most assuredly, that the writer of the Protest, in these passages, was reasoning upon the British Constitution, and not upon the Constitution of the United States. Indeed, he professes to found himself on authority drawn from the constitution of England. I will read, Sir, the whole passage. It is this:—

"In strict accordance with this principle, the power of removal, which, like that of appointment, is an original executive power, is left unchecked by the Constitution in relation to all executive officers, for whose conduct the President is responsible; while it is taken from him in relation to judicial officers, for whose acts he is not responsible. In the government from which many of the fundamental principles of our system are derived, the head of the executive department originally had power to appoint and remove at will all officers, executive and judicial. It was to take the judges out of this general power of removal, and thus make them independent of the Executive, that the tenure of their offices was changed to good behavior. Nor is it conceivable why they are placed, in our Constitution, upon a tenure different from that of all other officers appointed by the Executive, unless it be for the same purpose.

Mr. President, I do most solemnly protest (if I, too, may be permitted to make a protest) against this mode of reasoning. The analogy between the British constitution and ours, in this respect, is not close enough to guide us safely; it can only mislead us. It has entirely misled the writer of the Protest. The President is made to argue, upon this subject, as if he had some right anterior to the Constitution, which right is, by that instrument, checked, in some respects, and in other respects is left unchecked; but which, nevertheless, still derives its being from another source; just as the British king had, in the early ages of the monarchy, an uncontrolled right of appointing and removing all officers at pleasure; but which right, so far as it respects the judges, has since been checked and controlled by act of Parliament; the right being original and inherent, the check only imposed by law. Sir, I distrust altogether British precedents, authorities, and analogies, on such questions as this. We are not inquiring how far our Constitution has imposed checks on a preexisting authority. We are inquiring what extent of power that Constitution has granted. The grant of power, the whole source of power, as well as the restrictions and limitations which are imposed on it, is made in and by the Constitution. It has no other origin. And it is this, Sir, which distinguishes our system so very widely and materially from the systems of Europe. Our governments are limited governments; limited in their origin, in their very creation; limited, because none but

specific powers were ever granted either to any department of government, or to the whole: theirs are limited, whenever limited at all, by reason of restraints, imposed at different times, on governments originally unlimited and despotic. Our American questions, therefore, must be discussed, reasoned on, decided, and settled, on the appropriate principles of our own constitutions, and not by inapplicable precedents, and loose analogies, drawn from foreign states.

Mr. President, in one of the French comedies, as you know, in which the dullness and prolixity of legal argument is intended to be severely satirized, while the advocate is tediously groping among ancient lore having nothing to do with his case, the judge grows impatient, and at last cries out to him to come down to the flood! I really wish, Sir, that the writer of this Protest, since he was discussing matters of the highest importance to us as Americans, and which arise out of our own peculiar Constitution, had kept himself, not only on this side the general deluge, but also on this side the Atlantic. I desire that all the broad waves of that wide sea should continue to roll between us and the influence of those foreign principles and foreign precedents, which he so eagerly adopts.

In asserting power for an American President, I prefer he should attempt to maintain his assertions on American reasons. I know not, Sir, who the writer was (I wish I did), but, whoever he was, it is manifest that he argues this part of his case, throughout, on the principles of the constitution of England. It is true, that, in England, the king is regarded as the original fountain of all honor and all office; and that anciently, indeed, he possessed all political power of every kind. It is true that this mass of authority, in the history of that government, has been diminished, restrained, and controlled, by charters, by immunities, by grants, and by various modifications, which the friends of liberty have, at different periods, been able to obtain or to impose. All liberty, as we know, all popular privileges, as indeed the word itself imports, were formerly considered as favors and concessions from the monarch. But whenever and wherever civil freedom could get a foothold, and could maintain itself, these favors were turned into rights. Before and during the reigns of the princes of the Stuart family, they were acknowledged only as favors or privileges graciously allowed, although, even then, whenever opportunity offered, as in the instance to which I alluded just now, they were contended for as rights; and by the revolution of 1688, they were acknowledged as rights in England, by the prince who then ascended the throne, and as the condition on which he was allowed to sit upon it. But, with us, there never was a time when we acknowledged original, unrestrained, sovereign power over us. Our constitutions are not

made to limit and restrain preexisting authority. They are the instruments by which the people confer power on their own servants. If I may use a legal phrase, the people are grantors, not grantees. They give to the Government, and to each branch of it, all the power it possesses, or can possess; and what is not given, they retain. In England, before her revolution, and in the rest of Europe since, if we would know the extent of liberty or popular right, we must go to grants, to charters, to allowances, and indulgences. But with us, we go to grants and to constitutions to learn the extent of the powers of Government. No political power is more original than the Constitution; none is possessed which is not there granted; and the grant, and the limitations in the grant, are in the same instrument.

The powers, therefore, belonging to any branch of our Government, are to be construed and settled, not by remote analogies, drawn from other governments, but from the words of the grant itself, in their plain sense and necessary import, and according to an interpretation consistent with our own history and the spirit of our own institutions. And I will never agree that a President of the United States holds the whole undivided power of office in his own hands, upon the theory that he is responsible for the entire action of the whole body of those engaged in carrying on the Government and executing the laws. Such a responsibility is purely ideal, delusive, and vain. There is, there can be, no substantial responsibility, any further than every individual is answerable, not merely in his reputation, not merely in the opinion of mankind, but to the law, for the faithful discharge of his own appropriate duties. Again and again we hear it said that the President is responsible to the American people! that he is responsible to the bar of public opinion! For whatever he does, he assumes accountability to the American people! For whatever he omits, he expects to be brought to the high bar of public opinion! And this is thought enough for a limited, restrained, republican government! an undefined, undefinable, ideal responsibility to the public judgment! Sir, if all this mean any thing, if it be not empty sound, it means no less than that the President may do any thing and every thing which he may expect to be tolerated in doing. He may go just so far as he thinks it safe to go; and Cromwell and Bonaparte went no farther. I ask again, Sir, Is this legal responsibility? Is this the true nature of a government with written laws and limited powers? And allow me, Sir, to ask, too, if an executive magistrate, while professing to act under the Constitution, is restrained only by this responsibility to public opinion, what prevents him, on the same responsibility, from proposing a change in that Constitution? Why may he not say, "I am about to introduce new forms, new principles, and with a new spirit; I am about to try a political

experiment, on a great scale; and when I get through with it, I shall be responsible to the American people, I shall be answerable to the bar of public opinion?"

Connected, Sir, with the idea of this airy and unreal responsibility to the public, is another sentiment, which, of late, we hear frequently expressed; and that is, that the President is the direct representative of the American people. This is declared, in the Protest, in so many words: "The President," says the Protest, "is the direct representative of the American people." Now, Sir, this is not the language of the Constitution. The Constitution no where calls him the representative of the American people; still less their direct representative. It could not do so with the least propriety. He is not chosen directly by the people, but by a body of electors, some of whom are chosen by the people, and some of whom are appointed by the State Legislatures. Where, then, is the authority for saying that the President is the direct representative of the people? The Constitution calls the members of the other House, Representatives, and declares that they shall be chosen by the people; and there are no other direct or immediate representatives of the people in this Government. The Constitution denominates the President simply the President of the United States; it points out the complex mode of electing him, defines his powers and duties, and imposes limits and restraints on his authority. With these powers and duties, and under these restraints, he becomes, when chosen, President of the United States. That is his character, and the denomination of his office. How is it, then, that, on this official character, thus cautiously created, limited, and defined, he is to engraft another, and a very imposing character, viz. the character of the direct representative of the American people? I hold this, Sir, to be mere assumption, and dangerous assumption. If he is the representative of all the American people, he is the only representative which they all have. Nobody else presumes to represent all the people. And if he may be allowed to consider himself as the SOLE REPRESENTATIVE OF ALL THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, and is to act under no other responsibility than such as I have already described, then I say, Sir, that the Government (I will not say the people) has already a master. I deny the sentiment, therefore, and I protest against the language; neither the sentiment nor the language is to be found in the Constitution of the country; and whosoever is not satisfied to describe the powers of the President in the language of the Constitution, may be justly suspected of being as little satisfied with the powers themselves. The President is President. His office and his name of office are known, and both are fixed and described by law. Being commander of the army and navy, holding the power of nominating to office and removing from office, and being,

by these powers, the fountain of all patronage and all favor, what does he not become if he be allowed to superadd to all this the character of single representative of the American people? Sir, he becomes, what America has not been accustomed to see, what this Constitution has never created, and what I cannot contemplate, but with profound alarm. He who may call himself the single representative of a nation, may speak in the name of the nation; may undertake to wield the power of the nation; and who shall gainsay him, in whatsoever he chooses to pronounce as the nation's will?

I will now, Sir, ask leave to recapitulate the general doctrines of this Protest, and to present them together. They are

That neither branch of the Legislature can take up, or consider, for the purpose of censure, any official act of the President, without some view to legislation or impeachment;

That not only the passage, but the discussion of the resolution of the Senate of the 28th of March, was unauthorized by the Constitution, and repugnant to its provisions;

That the custody of the public treasury always must be intrusted to the Executive; that Congress cannot take it out of his hands, nor place it any where, except with such superintendents and keepers as are appointed by him, responsible to him, and removable at his will;

That the whole executive power is in the President, and that, therefore, the duty of defending the integrity of the Constitution results to him from the very nature of his office; and that the founders of our republic have attested their sense of the importance of this duty, and, by expressing it in his official oath, have given to it peculiar solemnity and force;

That, as he is to take care that the laws be faithfully executed, he is thereby made responsible for the entire action of the Executive Department, with power of appointing, overseeing, and controlling, those who execute the laws;

That the power of removal from office, like that of appointment, is an original executive power, and is left in his hands, unchecked by the Constitution, except in the case of judges; that, being responsible for the exercise of the whole executive power, he has a right to employ agents of his own choice to assist him in the performance of his duties, and to discharge them when he is no longer willing to be responsible for their acts;

That the Secretaries are his Secretaries, and all persons appointed to offices created by law, except the judges, his agents, responsible to him, and removable at his pleasure;

And, finally, that he is the direct representative of the American people.

These, Sir, are some of the leading propositions, contained in