f direct _control_ over and over again.
The President may go into the treasury, among the auditors and
comptrollers, and _direct_ them how to settle every man's account; what
abatements to make from one, what additions to another. He may go into
the custom-house, among collectors and appraisers, and may _control_
estimates, reductions, and appraisements. It is true that these officers
are sworn to discharge the duties of their respective offices honestly
and fairly, according to their _own_ best abilities; it is true, that
many of them are liable to indictment for official misconduct, and
others responsible, in suits of individuals, for damages and penalties,
if such official misconduct be proved; but notwithstanding all this, the
Protest avers that all these officers are but the _President's agents_;
that they are but aiding _him_ in the discharge of _his_ duties; that
_he_ is responsible for their conduct, and that they are removable at
his will and pleasure. And it is under this view of his own authority
that the President calls the Secretaries _his_ Secretaries, not once
only, but repeatedly. After half a century's administration of this
government, Sir;--after we have endeavored, by statute upon statute, and
by provision following provision, to define and limit official
authority; to assign particular duties to particular public servants; to
define those duties; to create penalties for their violation; to adjust
accurately the responsibility of each agent with his own powers and his
own duties; to establish the prevalence of equal rule; to make the law,
as far as possible, every thing, and individual will, as far as
possible, nothing;--after all this, the astounding assertion rings in
our ears, that, throughout the whole range of official agency, in its
smallest ramifications as well as in its larger masses, there is but ONE
RESPONSIBILITY, ONE DISCRETION, ONE WILL! True indeed is it, Sir, if
these sentiments be maintained,--true indeed is it that a President of
the United States may well repeat from Napoleon what he repeated from
Louis the Fourteenth, "I am the state"!

The argument by which the writer of the Protest endeavors to establish
the President's claim to this vast mass of accumulated authority, is
founded on the provision of the Constitution that the executive power
shall be vested in the President. No doubt the executive power is vested
in the President; but what and how much executive power, and how
li