincide with their duty. Even the love of fame, the ruling passion of the noblest minds, which would prompt a man to plan and undertake extensive and arduous enterprises for the public benefit, requiring considerable time to mature and perfect them, if he could flatter himself with the prospect of being allowed to finish what he had begun, would, on the contrary, deter him from the undertaking, when he foresaw that he must quit the scene before he could accomplish the work, and must commit that, together with his own reputation, to hands which might be unequal or unfriendly to the task. The most to be expected from the generality of men, in such a situation, is the negative merit of not doing harm, instead of the positive merit of doing good.
Another ill effect would be temptation to sordid aims, to embezzlement, and in some cases to usurpation. A greedy man near the end of his term would make the brief harvest abundant. With a longer prospect he might rest content with his regular benefits. His avarice would guard his avarice. If good conduct could prolong his honors, vanity might check his greed. A fixed end lets greed win. An ambitious man at the summit, sure no merit can save him from the fall, would be violently tempted to prolong his power. He would feel that pull far less if duty could secure the same end.
OriginalAnother ill effect of the exclusion would be the temptation to sordid views, to peculation, and, in some instances, to usurpation. An avaricious man, who might happen to fill the office, looking forward to a time when he must at all events yield up the emoluments he enjoyed, would feel a propensity, not easy to be resisted by such a man, to make the best use of the opportunity he enjoyed while it lasted, and might not scruple to have recourse to the most corrupt expedients to make the harvest as abundant as it was transitory; though the same man, probably, with a different prospect before him, might content himself with the regular perquisites of his situation, and might even be unwilling to risk the consequences of an abuse of his opportunities. His avarice might be a guard upon his avarice. Add to this that the same man might be vain or ambitious, as well as avaricious. And if he could expect to prolong his honors by his good conduct, he might hesitate to sacrifice his appetite for them to his appetite for gain. But with the prospect before him of approaching an inevitable annihilation, his avarice would be likely to get the victory over his caution, his vanity, or his ambition.
An ambitious man, too, when he found himself seated on the summit of his country's honors, when he looked forward to the time at which he must descend from the exalted eminence for ever, and reflected that no exertion of merit on his part could save him from the unwelcome reverse; such a man, in such a situation, would be much more violently tempted to embrace a favorable conjuncture for attempting the prolongation of his power, at every personal hazard, than if he had the probability of answering the same end by doing his duty.
Would it serve the peace of the community, or the stability of the government, to have half a dozen men who had once risen to the supreme magistracy? They would then wander among the people like discontented ghosts, sighing for a place they are destined never to hold again.
OriginalWould it promote the peace of the community, or the stability of the government to have half a dozen men who had had credit enough to be raised to the seat of the supreme magistracy, wandering among the people like discontented ghosts, and sighing for a place which they were destined never more to possess?
A third ill effect of exclusion is to rob the community of the experience the chief magistrate gains in office. No quality matters more in the first magistrate of a nation, yet exclusion puts it under a constitutional ban. The moment a man gains that experience, he must leave the station that taught it. A fourth ill effect is to banish men whose service the state may urgently need. Changing the chief magistrate at the outbreak of a war would trade experience for inexperience, even if the successor had equal merit. It would also unsettle a settled administration.
OriginalA third ill effect of the exclusion would be, the depriving the community of the advantage of the experience gained by the chief magistrate in the exercise of his office. That experience is the parent of wisdom, is an adage the truth of which is recognized by the wisest as well as the simplest of mankind. What more desirable or more essential than this quality in the governors of nations? Where more desirable or more essential than in the first magistrate of a nation? Can it be wise to put this desirable and essential quality under the ban of the Constitution, and to declare that the moment it is acquired, its possessor shall be compelled to abandon the station in which it was acquired, and to which it is adapted? This, nevertheless, is the precise import of all those regulations which exclude men from serving their country, by the choice of their fellowcitizens, after they have by a course of service fitted themselves for doing it with a greater degree of utility.
A fourth ill effect of the exclusion would be the banishing men from stations in which, in certain emergencies of the state, their presence might be of the greatest moment to the public interest or safety. There is no nation which has not, at one period or another, experienced an absolute necessity of the services of particular men in particular situations; perhaps it would not be too strong to say, to the preservation of its political existence. How unwise, therefore, must be every such self-denying ordinance as serves to prohibit a nation from making use of its own citizens in the manner best suited to its exigencies and circumstances! Without supposing the personal essentiality of the man, it is evident that a change of the chief magistrate, at the breaking out of a war, or at any similar crisis, for another, even of equal merit, would at all times be detrimental to the community, inasmuch as it would substitute inexperience to experience, and would tend to unhinge and set afloat the already settled train of the administration.
A fifth ill effect is that exclusion bans stability in the administration by constitutional rule. Forcing a change of men in the first office forces a change of measures. Men rarely change while measures stay the same. We need not fear too much stability while the people can still choose otherwise. These disadvantages tell most against a perpetual exclusion. But a partial one makes return so remote that they apply nearly as fully.
OriginalA fifth ill effect of the exclusion would be, that it would operate as a constitutional interdiction of stability in the administration. By necessitating a change of men, in the first office of the nation, it would necessitate a mutability of measures. It is not generally to be expected, that men will vary and measures remain uniform. The contrary is the usual course of things. And we need not be apprehensive that there will be too much stability, while there is even the option of changing; nor need we desire to prohibit the people from continuing their confidence where they think it may be safely placed, and where, by constancy on their part, they may obviate the fatal inconveniences of fluctuating councils and a variable policy.
These are some of the disadvantages which would flow from the principle of exclusion. They apply most forcibly to the scheme of a perpetual exclusion; but when we consider that even a partial exclusion would always render the readmission of the person a remote and precarious object, the observations which have been made will apply nearly as fully to one case as to the other.
Two advantages are claimed for exclusion: first, greater independence in the magistrate; second, greater security to the people. Unless the exclusion is perpetual, there is no ground even to claim the first. And even then, may he not have aims or friends for which he would sacrifice his independence? Knowing his time is short, he may be less willing to make enemies by firm conduct. He must soon face their resentment as a private man. Whether the rule promotes his independence or impairs it is hard to say.
OriginalWhat are the advantages promised to counterbalance these disadvantages? They are represented to be: 1st, greater independence in the magistrate; 2d, greater security to the people. Unless the exclusion be perpetual, there will be no pretense to infer the first advantage. But even in that case, may he have no object beyond his present station, to which he may sacrifice his independence? May he have no connections, no friends, for whom he may sacrifice it? May he not be less willing by a firm conduct, to make personal enemies, when he acts under the impression that a time is fast approaching, on the arrival of which he not only MAY, but MUST, be exposed to their resentments, upon an equal, perhaps upon an inferior, footing? It is not an easy point to determine whether his independence would be most promoted or impaired by such an arrangement.
The second claim is weaker. Suppose the exclusion were perpetual. A man of irregular ambition, the only kind worth fearing, would yield power reluctantly. If he had won the people’s favor, he might lead them to resent the rule as a restraint on themselves. Their resentment, joined to his thwarted ambition, could endanger liberty more than simply letting the community keep him in office. Disabling the people from keeping men they judge worthy is an excess of refinement. Its gains are speculative; its costs are certain.
OriginalAs to the second supposed advantage, there is still greater reason to entertain doubts concerning it. If the exclusion were to be perpetual, a man of irregular ambition, of whom alone there could be reason in any case to entertain apprehension, would, with infinite reluctance, yield to the necessity of taking his leave forever of a post in which his passion for power and pre-eminence had acquired the force of habit. And if he had been fortunate or adroit enough to conciliate the good-will of the people, he might induce them to consider as a very odious and unjustifiable restraint upon themselves, a provision which was calculated to debar them of the right of giving a fresh proof of their attachment to a favorite. There may be conceived circumstances in which this disgust of the people, seconding the thwarted ambition of such a favorite, might occasion greater danger to liberty, than could ever reasonably be dreaded from the possibility of a perpetuation in office, by the voluntary suffrages of the community, exercising a constitutional privilege.
There is an excess of refinement in the idea of disabling the people to continue in office men who had entitled themselves, in their opinion, to approbation and confidence; the advantages of which are at best speculative and equivocal, and are overbalanced by disadvantages far more certain and decisive. PUBLIUS
