Without Such Seats They
Cannot Really Share The Responsibility Of The President, Or Be In
Any Degree Amenable To Public Opinion For The Advice Which They Give
In Their Public Functions.
It will be said that the Constitution
has expressly intended that they should not be responsible, and
such, no doubt, has been the case.
But the Constitution, good as it
is, cannot be taken as perfect. The government has become greater
than seems to have been contemplated when that code was drawn up.
It has spread itself as it were over a wider surface, and has
extended to matters which it was not necessary then to touch. That
theory of governing by the means of little men was very well while
the government itself was small. A President and his clerks may
have sufficed when there were from thirteen to eighteen States;
while there were no Territories, or none at least that required
government; while the population was still below five millions;
while a standing army was an evil not known and not feared; while
foreign politics was a troublesome embroglio in which it was quite
unnecessary that the United States should take a part. Now there
are thirty-four States. The territories populated by American
citizens stretch from the States on the Atlantic to those on the
Pacific. There is a population of thirty million souls. At the
present moment the United States are employing more soldiers than
any other nation, and have acknowledged the necessity of maintaining
a large army even when the present troubles shall be over. In
addition to this the United States have occasion for the use of
statecraft with all the great kingdoms of Europe. That theory of
ruling by little men will not do much longer. It will be well that
they should bring forth their big men and put them in the place of
rulers.
The President has at present seven ministers. They are the
Secretary of State, who is supposed to have the direction of foreign
affairs; the Secretary of the Treasury, who answers to our
Chancellor of the Exchequer; the Secretaries of the Army and of the
Navy; the Minister of the Interior; the Attorney-General; and the
Postmaster-General. If these officers were allowed to hold seats in
one House or the other - or rather if the President were enjoined to
place in these offices men who were known as members of Congress,
not only would the position of the President's ministers be enhanced
and their weight increased, but the position also of Congress would
be enhanced and the weight of Congress would be increased. I may,
perhaps, best exemplify this by suggesting what would be the effect
on our Parliament by withdrawing from it the men who at the present
moment - or at any moment - form the Queen's cabinet. I will not say
that by adding to Congress the men who usually form the President's
cabinet, a weight would be given equal to that which the withdrawal
of the British cabinet would take from the British Parliament.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 186 of 275
Words from 95891 to 96400
of 142339
