al is constitutionally vested
in the President of the United States is a principle which has been not
more distinctly declared by judicial authority and judicial commentators
than it has been uniformly practiced upon by the legislative and
executive departments of the Government. The question arose in the House
of Representatives so early as the 16th of June, 1789, on the bill for
establishing an Executive Department denominated "the Department of
Foreign Affairs." The first clause of the bill, after recapitulating
the functions of that officer and defining his duties, had these words:
"To be removable from office by the President of the United States."
It was moved to strike out these words and the motion was sustained
with great ability and vigor. It was insisted that the President could
not constitutionally exercise the power of removal exclusively of the
Senate; that the Federalist so interpreted the Constitution when arguing
for its adoption by the several States; that the Constitution had
nowhere given the President power of removal, either expressly or by
strong implication, but, on the contrary, had distinctly provided for
removals from office by impeachment only.

A construction which denied the power of removal by the President was
further maintained by arguments drawn from the danger of the abuse of
the power; from the supposed tendency of an exposure of public officers
to capricious removal to impair the efficiency of the civil service;
from the alleged injustice and hardship of displacing incumbents
dependent upon their official stations without sufficient consideration;
from a supposed want of responsibility on the part of the President, and
from an imagined defect of guaranties against a vicious President who
might incline to abuse the power. On the other hand, an exclusive power
of removal by the President was defended as a true exposition of the
text of the Constitution. It was maintained that there are certain
causes for which persons ought to be removed from office without being
guilty of treason, bribery, or malfeasance, and that the nature of
things demands that it should be so. "Suppose," it was said, "a man
becomes insane by the visitation of God and is likely to ruin our
affairs; are the hands of the Government to be confined from warding off
the evil? Suppose a person in office not possessing the talents he was
judged to have at the time of the appointment; is the error not to be
corrected? Supp