THE EXECUTIVE POWER
I have been introduced at a great many places by the exuberant chairman
of a committee who referred to the fact that he was about to introduce a
gentleman who exercised the greatest power in the world. While the power
of the President may be very great as compared with the power of rulers
of other countries, I can testify that when you are exercising it, you
don't think of its extent so much as you do of its limitations. I think
a study of the relative power of the King of England, the President of
France, the Emperor of Germany, the King of Italy, the Emperor of
Austria and the Emperor of Russia might involve a very interesting
investigation. I am not sufficiently familiar with the power of those
executive heads to speak on the subject, though I do know something of
the power of the King of England. In England and all of her colonies
they have a so-called responsible government. The English King is said
to reign and not to rule, while the actual ruler is the Premier, who
combines executive and legislative power by virtue of his position as
head of the controlling party in Parliament. When the legislative
majority fails him, he goes out of office. It is a government
responsible both for legislation and for executive work.
With us, as you know, the President is a permanent officer for four
years. It is quite possible that he may be elected as President at the
same time that a Congress hostile to him is put into power. Such was the
case when Mr. Hayes was elected, and indeed when Mr. Cleveland was first
elected there was a majority against him in the Senate. It happens more
frequently, however, that at the end of two years a majority of the
opposing party is elected to a Congress at the mid-term election. Our
method has been criticised as rigid and unresponsive to change in
popular opinion, but I venture to think that it has some advantages over
the English one. It may be good for a country to have an occasional rest
from legislation, to let it digest what reformers have already gotten on
its statute book, and the period when the President differs from
Congress offers such an opportunity for test and rest. We have rests in
music, which are necessary to a proper composition, and I do not see why
we should not have rests in politics.
I think, however, that we might advantageously give greater power to the
President in the matter of legislation. One of the difficulties about a
Congress--I say it with deference to that body--is that it does not know
enough about the executive facts which ought to control legislation in
the course of an efficient government. The introduction of cabinet
officers on the floor of the House and the floor of the Senate to urge
legislation on the one hand, and to point out the defects of proposed
legislation, on the other hand, would furnish the necessary element.
This would, of course, make it requisite that cabinet officers should be
able to look after themselves on their feet. They would have to know
their Department and be ready to answer such questions as are put to
cabinet officers on the floor of Parliament.
President Wilson has inaugurated the policy of delivering his message to
Congress personally. I think that is a good innovation. A Democrat could
have made it, not a Republican. Washington had to go to Congress, so had
Adams, but when Jefferson came in he said, "No, that is monarchical, and
I will just write a letter to Congress," and so he did. Washington went
once to the Senate and attempted to have the Senate concur with him in a
treaty with the Indians. He took with him General Knox, who had
frequently dealt with Indians. John Quincy Adams, in his diary,
describes what happened as he learned it from a member of the Senate at
that time. He says that in the conference, Washington found that every
member of the Senate thought he knew more about the Indian treaty than
General Knox. Whereupon, he, the father of our country, who has been
represented as a model in every way, proved that he was no such "sissy"
as some of his historians would like to make him out. His character was
one which develops into grand proportions when you study it, but he was
no mere steel engraving of copy-book perfection. When he got through
with that particular session, he turned to Knox as he went out, and said
he would be damned if he would come to the Senate again. Now I do not
approve of profanity generally, but somehow or other I rather like that
story because it lets in a little light on Washington and shows he was a
man with good red blood.
The first power of the President that I wish to consider is the veto
power. The English King has it, but never exercises it, i.e., he has not
exercised it for two hundred years. If he attempted to exercise it under
the present British Constitution, he would shake the throne and should
he try it a second time he might not have a throne under him. The
President, however, has the veto power under a provision of the
Constitution. When he decides to differ with both Houses, certain
members of demagogic tendency rise to say that the President is
exercising a royal prerogative power, or that he is going back to the
time of Imperial Rome. This might frighten an inexperienced man, but in
reality it is mere bluster. As a matter of fact, the President
represents the people in a much wider sense than any particular
Congressional orator, for he was elected by all the people, while the
Congressman was chosen by only one district. The Constitution says that
if he disapproves of an act, he shall send it back with his objections
and it enjoins upon him the duty of examining every act and every bill
that comes to him, to see whether it ought to pass. He vetoes,
therefore, in his representative capacity, with legislative and
suspensive, but not absolute, power. A vetoed act is returned to the
House, and if its supporters can succeed in getting a two-thirds
majority in each House, the bill can still pass over his veto. This
rarely happens, however, for the President can usually give reasons good
enough to command the vote of at least the one-third of one House that
is necessary to sustain his veto.
The second great control exercised by the President is that of
Commander-in-Chief. This includes, first of all, his command over the
army, which is complete. He can send the army where he chooses and he
can call out the state militia to repel invasion, to suppress
insurrection and to execute the laws, if the army or militia be
necessary. Of that he alone is the judge. Early in our history certain
state judges thought that the commander of the militia in each state
should pass on the question as to whether an emergency had arisen which
would justify the President in calling out the militia, but that was one
hundred years ago.
To illustrate our practice now in regard to the execution of laws with
the aid of the army, there is one very striking instance which occurred
within my memory. Debs organized the American Railway Union in order to
take the American people by the throat and say to them: "You shall not
have any milk for your babies, you shall not have any food, you shall
not have anything. I am going to stop every railroad in the country
until you come with me and make Pullman pay his men what I think they
ought to have, and what they think they ought to have." That was a
secondary boycott, which Mr. Cleveland said ought to be suppressed.
Since it involved the stoppage of mails and interstate commerce, the
United States courts issued injunctions to prevent the malcontents from
continuing their work of obstruction. When Debs's Union defied the court
injunction, the President sent General Miles out to Chicago with a
military force to suppress that obstruction to the United States laws.
At this Governor Altgeld protested. "I can take care of this; I have
not asked you to bring these men in here. Under the Constitution it is
necessary for the governor or legislature to request the President to
send troops in to suppress domestic insurrection which the governor of
the state cannot control."
To which Mr. Cleveland and Mr. Olney answered: "That is true where the
insurrection does not relate to the United States laws, but where there
is an obstruction of the United States laws, the Supreme Court has
decided repeatedly that the President is dealing, not with state
territory, but with the territory of the United States. He can execute
the laws of the United States on every foot of United States soil and
have the whole army enforce them." And so he did.
Another indirect power of the President as Commander-in-Chief was
exhibited in a most remarkable way during the Spanish War. We took over
successively Cuba, Porto Rico and the Philippines, but for three years
after we had annexed the Philippines, Congress took no action in regard
to any of them. They formed territory ceded to us by virtue of the
Treaty of Paris and Congress thought the Philippines were a poker that
was a little bit hot for it to handle. The responsibility for them,
therefore, fell upon the President, and as Commander-in-Chief he
introduced a quasi-civil government, appointing a civil governor and
commission, whom he authorized to pass laws--subject to veto of the
Secretary of War--and to enforce them. He thus carried on a complete
government in Porto Rico, Cuba and the Philippines under his power as
Commander-in-Chief until Congress became sufficiently advised to enact
needed legislation for their government. Cuba was turned over to her
people, a Republic was set going. Then after several years,
circumstances made it necessary for us to step in and take Cuba again.
They had gotten into a row, as they frequently do in those
Latin-American countries, and they were having a revolution.
When we first let Cuba go, we made what was called the Platt Amendment
to the Cuban Treaty, suggested by Senator Platt of this state. That
amendment provided for the restoration of order by the United States
whenever law and order were disturbed and whenever life, liberty and
property were not secure. Mr. Roosevelt, therefore, sent me down to Cuba
with Mr. Bacon to see if we could not adjust the matter. When we
arrived, we found twenty thousand revolutionist troops outside the city
of Havana. President Palma had been so certain of peace that he had made
no provision to suppress insurrections, and these troops were just about
ready to march into Havana when I got there. I went out to stay at the
house of the American Minister in a suburb just between the lines, and
we did what we could to compose the situation. In those countries when
they have a revolution, the first thing they do is to elect generals.
The next thing they do is to determine what the uniform of the generals
shall be, and then they get the guns and last of all they organize.
President Palma became discouraged and resigned so that I had to
proclaim myself Provisional Governor of Cuba. The Platt Amendment said
that the United States could go into Cuba to preserve order; but the
question was whether the President had the authority to go in without
authorization by a resolution of Congress. I always thought that he had
and Congress seemed to agree to it. So we went in, established a
provisional government, passed a good election law, held an election
and, at the end of a year, turned back the government to the Cubans,
where it now is.
The President has not the power to declare war. Congress has that power;
but if a foreign nation invades our country, the President must, without
awaiting such declaration, resist and use the army and navy for that
purpose. It is, therefore, possible for us to actually get into war
before Congress makes a formal declaration. That is what happened in the
Civil War. The Southern states seceded and Mr. Lincoln had war on his
hands before Congress could declare it. The President thereupon declared
a blockade of the Southern ports and the question then came up as to
whether it was a legal blockade so that prizes might be taken as in a
naval war. Our war vessels had captured merchant vessels trying to run
the blockade, had taken them into prize courts, and had sold them there,
distributing the proceeds among themselves. The owners fought the
proceedings and these suits, called "The Prize Cases," were carried to
the Supreme Court of the United States. The court held that while
Congress under the Constitution had sole power to declare war,
nevertheless, actual war might follow with all its legal consequences if
a nation invaded our country or if such an insurrection arose as that
which had just taken place in the Civil War.
Let me give you an example of presidential authority exercised in
pursuance of his constitutional duty to execute the laws even when
Congress passes no law on the subject-matter. The Canal Zone was
acquired by a treaty with Panama that followed its recognition--a
recognition made with such promptness that it has since attracted some
criticism. Congress passed a law that the President should have power to
govern that country for a year, but failed to renew the grant of power.
The question arose then as to what was to be done in the Canal Zone. A
prior act covering the building of the Panama Canal required the
President to build it through a commission, but that was all. He might
build it anywhere, either in Nicaragua or Panama, but he had no express
governmental power over the Canal territory. He had, however, to see
that the laws were executed, which meant that he must look after every
piece of territory belonging to the United States and safeguard it in
the interest of the people. It seemed to us, therefore, to be within the
executive authority, until Congress should act, to continue the
government of the Zone, maintain courts, execute men who committed
murder, and discharge all the political functions required to constitute
a law-abiding community.
Let me give you another instance of the President's exercising a law
that Congress did not pass. Sarah Althea Hill thought she was married to
Senator Sharon, at least she said she thought so. Senator Sharon was a
rich man. She wished to share it. So she brought in the State courts of
California a suit for divorce and alimony against the senator and
exhibited a letter purporting to have been written by the senator
admitting the marriage. She got into a great deal of litigation and
employed as her lawyer Judge Terry. Senator Sharon then brought suit in
the United States Court in California to have this letter declared a
forgery and delivered up to him. Justice Field of the United States
Supreme Court heard the case on the circuit. Judge Terry, who had been
on the Supreme Court of California in its early days and had served on
the same court with Judge Stephen J. Field, was a noted duelist and was
known to have killed one man in a duel. Mr. Justice Field had been
appointed from the California court to be a Supreme Justice of the
United States by Mr. Lincoln during the war. Pending the litigation,
Senator Sharon died and soon thereafter the association of Miss Hill and
Judge Terry as client and counsel developed into a warmer relation and
they became man and wife. She was a very violent woman, as Judge Terry
was a violent man, and made threatening demonstrations in court when
Justice Field gave the judgment against her. Justice Field sentenced
Mrs. Terry to thirty days' imprisonment for contempt because in her fury
she insulted the Court and attempted to commit violence upon the Judge.
The bitterness of feeling between the Terrys and Justice Field was
really heightened by the old association between Judge Terry and Justice
Field as judicial colleagues. The Terrys frequently declared their
intention, when occasion offered, to kill Judge Field. Word of this came
to the Attorney-General, then W. H. H. Miller, in Mr. Harrison's
administration. He notified the United States Marshal to direct a
deputy to follow Justice Field in his Circuit work and protect him
against any threatened attack.
As Justice Field was proceeding north from Los Angeles to San Francisco
to hold court there, he got out for breakfast at Fresno. Unfortunately
the Terrys reached the same station on another train at the same time.
Justice Field and Neagle, the deputy marshal, got out of the train, went
into the restaurant and sat down. When Judge and Mrs. Terry came in and
Mrs. Terry saw Justice Field, she ran out to the car to get a revolver
she had left in her satchel by an oversight. In the meantime Judge Terry
went up to Justice Field, denounced him and struck him from behind.
Thereupon Neagle arose, saying, "I am an officer, keep off," but Judge
Terry continued to assault Justice Field. Neagle said he thought Judge
Terry reached for a knife. At any rate, Neagle shot, and Terry fell dead
at the feet of Justice Field.
Neagle was at once indicted by a state jury for murder. He went into the
Federal Court and got a writ of _habeas corpus_, asking to be released
on the ground that he was discharging a duty under the government of the
United States. Judge Sawyer granted the writ and released Neagle. The
state of California took the case to the Supreme Court of the United
States. The court divided, with the Chief Justice and Justice Lamar
dissenting. The majority of the court held, Mr. Justice Miller
pronouncing the judgment, that the President was justified by the duty
imposed upon him by the Constitution to see that the laws were
faithfully executed. Although there was no specific law on the statute
book conferring upon the President authority to direct Neagle to take
the action he did, there was an implied obligation on the part of the
government to protect its judges in discharging their duty from the
violence of disappointed litigants, and this obligation was a law which
it was the duty of the President to see executed. The President,
therefore, has the right through his Attorney-General, who is the finger
of his hand, to direct an officer of the United States to protect to the
uttermost a justice while on judicial duty, even if it necessitates
killing an assailant.
I cannot tell you all the officers of the United States--internal
revenue men, customs men, post-office men, immigrant inspectors, public
land men, reclamation men, marine hospital men--certainly 150,000 in
number, who are subject to the direction of the President. In the
executive work under this head, he wields a most far-reaching power in
the interpretation of Congressional acts. A great many statutes never
come before the court. The President or his officers for him have
finally to decide what a statute means when it directs them to do
something. Many statutes contain a provision that under that statute,
regulations must be made by executive officers in order to facilitate
their enforcement. This is quasi-legislative work. The situation in
regard to the present income tax illustrates the necessity for
regulations. You will recognize that regulations adopted by the
President and his subordinates are sometimes necessary to straighten out
law. If you desire to study a maze or look into a labyrinth, I commend
you to the present income tax law.
Then often Congress relies upon the discretion of the President to
accomplish such tremendous things as in the Panama Canal. It directed
the President to build the Canal. It remained for him to appoint all the
persons engaged in the work, and he became responsible for every one of
them. Another notable instance of the reliance of Congress upon the
President occurred in the Spanish War, when it appropriated $50,000,000
to be allotted at his discretion.
Yet it seems to me that a curtailment of the small duties now imposed on
the President might well be made. The number of his appointments, for
instance, might well be lessened. The President ought, of course, to
appoint his Cabinet, the Supreme Court, ambassadors, ministers,
generals and admirals, but beyond that I think appointments ought to be
made without bothering the President about them. We have introduced a
Civil Service reform system with a Civil Service Commission, and I trust
that the matter of taking these subordinate officers out of politics
will be pressed generally as a much-needed reform.
Is the position occupied by a postmaster of sufficient importance to
justify the President in bothering with his appointment when he has such
a problem as the Mexican situation on his hands? We are coming to the
time when there are great complicated duties to perform under the
government. We have departed from the Jefferson view, and we now think
that the government can do a great many things helpfully, provided it
has experts to do them. Is it not entitled to the best men to do these
things? Yet how are experts obtainable unless they are selected to
permanent positions by those who are looking for experts and not looking
for men who exercise influence at the polls?
I recommended to Congress four times, that is, in each annual message,
that it enable me to put these men under the Civil Service law and in
the classified service; but it did not do it, and why? Because all local
officers now have to be confirmed by the Senate. That power of
confirmation gives a hold on the Executive and each Senator and each
Congressman wants to name the postmaster and the other local officers in
his district or state. The consequence is that Congressmen do not wish
the Senate to lose the power of confirmation. They believe this personal
patronage to be a means of perpetuating their own tenure. As a matter of
fact, this is not the case. Few men help themselves politically in the
long run through the use of patronage. It is a boomerang. Some few
manage to make it useful, but generally when a man secures an
appointment for a henchman, as the saying is in Washington--and it is a
very true one--he makes one ingrate and twenty enemies. The result is
that after he has served a term or two, he begins to find those aspiring
constituents, whom he did not appoint, rising like snakeheads to strike
him down.
Therefore, if Congressmen really had wisdom and looked ahead, they would
rid themselves of responsibility for these appointments, would abolish
the necessity for confirmation by the Senate, and would thus enable the
President to classify them under the Civil Service law and merit system.
But we have made progress and I am not discouraged about it. Ultimately
we shall get the Senate to consent to give up that power, though at
present the Democratic majority in the two Houses is fierce against such
a suggestion, and quite naturally so, for, while the Republican party
has been in control for sixteen years, the trend into office has been
Republican and the Democrats wish to change it. That is human nature,
and I am merely regretting, not condemning it. Perhaps if the
Republicans come back into power after four years, they will not be
quite so hungry as the Democrats were after sixteen years of famine, and
we may have a little less wolfish desire to get at the offices.
The time taken up in the consideration of minor appointments by
executive officers, the President and Cabinet officers especially, is a
great waste and no one can know the nervous vitality that can be
expended upon them until he has had actual experience.
Of course they lead to some amusing experiences, for there is nothing
which gives such a chance for the play of human impulse as
office-seeking. I remember having a lady come into my office when I was
Secretary of War. Her boy had passed the examination for West Point, but
a medical board had examined him and found that his chest did not
measure enough for his height. She came in to urge me to waive that
defect. I explained to her the necessity for great care in the
appointment of army officers, because if, after being commissioned, they
had any organic trouble, they were disqualified for further discharge of
their duty, and would be retired on three-fourths pay without rendering
any real service to the government. She listened with gloom to my
explanation, and asked me to look at the papers. I took them in her
presence and went through them. I found that the young man had, on the
basis of 100, made 93 per cent in all his mental examinations. That
isn't done by every candidate for West Point, and there is no reason why
we should not have brains as well as brawn in army officers. So I looked
again at the measurements and concluded he was a man we ought not to
lose. I told her: "Madam, I did not have so much difficulty in filling
out my chest measurement. Your boy shows such general intelligence that
I have no doubt he will have sense enough to pursue a regimen that will
make him sufficiently enlarge his chest measurement, so I am going to
waive the objection and let him in." She had not expected so quick a
decision in her favor, and was taken back a little. She hesitated a
minute, and then, with an angelic smile, she said to me, "Mr. Secretary,
you are not nearly so fat as they say you are."
Then I had another experience. A lady in Washington, whose husband had
some political influence, came and labored with me for six weeks or more
to appoint her son to a position. She secured the aid of Senators and
Congressmen in formidable number and came with them to see that they
spoke with emphasis. The place was one requiring technical
qualification, and following the recommendation of the head of the
Bureau, I appointed somebody else. I then received a letter from the
mother, saying that I was most ungrateful, since I declined to make her
a happy woman as I could have done by a turn of my hand. She complained
further that she had labored with her state delegation and got all the
votes for an administration bill in which I was especially interested
and this was the way I had rewarded her.
When you get a letter like that, the first thing you do is to think how
you can be severe with a person who has committed an impropriety, or
even been a little impertinent. Then you may compose an answer. Then if
you are wise, you will put the letter in a drawer and lock the drawer.
Take it out in the course of two days--such communications will always
bear two days' delay in answering--and when you take it out after that
interval, you will not send it. That is just the course I took. After
that, I sat down and wrote her just as polite a letter as I could,
telling her I realized a mother's disappointment under such
circumstances, but that really the appointment was not left to my mere
personal preference, that I had to select a man with technical
qualifications, and had, therefore, to follow the recommendation of the
head of the Bureau. I expressed the hope that her son would go on to
accomplish what she had hoped for him in the position which he then had.
That mollified her and she wrote me a note saying she was sorry she had
written as she had.
But the appointment I sent in was not confirmed at once and after an
interval I received a letter which purported to come from her husband,
though it was in the same handwriting as all the others. I was therein
advised that, due to the nervous prostration that had followed her
disappointment in this case, she had to take to her bed and had
developed a most serious case of cancer of the stomach. Would I not
restore her to health by withdrawing the first name and replacing it by
her son's? I had to write another letter, this one to the husband, to
say that I hoped the diagnosis would prove to be inaccurate, that I
sympathized with him in the sorrow he must have in the serious illness
of his wife, but that it was impossible to withdraw the name sent in.
The man whom I appointed was confirmed, and within two days after I
received that letter, we gave a musicale at the White House. The first
two people to greet Mrs. Taft and me were this husband and wife, though
the wife had so recently been _in articulo mortis_.
Another great power of the President is his control of our foreign
relations. In domestic matters, the Federal government shares every
field, executive, judicial and legislative, with the states, but in
foreign affairs, the whole governmental control is with the President,
the Senate and Congress. The states have nothing to do with it. The
President initiates a treaty and the Senate confirms it. The Senate,
however, cannot initiate a treaty, the President alone can do that.
Congress' powers to declare war and regulate our foreign commerce are
its chief powers in respect to our foreign relations. So that, except in
ratifying treaties, in regulating commerce and in declaring war, the
President guides our whole foreign policy.
Through the State Department he conducts all negotiation and
correspondence with other governments and according to the Constitution
he receives ambassadors and foreign ministers. Now you might possibly
think that that meant only that he must have a flunky at the White House
to take their cards--but it means a good deal more. He appoints
ambassadors and ministers to other countries and instructs them. He
receives the diplomatic representatives from other countries and does
business with them. He construes treaties and asserts the rights of our
government and our citizens under them. He considers and decides the
rights of other governments and their subjects in a way which
practically binds our government and people. And in order to receive
ambassadors and ministers, he must determine whether they have been
properly accredited, so that they have the proper authority to act for
the country they claim to represent.
When there is a dispute as to what person is the chief executive of a
foreign country and therefore entitled to send an ambassador or
minister, the President must decide it. In other words, he alone can
exercise the power of recognition. How important a power this is, we may
know from our recent experiences with Mexico, for President Wilson, by
withholding recognition from General Huerta, was able to render his
longer tenure as chief executive impossible.
In our foreign relations it is often the President's duty to formulate
the national claim of sovereignty over territory whose ownership is in
dispute. This is a political question and his decision or claim in
regard to it is taken as final by the Supreme Court.
In the Fur-Seal Controversy, Mr. Blaine took the position that our
jurisdiction reached out over the Bering Sea. The question was contested
in the Supreme Court by the British and the Canadian governments. The
Supreme Court said: "We cannot determine this. It is a political
question and must, therefore, be decided by the President through his
Secretary of State." We then submitted the issue to an international
tribunal, and the decision was against us.
Another great power of the President is the power of pardons and
reprieves. This is not to be determined by rules of law nor indeed by
absolute rules of any kind and must, therefore, be wielded skilfully
lest it destroy the prestige and supremacy of law. Sometimes one is
deceived. I was. Two men were brought before me, both of whom were
represented as dying. When a convict is near his end, it has been the
custom to send him home to die. So, after having all the surgeons in the
War Department examine them to see that the statements made to me about
them were correct, I exercised the pardoning power in their favor. Well,
one of them kept his contract and died, but the other seems to be one of
the healthiest men in the community today.
The President is also the titular head of a party and ought to have a
large influence in legislation. He is made responsible to the country
for his party's majority in Congress, and does thereby have some voice
in legislation. Some Presidents have more control than others, but all
Presidents find as the patronage is distributed, and as the term goes
on, that the influence and power that they have over legislation rapidly
diminishes. In fact, when there are no more offices to distribute and
somebody else comes into view as the next President, the authority of
the incumbent becomes strictly limited to his constitutional functions.
All of this tends to show that a President who seeks legislative changes
and reforms should begin early.
The people think that the Presidency gives a man an opportunity to make
a lot of personal appointments. I can recall some of these personal
appointments, but I tell you they are very few. There are certain
political obligations involving the recognition of party leaders which
he has to take into consideration with reference to some appointments.
But when it comes to purely personal appointments, one can count them on
the fingers of one hand. It is well that it is so. A President with his
proper sense of duty finds many men in office whom he ought to let
continue and the question of friendship for others can play no part in
displacing them.
The social influence of the President in Washington is not much. I think
perhaps it might be useful if it were a little more, for the question of
precedence, which makes everybody outside of Washington laugh, sometimes
becomes a very serious matter. As the French ambassador once said, when
there are three hundred people, they cannot all go through the door at
one time. Somebody has to go first, therefore it is most important to
fix who that somebody shall be. But nobody in Washington has the
authority to say. If only the army and navy were concerned, the matter
would be easy enough, because they are controlled by the President and
he can issue orders that they must respect, but with civil officers he
has no such authority. Congress could, of course, provide rules of
social and official precedence, either by legislation or executive
order, as is done in all European countries. But here such a proposal
would be laughed out of Congressional halls, though it would be a wise
measure to prevent confusion, unnecessary friction and heartburning.
The very men who make most fun of such matters and profess to despise
their consideration are in actual practice the most unreasonable as to
their own places at functions. The House of Representatives is supposed
to be the embodiment of democracy and contempt for social distinctions,
yet of all the people in the world who have made a fuss over the matter
of precedence, speakers of the House of Representatives have been the
most insistent on their proper place at official dinners. The speaker
says: "I represent the body of the people who come from the soil and the
people who make this country. Therefore, I decline to sit after the
presiding officer of the Senate." An ambassador says: "I am the personal
representative of my sovereign. If he were here in Washington, he would
sit next to the President." The Cabinet officer says: "The President is
the head. I am connected with him as Secretary of War, the Cabinet is a
small body and the Senate is a large body. Therefore, we are bigger men
than the Senate and we ought to have precedence." In fact, the head of a
scientific bureau came in to see me one day and said, "I think you ought
to put me after the Supreme Court." He even filed a brief with me on the
subject, to the effect that "I run an independent department. The judges
represent the judicial branch, and the President the executive branch,
and the heads of the two Houses, the legislative branch, while I
represent the scientific branch." Indeed, the matter of procedure is not
such a joke as it seems outside. It is not so important as to who comes
first as that their order of precedence should be once determined.
The President is made responsible for everything, especially for hard
times. Of course his supporters claim credit for good crops, so that
perhaps it is not so unfair to charge him with responsibility for bad
crops and for everything else that happens wrong during his term. Every
President strives to do the best he can for the country. It is a great
task, one of the heaviest in the world. A man does not really know,
until he gets out of the office, what the strain is. And, therefore,
knowing that he is struggling to do the best he can, while he may differ
with you, while he may do things that seem to you absurd, consider that
he is there, elected by the American people, as your representative, and
remember that while he is in office he is entitled to your respect. Now,
don't be flippant in regard to him. Don't think it shows you to be a big
man to criticise him or speak contemptuously of him. You may differ with
his policy, but always maintain a profound respect for a man who
represents the majesty and the sovereignty of the American people.