Decision-making

“ If you decide it rightly and firmly stick to the decision, it will stay decided, and your Administration will mark one of the most important turning-points in our political development,—so important indeed, and so salutary in its significance that to stand in history identified with it might satisfy the ambition of any man. A failure would of course be all the more deplorable as opportunities so great occur but rarely. ”

“ If, when the people, being furnished with adequate information, held its deliberations, the citizens had no communication one with another, the grand total of the small differences would always give the general will, and the decision would always be good. ”

“ Why should one also have wanted to decide what one had no power to decide? How could one have learned to make decisions that one never made? When to rise, where to go, what to do, how, why, with whom -these matters were never within one's reach, one never had the ability to make such decisions. Yet one day the official decision-makers are sprung into the air. When is one to rise, where should one go, what should one do, how, why, with whom? No, one cannot dispense with managers. ”

“ If you examine closely into the circumstances which, in any deliberation, ultimately turn the scale in favor of some particular course, you will generally find that the decision is influenced, not by any clear arrangement of ideas leading to a formal judgment, but by some fanciful picture which seems to stand for one of the alternatives in question. ”

“ Each case with decision being thus limited as law to itself alone would in turn pass away and be forgotten, leaving behind it no record of principle established, or light to guide, or rule to govern the future. ”

“ It was decided to begin by a prolonged process of general discussion, in which men could express their minds freely without the necessity of coming to an operative decision on any of the controversial points, until the value of each could be assessed in relation to the possibility of a general agreement. ”

“ But government and legislation are matters of reason and judgment, and not of inclination—and what sort of reason is that in which the determination precedes the discussion; in which one set of men deliberate and another decide ”

“ As I tell my NIMs, you should be seeking to create conversations that are uncomfortable but necessary. What you want to do is to create some tension in the system, to get to the heart of the decision-maker’s problem. ”

“ Hence reason, and reason only can ultimately decide; and, in order to a just determination, nature the never-failing and only safe guide in all cases must be consulted. No decision that clashes with her laws can be correct. ”

“ When once a decision is reached and execution is the order of the day, dismiss absolutely all responsibility and care about the outcome. Unclamp, in a word, your intellectual and practical machinery, and let it run free ”

“ He who chooses his plan for himself, employs all his faculties. He must use observation to see, reasoning and judgment to foresee, activity to [Pg 110] gather materials for decision, discrimination to decide, and when he has decided, firmness and self-control to hold to his deliberate decision. And these qualities he requires and exercises exactly in proportion as the part of his conduct which he determines according to his own judgment and feelings is a large one. ”

“ In an age which has learned {151} as its special lesson the advantages, in ordinary business affairs of life, of organisation, thoroughness, long views, reticence, and combined effort, guided by a strong central control, is it reaction, or is it progress, to aim at applying the same principles to the greatest, most complex, and infinitely most important of all businesses—that of government itself? ”

“ While past events and present exigencies may have largely shaped some political constitutions, we know that others have been deliberately modified by a choice that has had more or less of a free scope, and that sometimes this has amounted to an arbitrary decision. ”

“ We will make decisions scientifically and democratically. In all decisions we make, the procedures need to be lawful and standardized, the process democratic and open, and the results scientific and equitable. ”

“ Whether future legislation be based on some such plan as the one here outlined, or whether another can be devised that will more closely meet the requirements, the fundamental principles we have considered should be kept in mind in any change that is made. ”

“ Advisory and executive functions, and a quasi-representation, seem to be three essentials in any experiment Till the principle has been generally accepted, detailed schemes are simply a waste of time, but it is worth while to get our minds quite clear on the necessary elements of any plan. ”

“ In the mean time, though the suggestion, for the present, may not be a practical one, it will serve to mark what is best in principle, and enable us to judge of the eligibility of any indirect means, either existing or capable of being adopted, which may promote in a less perfect manner the same end. ”

“ Make a decision and make it with the confidence that you are right. If you will determine now to follow this rule it will compel you to follow the first two because, in order to be sure you are right, to be certain you are not misjudging anybody, you will read each rule concentratedly and observe each person carefully beforehand. ”

“ If the law is unwritten, and has to be gathered either from traditional report or by reference to the rules which have been laid down on previous occasions in cases resembling the one now calling for decision, opportunity is presented for all sorts of logical conflict as to the import of the previous cases cited in illustration, or as to the value of the analogies insisted upon. ”

“ The rule-making procedure performs important functions. It gives notice to an entire segment of society of those controls or regimentation that is forthcoming. It gives an opportunity for persons affected to be heard. ”

“ And it is, as far as I have been able to learn, the practice of all countries.' The same will, the same positive action, the same purpose, and, it may be added, the same predicament or position of the actors, must exist in each class of cases. There must be intent and act, prompted by, and tending to, a practicable, or at least a probable result, and not mere endurance or submission to uncontrollable necessity in either case. ”

“ Our system does not profess to make human judgment infallible; it professes only to provide that our deliberative assemblies shall decide according to the best of their judgment, and shall neither retain nor reject anything, without a full opportunity at least being given for the exercise of deliberate reflection and mature discussion. ”

“ In legislating for a Government like ours, where many of our most valuable institutions are founded on experiment, the best informed minds could not, in the earlier progress of things, determine with reasonable certainty upon the regulations and rules of action best suited to the circumstances of society, and the permanent good of the country. Experience alone can develop the fitness of measures, and the salutary or pernicious influence of particular laws. ”

“ The need for final decisions will remain, not merely in emergencies, but also as to policy ; and it is of 'high importance to vest the responsibility for decision, according to the nature of the case, in the right hands. But we suggest that a great deal of the old autocracy in industry and services, once deemed to be indispensable, is ceasing to be necessary to effi- ciency, and will accordingly, as Democracy becomes more genuinely accepted, gradually be dispensed with. ”

“ In formulating and implementing major government policies and decisions, we need to conduct thorough research and studies, heed people's concerns, solicit their opinions, pool their wisdom, act in accordance with objective laws, and make our policies and decisions more foresighted, scientific and effective. ”

“ Who, in drawing his conclusions about public policies, will be made to hesitate by remembering the many obstacles that stand in the way of right judgments? Who will think it needful to fit himself by inquiries so various and so extensive? ”

“ Your present decisions, subject to mutual changes and amendments, will become more and more important for future reference, as time rolls on, by enabling each to correct both; for our own changes make us think others have changed. ”

“ They who seriously contemplate the present state of our affairs, will be convinced that other considerations, of at least equal importance, demand their attention. Let it be admitted that this plan, like every thing else devised by man, has its imperfections. ”

“ The wisdom of Congress, aided by the experience and the advice of the Executive, will no doubt be sufficient for the great exigency. But in any plan which may be adopted, certain general principles must obtain. ”

“ I think, therefore, that I have established the truth of the proposition, that men who aspire to exercise a directing and controlling influence in any pursuit or business, should be distinguished by a knowledge of principles and general laws. ”

“ If we intend to comprise in the idea of Order all that society requires from its government which is not included in the idea of Progress, we must define Order as the preservation of all kinds and amounts of good which already exist, and Progress as consisting in the increase of them. ”

“ He who has acquired the first will judge calmly, and weigh with care the consequences of changes proposed and consider with thoughtful judgment the measures to be taken or modification of laws or customs necessary to meet the ever- varying phases of a nation's life. ”

“ Decision and action, everywhere blunted, delayed, or curtailed by talk and the processes of discussion, are brought forth only after the difficult, tumultuous assent of several discordant wills.2314 Elective and collective as these powers are, measures are still taken to guard against them. ”

“ If they have a case to decide, they begin by acquiring the most vivid and distinct perception of it, and we see before our eyes the rise and progress of the whole affair, and all the changes it undergoes. ”

“ Government as a science must make its improvement along the same practical lines which develop system, simplification, classification of kindred activities, and better administrative direction in the evolution of business. ”

“ As to the improvements which are to be introduced into a political system, their quantity and their period must be determined by the degree of knowledge existing in any country, and the state of preparation of the public mind for the changes that are to be desired. ”

“ In all the business of everyday life, directive thinking must be employed; whether we are merely using our minds to decide the most [Pg 69] trivial problem, such as the best way of eradicating weeds from the garden, or whether we are deciding upon a policy to be pursued in some great commercial or political enterprise. ”

“ And when we find this persistence manifested throughout all ages in all departments of the regulative organization—when we see it to be the natural accompaniment of the function of that organization, which is essentially restraining—when we estimate the future action of the organization in any case, by observing the general sweep of its curve throughout long periods of the past—we shall see how misleading may be the conclusions drawn from recent facts taken by themselves. ”

“ Good administration, the effective transaction of business, implies system, exactness, the judgment of evidence upon its merits, and the prompt solution of problems as they arise, and to each of these requisites the scientific education is directly related. ”

“ If legislation is applied to the control of interests, especially when the latter are favored by the facts of the situation, the only effect is to impose on the interests more crafty and secret modes of action. ”

“ If there be a necessity that an action shall be done, or that any effect shall be brought to pass, it does not therefore follow that there is nothing necessarily requisite as a means to bring it to pass; and therefore when it is determined that one thing shall be chosen before another, ’tis determined also for what cause it shall be chosen, which cause for the most part is deliberation or consultation ”

“ Then, with regard to the phenomena of what are called constitutions of government, or the political systems of exercising public authority, I find numerous cases in which the force of an individual will and intelligence has been not only a great factor, but by far the largest factor in the production of particular institutions. ”

“ That which I hold to be the chief business of legislation—an administration of justice such as shall secure to each person, with certainty and without cost, the maintenance of his equitable claims—is a business to which little attention is paid; while attention is absorbed in doing things which I hold should not be done at all. ”

“ It is not enough, however, to determine the abstract principles upon which a policy may be founded—that which is just may not always be most expedient, and if both the one and the other, it may not be practicable. ”

“ Why, another set of men, forty miles off, on the same day, with the same propriety, with as good qualifications, and in as large numbers, may meet and set up another government....
"When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary to ascertain the will of the people on a new exigency, or a new state of things, or of opinion, the legislative power provides for that ascertainment by an ordinary act of legislation. ”