gs of the Convention strongly indicate a partiality to that
theory then at the zenith of favor among the most distinguished
commentators on the organization of political power." Chief Justice
Marshall fortified the position of Mr. Madison, by declaring that the
action of the First Congress on this question "has ever been considered
as a full expression of the sense of the Legislature on this important
part of the American Constitution."

Of the thirty-nine members of the Convention of 1787 who signed the
Constitution, thirteen, including Mr. Madison, were members of the
first Congress; Alexander Hamilton was Secretary of the Treasury under
the new Government; and above all, General Washington, who had presided
over the deliberations of the Convention, had attentively listened to
every discussion, and had carefully studied every provision, was
President of the United States. More than one-third of the members of
the Constitutional Convention were therefore engaged in the Executive
and Legislative Departments of the new Government in applying the
organic instrument which they had taken so large a part in creating.
The cotemporaneous interpretation was by those facts rendered valuable
if not authoritative. Cotemporaneous interpretations of organic law
are not always, it is true, to be regarded as conclusive, but they are
entitled to the most careful and respectful consideration, and cannot
be reversed with safety unless the argument therefor is unanswerable
and the motive which suggests the argument altogether patriotic and
unselfish. The familiar rule laid down by Lord Coke is as pertinent
to-day as when first announced: "Great regard ought, in construing a
law, to be paid to the construction which the sages, who lived about
the time soon after it was made, put upon it, because they were best
able to judge of the intention of the makers at the time when the law
was made. _Contemporania exposito est fortissima in legem_."

Against the early decision of the founders of the Government, against
the ancient and safe rule of interpretation prescribed by Lord Coke,
against the repeatedly expressed judgment of ex-President Madison,
against the equally emphatic judgment of Chief Justice Marshall, and
above all, against the unbroken practice of the Government for
seventy-eight years, the Republican leaders now determined to deprive the
President of the power of removing Federal officers. Many were induced
to join in the move