mited? To this question I should answer, "Look to the Constitution,
and see; examine the particulars of the grant, and learn what that
executive power is which is given to the President, either by express
words or by necessary implication." But so the writer of this Protest
does not reason. He takes these words of the Constitution as being, of
themselves, a general original grant of all executive power to the
President, subject only to such express limitations as the Constitution
prescribes. This is clearly the writer's view of the subject, unless,
indeed, he goes behind the Constitution altogether, as some expressions
would intimate, to search elsewhere for sources of executive power.
Thus, the Protest says that it is not only the _right_ of the President,
but that the Constitution makes it his _duty_, to appoint persons to
office; as if the _right_ existed before the Constitution had created
the _duty_. It speaks, too, of the power of removal, not as a power
_granted_ by the Constitution, but expressly as "an original executive
power, _left_ unchecked by the Constitution." How original? Coming from
what source higher than the Constitution? I should be glad to know how
the President gets possession of any power by a title earlier, or more
_original_, than the grant of the Constitution; or what is meant by an
_original_ power, which the President possesses, and which the
Constitution has _left_ unchecked in his hands. The truth is, Sir, most
assuredly, that the writer of the Protest, in these passages, was
reasoning upon the British constitution, and not upon the Constitution
of the United States. Indeed, he professes to found himself on authority
drawn from the constitution of England. I will read, Sir, the whole
passage. It is this:--

"In strict accordance with this principle, the power of removal,
which, like that of appointment, is an original executive power, is
left unchecked by the Constitution in relation to all executive
officers, for whose conduct the President is responsible; while it
is taken from him in relation to judicial officers, for whose acts
he is not responsible. _In the government from which many of the
fundamental principles of our system are derived, the head of the
executive department originally had power to appoint and remove at
will all officers, executive and judicial._ It was to take the
judges out of this general power of removal, and thus