§ 15. The president and vice-president go into office on the 4th day of March next after their election, and end their term on the 3d day of March, four years thereafter; the same days on which senators every six years, and representatives every two years, commence and end their rcgular terms of office.

CHAPTER XL.

POWERS AND DUTIES OF THE PRESIDENT; TREATIES; PUBLIC MINISTERS; APPOINTMENTS AND REMOVALS.

§ 1. THE powers and duties of the president are enumerated in the 2d and 3d sections of the 1st article of the constitution. He is made 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. It has been observed, that singleness of purpose, promptitude of action, and responsibility, are indispensable to a successful exercise of the powers and duties of an executive; and that these are supposed to be best se cured by vesting the executive power in a single person. (Chap. XXXIX. sec. 3.) To execute the laws, to suppress insurrections, and carry on war, are executive duties; and it is highly proper that the president should have the command of the public forces.

§ 2. The president has also the power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment. The necessity of this power arises from the fallibility of courts of justice. Through partial or false testimony, errors in conducting trials, or the mistakes of judges and juries, a person may be unjustly convicted; or the offense may have been attended with palliating or mitigating circumstances. It is proper, therefore, that there should be lodged somewhere a power to mitigate the sentence, or postpone its execution, or to remit the punishment, as the case may seem to require; and in no other hands, it is presumed, would this power be more judiciously exercised than in those of the executive. Hence

the same power is given to the governors of the states. (Chap. XVI, § 4.)

§3. The next clause confers on the president the power, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, to make treaties, to appoint embassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the supreme court, and other officers. A treaty is an agreement between two nations. Treaties are made to restore or preserve peace, and sometimes to regulate trade, between nations. It is plain, therefore, that this power ought to be in the national government. In monarchical governments it resides in the king. To confide so important a trust to the president alone, would be imprudent. To associate the house of representatives with the president and senate, as in the enactment of laws, would render it impossible to act with the decision, secrecy, firmness and dispatch, which are sometimes necessary in negotiating treaties.

§ 4. The power of making treaties, being neither wholly executive, nor wholly legislative, but partaking of the nature of both, a part of the legislature-the body combining more of stability, energy, and experience, and, from its being less numerous, capable of acting more promptly, as well as being more easily convened, and at less expenseappears to be very properly associated with the executive in the exercise of this power. So the power "to appoint embassadors, ministers," or other agents, by whom treaties are negotiated, seems to be with equal propriety placed in the same hands.

§ 5. In making a treaty, the terms are arranged and agreed upon by the agents of two governments; and the articles of agreement are sent to their respective governments to be ratified. Both governments must ratify, or the treaty fails. What is meant by the president and senate's making treaties, is their approving and sanctioning, or, as it is usually called, ratifying them. Treaties are sometimes negotiated by persons appointed by the two governments for that special purpose; at other times by the permanent representatives or ministers of the respective governments.

6. Each of the principal civilized nations has some of ficer at home, who acts as agent in negotiating treaties and transacting other business with foreign governments; and has also a representative at the seat of each foreign go

vernment, to transact business for his nation, and to keep his government advised of what is done abroad. Hence, there are at the city of Washington, a minister from Great Britain, one from France, one from Russia, and one from each of the other principal governments of Europe and America. And our government has a minister residing at the seat of government of each of those countries. The officer of our government who corresponds with foreign ministers, and with our ministers abroad, is the secretary of state.

§ 7. Representatives at foreign courts are differently styled, embassadors, envoys, ministers, and charges des affaires, commonly written chargês d'affaires. An embassador who is intrusted with the ordinary business of a minister at a foreign court, is called an embassador in ordinary. An embassador extraordinary is a person sent on a particular occasion, who returns as soon as the business on which he was sent is done. He is sometimes called envoy; and when he has full power to act as he may deem expedient, he is called envoy plenipotentiary; the latter word signifying full power. An ordinary embassador resides abroad, and acts in obedience to instructions sent him from time to time.

§ 8. Agents sent by the United States to reside at foreign courts, are usually called ministers, especially those sent to the principal or more important countries. Chargés d'affaires are ministers of a lower grade, and are sent to inferior countries, or those with whom we have less important relations. The name is French, and is pronounced shar-zha-daf-fair, accented on the first and last syllables. It means a person having charge of the affairs of his nation.

§ 9. Consuls reside in foreign seaports. Their business is to aid their respective governments in their commercial transactions with such foreign countries, and to protect the rights, commerce, merchants, and seamen of their own nation. Hence much of their business is with masters of vessels, and with merchants. They also dispose of the per sonal estate left by the citizens of the United States, who die within their consulates, leaving no representative or partner in trade to take care of their effects.

§ 10. The president has power also, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, to appoint judges of the su

preme court, the head officers of the several executive departments, and a great number and variety of other officers. The election of judges of the supreme court of the United States by the people, would be not only inconvenient but injudicious. And as a president is in a measure responsible for the acts of his subordinates in the several executive departments, and as without their coöperation and advice he could scarcely carry out his own measures; the appointment is properly given to the executive; and by being required to submit his choice to the body of senators, a sufficient safeguard is provided against the appointment of unworthy or incompetent men.

§ 11. The president has 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 the next session. (Sec. 2, cl. 3.) Without such a power somewhere, the public interests would often suffer injury before the next regular session of the senate, or even before that body could be convened in extraordinary session. And as the president is responsible for the faithful performance of the duties of the subordinate executive officers, no danger was apprehended from his having the power alone to fill vacancies until the next session of the senate.

§ 12. In the exercise of powers claimed under the two preceding clauses, two important questions have arisen since the organization of the government. First: Is the consent of the senate required in the removal as well as in the appointment of an executive officer? From the silence of the constitution on the subject of removal, it has been inferred by many of the ablest statesmen, including some who were most conspicuous among the framers of the constitution that "the consent of the senate was as necessary to displace as to appoint :" otherwise the president might defeat the object of this provision, which was intended to guard against the abuse of the appointing power. He might, immediately after the close of each session of the senate, remove any officer at pleasure, and appoint some favorite who would hold until the expiration of the next session of the senate; and if, to secure the consent of the senate, he should be compelled to nominate an acceptable person, he might, immediately after the adjournment of that body, remove the newly appointed incumbent, and

reäppoint the obnoxious favorite. Or, if the senate should refuse to confirm an appointment made during the recess, he may, as some suppose, after the adjournment, reäppoint the same person or any other. Or he may thus reappoint after the expiration of each session of the senate, even without having made any nomination during the session.

§ 13. This suggests the other question: Does the power to fill vacancies authorize such appointments? It has been alleged that, when an office expires, by its own limitation, with the session of the senate, a vacancy cannot be truly said to have happened during the recess, in the meaning of the constitution. The object of the framers doubtless was to prevent the continuance in office of any appointee, without the consent of the senate, after the close of the next session. In 1831, a vacancy was filled by the president, during the recess of the senate. At the ensuing session, the person appointed was three times nominated, and as often rejectedthe last time on the last night of the session, and in the face of a previous declaration of the president, that he would nominate no other person. Immediately after the adjournment, the incumbent was reäppointed by the president. The constitutionality of the reappointment was called in question, but was sustained by the opinion of the attorney-general. The mere opinion, however, of a single individual, holding his office at the will of the president, in the only case of the kind on record, is regarded by many as insufficient to settle this question.

14. But the doctrine of the power of removal by the president alone, rests on a better foundation-the practice of the government. In organizing the auxiliary executive departments by the first congress, the question arose, whether the officers of these departments could be removed by the president, independently of the senate. It was argued, that, as the president and senate were associated in making appointments, the fair inference was, that they must agree in removals. This power in the hands of the president alone, it was further said, was dangerous to liberty, monarchical, and would convert executive officers into mere instruments of his will. In reply it was said, that the power of removal was completely executive. The president must see the laws faithfully executed; but this was