Appointing power

“ For the protection of those who are intrusted with the appointing power against a waste of time and obstruction of public business, caused by the inordinate pressure for place, and for the protection of incumbents against intrigue and wrong, I shall, at the proper time, ask Congress to fix the tenure of minor offices of the several Executive Departments, and prescribe the grounds upon which removals shall be made during the terms for which the incumbents have been appointed. ”

“ If the judges are appointed at short intervals, either by the legislative, or the executive department, they will naturally, and, indeed, almost necessarily, become mere dependents upon the appointing power. If they have any desire to obtain, or to hold office, they will at all times evince a desire to follow, and obey the will of the predominant power in the state. ”

“ The principle that the greater the concentration of the appointing power, the greater will be the sense of individual responsibility for every appointment made, makes this result of a Senate of ninety members not wholly unfortunate. ”

“ The power of appointing to office was brought down by placing a part of it in the Legislature. It was further restrained by prohibiting any member of the Legislature from enjoying, during the period for which he was elected, any office which should have been created, or the emoluments of which should have been increased, during that time. Thus, holding up to view the avenues by which corruption was most likely to enter. ”

“ However, the plea for the discretion of the appointing officers forms the backbone of Governor Black's memorandum, and therefore demands closer inspection. The Governor insists that the head of a State, or of a public department, bears a heavy responsibility; that he will therefore be very careful in the exercise of his power as an appointing officer ”

“ They are mere employés, without any authority at all, except of superintendence. "The executive department is official, and is subordinate to the legislative as the body is to the mind." The chief of these official departments is the judicial. In appointing officials the most important rule is, "never to invest any individual with extraordinary power ”

“ I cannot subscribe to the opinion, delivered by some gentlemen, that the executive in its nature implies the power to appoint the officers of government. Why does it imply it? The appointment of officers depends upon the qualities that are necessary for forming a judgment on the merits of men; and the displacing of them, instead of including the idea of what is necessary for an executive officer, includes the idea necessary for a judicial one; therefore it cannot exist, in the nature of things, that an executive power is either to appoint or displace the officers of government. ”

“ The invariable rule in appointments should have reference to the honesty, fidelity, and capacity of the appointees, giving to the party in power those places where harmony and vigor of administration require its policy to be represented, but permitting all others to be filled by persons selected with sole reference to the efficiency of the public service, and the right of all citizens to share in the honor of rendering faithful service to the country. ”

“ If the majority of the administrative officials who are now elected were made appointive, responsibility for their conduct in office could be concentrated upon the chief executive officer appointing them. ”

“ To give the appointment of such a multitude of public servants, invested with such functions, to the unchecked authority of the President, would be to create an executive with power not less formidable and real than that of some monarchs, and far greater than that of others. No one desired that a sole power of appointment should be vested in the President alone ”

“ The Senate guards jealously its right to determine whether an appointee is properly to be considered as belonging to any one of the twenty-one stipulated categories, and if it decides that he is not thus eligible, he is refused a seat. But as long as the sovereign keeps clearly within the enumerated classes, no practical limitation can be placed upon his power of appointment. [546] In practice, appointment by the king has meant regularly appointment by the ministry commanding a majority in the lower chamber ”

“ By reason, also, of its popular origin, and the frequency with which the short term of office of its members requires the renewal of their authority at the hands of the people,-the great source of all power in this country,-encroachments by that body on the domain of co-ordinate branches of the government would be receive with less distrust than a similar exercise of unwarranted power by any other department of the government. ”

“ While some general expressions will be found in the decisions tending to support the government's contention, the rule is well established that to constitute an officer de facto it is not a necessary prerequisite that there shall have been an attempted exercise of competent or prima facie power of appointment or election. ”

“ From this incessant, imperious, and deceptive pressure which forces itself mercilessly upon the appointing officer, the private business man is wholly exempt. In selecting his employees he is permitted to act upon his best judgment, while the appointing officer in the public service is not. ”

“ Reading the policymaker exclusion in light of the other categories of employees listed with it, I conclude that the class of "appointee [s] on the policymaking level" should be limited to those officials who share the characteristics of personal staff members and immediate advisers, i.e., those who work closely with the appointing official and are directly accountable to that official. ”

“ The circumstances of the body authorized to make the permanent appointments would, of course, have governed the modification of a power which related to the temporary appointments; and as the National Senate is the body, whose situation is alone contemplated in the Clause upon which the suggestion under examination has been founded, the vacancies to which it alludes can only be deemed to respect those officers in whose appointment that body has a concurrent agency with the President. ”

“ Parliament does not nominate any minister, but the crown appoints the head of the administration in conformity to the general wishes and inclinations manifested by Parliament, and the other ministers on the recommendation of the chief; while every minister has the undivided moral responsibility of appointing fit persons to the other offices of administration which are not permanent. ”

“ That a national executive be instituted, to consist of a single person, to be chosen by the national legislature for the term of seven years, with power to carry into execution the national laws, to appoint to offices in cases not otherwise provided for, to be ineligible a second time, and to be removable on impeachment and conviction of malpractice or neglect of duty ”

“ It may be objected by the advocates of the theory in question that the executive is under the control of the legislature, and that the sum total of sovereign power is therefore vested in the latter, and is not divided between it and the executive. ”

“ No act of the King can have effect if it is not countersigned by a minister, who, thereby, makes himself responsible. Article 65. The King appoints and dismisses his ministers. Article 66. He confers the grades in the army. He appoints to the offices of general administration and of foreign relations, with the exceptions determined by law. He appoints to other offices only by virtue of express provisions of a law. Article 67. He makes the regulations and decrees necessary to the execution of the laws, without power to suspend the laws themselves, nor to exempt from their execution. ”

“ The president nominates to the senate, and with its "advice and consent," appoints all the officers of the government, with the exception of those whose appointment congress has authority to vest, by law, in the heads of departments, or in the courts of justice. ”

“ The Constitution declares that 'the Congress may, by law, vest the appointment of such inferior officers as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.' It is no doubt usual and proper to vest the appointment of inferior officers in that department of the government, executive or judicial, or in that particular executive department to which the duties of such officers appertain. ”

“ And be it further enacted, That the said corporation and body politic shall have full power to appoint from their own body a president and such other officers as they may deem necessary for the purposes of their creation; and in case of the death, resignation, or refusal to serve, of any of their number, the remaining members shall elect and appoint other persons in lieu of those whose places may have been vacated ”

“ It will be agreed on all hands, that the power of appointment, in ordinary cases, ought to be modified in one of three ways. It ought either to be vested in a single man, or in a select assembly of a moderate number; or in a single man, with the concurrence of such an assembly. The exercise of it by the people at large will be readily admitted to be impracticable ”

“ Under the constitution, the President and heads of departments are to make nominations for office, the Senate is to advise, and consent to appointments, and the House of Representatives is to accuse and prosecute faithless officers. The best interest of the public service demands that these distinctions be respected; that Senators and Representatives who may be judges and accusers should not dictate appointments to office. ”

“ Everything flows directly or indirectly from the power immanent in the Sovereign. Governors and nominated members of Legislative Councils owe their commissions directly, and officials below them indirectly, to his delegation of power. ”

“ So too the officers of the state derive their commission from the people, albeit the king, in conformity with law, decides the detail of their appoint ment, together with the other necessary arrangements of the executive government. Once establish the principle, and the consequences are easy to draw. ”