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On this subject I can speak with certainty, and I embrace with pleasure this opportunity for explanation. The duty of designating the printers of the laws appertains to the office which I lately filled. The selection is usually made at the commencement of every session of congress. It was made by me, without any particular consultation with the president, or any member of his cabinet. In making it, I felt under no greater obligation to select the publisher of the laws of the previous year, than an individual feels himself bound to insert a succeeding advertisement in the same paper which published his last. The law does not require it, but leaves the secretary of state at liberty to make the selection according to his sense of propriety. A publisher of the laws is not an officer of the government. It has been judicially so decided. He holds no commission. The accuracy of the statement, therefore, that no officer of the government was dismissed by the late administration, in consequence of his political opinions, is not impaired by the few changes of publishers of the laws which were made.

But if they had been officers of government, who could have imagined that those who objected to the removal, would so soon have themselves put in practice a general and sweeping system of exclusion.

The president is invested with the tremendous power of dismis sion, to be exercised for the public good, and not to gratify any private passions or purposes. It was conferred to prevent the public from suffering through faithless or incompetent officers. It was made summary because, if the slow progress of trial before a judicial tribunal were resorted to, the public might be greatly injured during the progress and prior to the decision of the case. But it never was in the contemplation of congress, that the power would or could be applied to the removal of competent, diligent, and faithful officers. Such an application of it is an act of arbitrary power, and a great abuse.

I regret extremely that I feel constrained to notice the innovation upon the principles and practice of our institutions now in progress. I had most anxiously hoped, that I could heartily approve the acts and measures of the new administration. And I yet hope that it will pause, and hereafter pursue a course more in unison with the spirit of a free government. I entreat my friends and fellowcitizens, here and elsewhere, to be persuaded that I now perform a painful duty; and that it is far from my wish to say one word that can indict any wound upon the feelings of any of them. I think, indeed, that it is the duty of all of them to exercise their judgments freely and independently on what is passing; and that none ought to feel themselves restrained, by false pride, or by any part which they took in the late election, from condemning what their hearts cannot approve.

Knowing the imputations to which I expose myself, I would

remain silent if I did not solemnly believe that there was serious cause of alarm in the principle of removal, which has been recently acted on. Hitherto, the uniform practice of the government has been, where charges are preferred against public officers, foreign or domestic, to transmit to them a copy of the charges, for the purpose of refutation or explanation. This has been considered an equitable substitute to the more tedious and formal trials before judicial tribunals. But now, persons are dismissed, not only without trial of any sort, but without charge. And, as if the intention were to defy public opinion, and to give to the acts of power a higher degree of enormity, in some instances the persons dismissed have carried with them, in their pockets, the strongest testimonials to their ability and integrity, furnished by the very instruments employed to execute the purposes of oppression. If the new administration had found these discharged officers wanting in a zealous coöperation to execute the laws, in consequence of their preference at the preceding election, there would have been ground for their removal. But this has not been pretended; and to show that it formed no consideration, they have been dismissed among its first acts, without affording them an opportunity of manifesting that their sense of public duty was unaffected by the choice which they had at the preceding election.

I will not dwell on the injustice and individual distress which are the necessary consequences of these acts of authority. Men who accepted public employments entered on them with the implied understanding, that they would be retained as long as they continued to discharge their duties to the public honestly, ably, and assiduously. All their private arrangements are made accordingly. To be dismissed without fault, and without trial; to be expelled, with their families, without the means of support, and in some instances disqualified by age or by official habits from the pursuit of any other business, and all this to be done upon the will of one man, in a free government, was surely intolerable oppression.

Our institutions proclaim, reason enjoins, and conscience requires, that every freeman shall exercise the elective franchise freely and independently; and that among the candidates for his suffrage, he shall fearlessly bestow it upon him who will best advance the interests of his country. The presumption is, that this is always done, unless the contrary appears. But if the consequence of such a performance of patriotic duty is to be punishment; if an honest and sincere preference of A. to J. is to be treated as a crime, then our dearest privilege is a mockery, and our institutions are snares.

During the reign of Bonaparte, upon one of those occasions in which he affected to take the sense of the French people as to his being made consul for life, or emperor, an order was sent to the French armies to collect their suffrages. They were told in a

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public proclamation, that they were authorized and requested to vote freely, according to the dictates of their best judgments, and their honest convictions. But a mandate was privately circulated among them, importing that if any soldier voted against Bonaparte, he should be instantly shot.

Is there any other difference, except in the mode of punishment, between that case and the arbitrary removal of men from their public stations, for no other reasons, than that of an honest and conscientious preference of one presidential candidate to another? And can it be doubted, that the spirit which prompts these removals is restrained from being extended to all, in private life, who manifested a similar preference, only by barriers which it dare not yet break down? But should public opinion sanction them, how long will these barriers remain?

One of the worst consequences of the introduction of this tenure of public office will be, should it be permanently adopted, to substitute for a system of responsibility, founded upon the ability and integrity with which public officers discharge their duties to the community, a system of universal rapacity. Incumbents, feeling the instability of their situations, and knowing their liability to periodical removals, at short terms, without any regard to the manner in which they have executed their trusts, will be disposed to make the most of their uncertain offices while they hold them. And hence we may expect innumerable cases of fraud, peculation, and corruption.

President Jackson commenced his official career on the fourth of March last, with every motive which should operate on the human heart to urge him to forget the prejudices and passions which had been exhibited in the previous contest, and to practice dignified moderation and forbearance. He had been the choice of a considerable majority of the people, and was elected by a large majority of the electoral votes. He had been elected mainly from the all-powerful influence of gratitude for his brilliant military services, in spite of doubts and fears entertained by many who contributed to his elevation. He was far advanced in years, and if fame speak true, was suffering under the joint infirmities of age and disease. He had recently been visited by one of the severest afflictions of Providence, in the privation of the partner of his bosom, whom he is represented to have tenderly loved, and who warmly returned all his affection. He had no child on whom to cast his honors. Under such circumstances, was ever man more imperiously called upon to stifle all the vindictive passions of his nature, to quell every rebellious feeling of his heart, and to dedicate the short residue of his life to the God who had so long blessed and spared him, and to the country which had so greatly honored him?

I sincerely hope that he will yet do this. I hope so for the sake of human nature, and for the sake of his own reputation. Whether

he has, during the two months of his administration, so conducted himself, let facts tell and history pronounce. Truth is mighty, and will prevail.

It was objected to Mr. Adams, that by appointing several members of congress to public places, he endangered the purity of the body, and established a precedent fraught with the most dangerous consequences. And president Jackson, (no, he begged. his pardon, it was candidate Jackson,) was so much alarmed by these appointments, for the integrity and permanency of our institutions, that in a solemn communication which he made to the legislature of Tennessee, he declared his firm conviction to be, that no member of congress ought to be appointed to any office except a seat upon the bench. And he added, that he himself would conform to that rule.

During the four years of Mr. Adams's administration, the whole number of appointments made by him from congress, did not exceed four or five. In the first four weeks of that of his successor, more than double that number have been appointed by him. In the first two months of president Jackson's administration, he has appointed more members of congress to public office, than I believe. were appointed by any one of his predecessors during their whole period of four or eight years. And it appears, that no office is too high or too low to be bestowed by him on this favored class, from that of a head of a department, down to an inconsiderable collectorship, or even a subordinate office under a collector. If I have not been misimformed, a representative from the greatest commercial metropolis in the United States, has recently been appointed to some inferior station, by the collector of the port of New York.

Without meaning to assert as a general principle, that in no case would it be proper that a resort should be had to the halls of congress, to draw from them tried talents, and experienced public servants, to aid in the executive or judicial departments, all must agree, that such a resort should not be too often made and that there should be some limit both as to the number and the nature of the appointments. And I do sincerely think, that this limit has, in both particulars, been transcended beyond all safe bounds, and so as to excite serious apprehensions.

It is not, however, my opinion, but that of president Jackson, which the public has now to consider. Having declared to the American people, through the Tennessee legislature, the danger of the practice; having deliberately committed himself to act in consonance with that declared opinion, how can he now be justified in violating this solemn pledge, and in entailing upon his country a perilous precedent, fraught with the corrupting tendency which he described?

It is in vain to say, that the constitution, as it now stands, does not forbid these appointments. It does not enjoin them. If there

be an inherent defect in the theoretical character of the instrument, president Jackson was bound to have redeemed his pledge, and employed the whole influence and weight of his name to remedy the defect in its practical operation. The constitution admitted of the service of one man in the presidential office, during his life, if he could secure successive elections. That great reformer, as . president Jackson describes him, whom he professes to imitate, did not wait for an amendment of the constitution, to correct that defect; but after the example of the father of his country, by declining to serve longer than two terms, established a practical principle which is not likely to be violated.

There was another class of citizens upon whom public offices had been showered in the greatest profusion. I do not know the number of editors of newspapers that have been recently appointed, but I have noticed in the public prints, some fifteen or twenty. And they were generally of those whose papers had manifested the greatest activity in the late canvass, the most vulgar abuse of opponents, and the most fulsome praise of their favorite candidate. Editors are as much entitled to be appointed as any other class of the community; but if the number and the quality of those promoted, be such as to render palpable the motive of their appointment; if they are preferred, not on account of their fair pretensions, and their ability and capacity to serve the public, but because of their devotion to a particular individual, I ask if the necessary consequence must not be to render the press venal, and in time to destroy this hitherto justly cherished palladium of our liberty.

If the principle of all these appointments, this monopoly of public trusts by members of congress and particular editors, be exceptionable, (and I would not have alluded to them but from my deliberate conviction that they are essentially vicious,) their effects are truly alarming. I will not impute to president Jackson any design to subvert our liberties. I hope and believe, that he does not now entertain any such design. But I must say, that if an ambitious president sought the overthrow of our government, and ultimately to establish a different form, he would, at the commencement of his administration, proclaim by his official acts, that the greatest public virtue was ardent devotion to him. That no matter what had been the character, the services, or the sacrifices of incumbents or applicants for office, what their experience or ability to serve the republic, if they did not bow down and worship him, they possessed no claim to his patronage. Such an ambitious president would say, as monarchs have said, 'I am the state.' He would dismiss all from public employment who did not belong to the true faith. He would stamp upon the whole official corps of government one homogeneous character, and infuse into it one uniform principle of action. He would scatter, with an open and

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