Cabinet council

“ By this means our Government will possess what it has always wanted, but never yet had, a Cabinet Council. An institution essential in all Governments, whose situation or connections oblige them to have an intercourse with other powers. ”

“ The exclusion of one half of the counsellors from office under the Crown, an exclusion which is quite absurd when we consider the Council merely as an executive board, becomes at once perfectly reasonable when we consider the Council as a body intended to restrain the Crown as well as to exercise the powers of the Crown, to perform some of the functions of a Parliament as well as the functions of a Cabinet. ”

“ One of the great changes in administrative machinery that has taken place in the civilised world within the last two hundred years is the substitution of an informal cabinet composed of the heads of departments, for a formal governing council of members who had themselves no direct administrative duties. ”

“ The Government looked to the Council, not only for a study of all questions, but for a preparatory and amicable experience of the ideas, desires, and objections it was destined to encounter at a later period, in a rougher contest, and a more tumultuous theatre.
The Cabinet, composed as it was at the time when the decree of the 5th of September, 1816, appeared, was not equal to that line of policy, continually increasing in moderation, sometimes resolutely, liberal, and, if not always provident, at least perpetually active. But the same progress which accompanied events, affected individuals. ”

“ The Cabinet members will be ignorant of whether or not any issue under discussion in the Cabinet has already been discussed in the Supreme Council, and the members of the Cabinet will consequently be likely to feel that they are often acting in the dark. May there not be a danger that many of the Cabinet Members will simply watch which way the members of the Supreme Council vote, and will cast their vote accordingly, instead of exercising an an independent judgment and feeling a real sense of responsibility? ”

“ Under responsible government legislation is carried on by parliamentary means exactly as at home, with a cabinet responsible to parliament, the crown reserving only a right of veto, which is exercised at the discretion of the governor in the case of certain bills. The executive councils in those colonies, designated as at home by parliamentary choice, are appointed by the governor alone, and the other public officers only nominally by the governor on the advice of his executive council. ”

“ The duties of this council are confined chiefly to a salutary vigilance over the constitution and laws, and to the convocation of extraordinary sessions of the national legislature, either in conjunction with the president or by its sole act. The cabinet consists of a minister of foreign and domestic affairs; a minister of justice; a minister of finance; a minister of war and marine, each of whom receive an annual salary of six thousand dollars.
Each state government is independent within its local jurisdiction, and, like the federal government has, executive, legislative and judicial powers. ”

“ The Council was organized on the twenty-first of April, 1679; and, within a few hours, one of the fundamental principles on which it had been constructed was violated. A secret committee, or, in the modern phrase, a cabinet of nine members, was formed. But, as this committee included Shaftesbury and Monmouth, it contained within itself the elements of as much faction as would have sufficed to impede all business. Accordingly there soon arose a small interior cabinet, consisting of Essex, Sunderland, Halifax, and Temple. ”

“ The Administration includes three offices of high standing, having little if any departmental duties, but carrying salaries of £2,000 each, which are usually given to elderly men of long service, so that the Cabinet might have the advantage of their ripe experience and sage councils. The first in dignity is the Lord President of the Council. ”

“ Despite the fact that during upwards of two hundred years the sovereign has not attended the meetings of the cabinet, and so is deprived of the opportunity of wielding influence directly upon the deliberations of the ministers as a body, the king keeps in close touch with the premier, and cabinet councils at which important lines of policy are to be formulated are preceded not infrequently by a conference in which the subject in hand is threshed out more or less completely by king and chief minister. ”

“ Growing and struggling power always gives more annoyance and is more unmanageable than established power. The House of Commons gave infinitely more trouble to the Ministers of Charles the Second than to any Ministers of later times; for, in the time of Charles the Second, the House was checking Ministers in whom it did not confide. Now that its ascendency is fully established, it either confides in Ministers or turns them out. This is undoubtedly a far better state of things than that which Temple wished to introduce. The modern Cabinet is a far better Executive Council than his. ”

“ As long as it is supported by a majority of that house, the cabinet is the supreme power of the land in federal affairs. As soon as it ceases to be supported by the majority, it loses the right to govern and a new ministry comes in. ”

“ Unless the composition of the House of Commons were improved, or unless the rules requiring cabinet ministers to be members of the legislature were relaxed, it would undoubtedly be difficult to find, without the Lords, a sufficient supply of chief ministers. But the detail of the composition of a cabinet, and the precise method of its choice, are not to the purpose now. The first and cardinal consideration is the definition of a cabinet. We must not bewilder ourselves with the inseparable accidents until we know the necessary essence. ”

“ Even if he did usually follow the advice of others, he was a man of power. When, as so often happened, the delegations were not unanimous, [10] and when the local powers were not satisfied with the selections of congressmen, the administration had to award judgment. Few members of the cabinet, moreover, were content to be absolute nonentities: they were responsible for the conduct of their subordinates, and thought it was but fair that they should have some share in picking them out. ”

“ Indeed the peers, who constitute a large element in modern cabinets, are members, now-a-days, only of a subordinate assembly. The House of Lords still exercises several useful functions; but the ruling influence—the deciding faculty—has passed to what, using the language of old times, we still call the lower house—to an assembly which, though inferior as a dignified institution, is superior as an efficient institution. A principal advantage of the House of Lords in the present age indeed consists in its thus acting as a reservoir of cabinet ministers. ”

“ Cabinet government is a device for bringing the executive and legislative branches into harmony and coöperation without uniting or confusing their functions. It is as if the majority in the Commons deputized its leaders to act as the advisers of the Crown and the superintendents of the public business, in order that they might have the advantage of administrative knowledge and training in advising legislation and drafting laws to be submitted to parliament. ”

“ Moreover, we wish to make it clear that we are not necessarily standing for a division of power. There may be separately constituted departments of government, one primarily for administration, the other primarily for legislation, yet a concentration of authority in one of them, as in the case under the cabinet system of Europe. The gentlemen of the opposition are advocating not only a concentration of power, but a fusion of functions as well. Their commission is at once the executive cabinet and the legislative body. ”

“ And, Honorable Judges, the whole experience of government proves the absolute necessity for a separate legislative department. Look where you will, and in each case there is an executive cabinet, based upon appointment, untrammelled by the burdens of legislation, and subjected to the criticism and control of a reviewing body. In Europe, the city councils are elected by the people, and the administrative departments are made up through a process of selection and appointment, together with the assurance of reasonable permanence of tenure, responsibility, and adequate support. ”

“ All laws are sanctioned and promulgated by the president, who is invested with the veto power, which can be overruled only by a two-thirds vote. The president, with the advice and consent of the senate, appoints judges, diplomatic agents, governors of territories, and officers of the army and navy above the rank of colonel. All other officers and officials he appoints and promotes without the consent of the senate. The cabinet is composed of eight ministers—the heads of the government departments of the interior, foreign affairs, finance, war, marine, justice, agriculture, and public works. ”

“ The nicest of all the adjustments involved in the working of the British Government is that which determines, without formally defining, the internal relations of the Cabinet. On the one hand, while each Minister is an adviser of the Crown, the Cabinet is a unity, and none of its members can advise as an individual, without, or in opposition actual or presumed to, his colleagues. On the other hand, the business of the State is a hundred-fold too great in volume to allow of the actual passing of the whole under the view of the collected Ministry. ”

“ Within a week of the opening of the house the complete reorganisation of the ministry which Bagot deemed needful came, and with it opened the real era of responsible government. The more conservative members (Draper, Ogden, Davidson, Sherwood) quickly retired from the executive, and the reform leaders (Baldwin, Lafontaine, Morin, Aylwin) took office. Thus was formed the first colonial cabinet that was really representative of parliament, and responsible to it. ”

“ This has led to frequent and oftentimes ridiculous ministerial crises. These numerous cabinet changes embarrass an executive in whatever policy he may be trying to develop. But he is helpless under the theory of parliamentary government that has grown up. Whenever the President proposes a certain cabinet, he is met by a counter proposition from some group or other in the legislative bodies. Sometimes he may gain a little temporary majority by a coalition or fusion of some of the groups represented in Congress. ”

“ Members of the House may be returned by any constituency in the Dominion without reference to residence. All bills affecting taxation or revenue must originate in the House, and be recommended by a message from the Governor-general. The Government introduces bills, and takes the responsibility of them. The premier is leader of the House; there is also a recognized leader of the Opposition. In case the Government cannot command a majority it resigns, and the Governor-general forms a new cabinet. ”

“ Neither in the Constitution nor in the statutes of Congress is there provision for a Cabinet, but as the result of custom which has been formulating since Washington's second term the heads of the Federal executive departments have come to constitute, in their collective capacity, the President's Cabinet. ”

“ As has been pointed out, the uses of the crown are by no means wholly ornamental. None the less, the actual executive of the nation is the cabinet. It is within the cabinet circle that administrative policies are decided upon, and it is by the cabinet ministers and their subordinates in the several departments that these policies, and the laws of the land generally, are carried into effect. On the other side, the cabinet members not only occupy seats in one or the other of the houses of Parliament; collectively they direct the processes of legislation. ”

“ If Parliament rejects the Statement of Government Policy or the Appropriation Bill or passes a vote of no-confidence in the Government, the Cabinet of Ministers shall stand dissolved, and the President shall, unless he has in the exercise of his powers under Article 70, dissolved Parliament, appoint a Prime Minister, Ministers of the Cabinet of Ministers, other Ministers and Deputy Ministers in terms of Articles 43, 44, 45 and 46. ”

“ By the promulgation of party programmes and by the practice of stump oratory, modern Cabinet leaders have been brought into more intimate touch with the electorate. They have thus drawn to themselves much of the popular favour formerly divided less unequally among the members of the Lower Chamber, and have, in doing so, increased their control over the parliamentary machine. The initiative and independence lost by the rank and file of individual members have gone to swell the authority of the Cabinet. ”

“ Economy and sound business policy require that all existing independent bureaus and commissions should be placed under the jurisdiction of appropriate executive departments. It is unwise from every standpoint, and results only in mischief, to have any executive work done save by the purely executive bodies, under the control of the President; and each such executive body should be under the immediate supervision of a Cabinet Minister. ”

“ A nation in such a happy state as this has obvious advantages for constructing a cabinet government. It has the best people to elect a legislature, and therefore it may fairly be expected to choose a good legislature—a legislature competent to select a good administration. ”