Editors Note: The major purpose of American Free News Network, is education; education on American Civics and how our government is supposed to work. John Parillo has put forth a stellar effort to explain not only what the Framers did when they wrote our Constitution, but why.
Ed
Hamilton continues in Federalist 71 to explore the nature of the presidency. In the last paper he discussed how the President must be energetic. He was arguing against dividing the position of the chief executive into parts because it would dilute the unity needed in that position, and would make it possible to evade accountability.
In this paper, Hamilton discusses the “DURATION”[1] of the Presidential terms. He feels that stability is necessary in this position because, as human nature tells us, “a man will be interested in whatever he possesses, in proportion to the firmness or precariousness of the tenure by which he holds it” and that he “will be less attached to what he holds by a momentary or uncertain title”. In other words, if the duration of the office is too short, the person holding it will not put forth the required effort to do a good job in performing the role. A person who knows that they will be inconsequential would be susceptible to “feebleness” in that position.
Hamilton recognizes that there are people who would prefer that the Presidency be subservient to the legislature. After all, the House of Representatives was to be elected by the people, and the Senate, by the various state legislatures. Keeping the Presidency weak would naturally make our government more democratic. But, as we have discussed extensively before, while the founders wanted the people to be represented in the new republic, they did not believe that unrestrained democracy was a good thing.
There were benefits to ensuring that the new government was not subject to “every transient impulse which the people may receive from the arts of men”. Taming the baser impulses of the general population was as wise a policy then as it is today. From time to time, we can see popular opinions that may seem reasonable, that garner large and vocal popular support, but upon reflection would be damaging to our Republic. For this reason, the popularly selected Congress needs to be offset by a more distantly selected President who has the power of “audit”.
Remember that in our Republic, the President cannot make any law (modern misuse of executive orders are a perversion of this principle), but he can “audit” the worst popular ideas that are put forth by the “wiles of parasites and sycophants” that often influence the popular passions by using the power of the veto. When those passions are aroused, a President with sufficient duration may temper the “temporary delusion” of the people and provide a more “sedate reflection” of the issues that face the nation.
To those who felt that the President should be a popular reflection of the people, Hamilton points out that in passionate situations, where the people through their representatives are willing to respond as a mob, it is the role of the President to “dare to act his own opinion with vigor and decision” and make calm and reasoned decisions regardless of their popularity.
Hamilton goes on to point out that the very separations of power that make this constitution so unique would be harmed by making the selection process for any two branches similar. If the Presidency and the Congress were both selected using the same manner, they would be subject to the same popular passions “and incapable of producing the ends for which it was established.” If both branches are popularly elected, how can they serve as checks on each other? In yet another message to us today, Hamilton writes of the Congress:
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.
The thwarting of the will of Congress, by either the Executive branch or the Judiciary, is yet another feature of our republic, designed to help ensure our freedoms. The Presidential term duration of four years was thought to be sufficient for him to want to exercise his “audit” authority, but not so long as to cause him be tempted by “ambitious designs”. At the end of his four years the President, should he want to remain in that position, would need to convince the population that neither the “sense of his conduct, his confidence, and with it his firmness, would decline” or else he would likely be replaced.
Hamilton points out that his opponents cannot have it both ways. If the presidency is too weak, then there should be no objection to a term of four years. If the position is too monarchial, then his opponents must acknowledge that it is limited by the fact that there is no legislation that the President can enact alone by simply using his own pen.
Indeed.
- All quotes are from https://guides.loc.gov/federalist-papers/text-71-80 ↑
To read all of John Parillo’s work on the Federalist Papers, check here.
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