Government officer

“ Each cabinet officer, again, controls his own department pretty much as he pleases, without consultation with the President or with his coadjutors, and often in the face of determinations which have been reached by the others. ”

“ The first is necessary to give to the officer himself the inclination and the resolution to act his part well, and to the community time and leisure to observe the tendency of his measures, and thence to form an experimental estimate of their merits. The last is necessary to enable the People, when they see reason to approve of his conduct, to continue him in the station, in order to prolong the utility of his talents and virtues, and to secure to the Government the advantage of permanency in a wise system of administration. ”

“ To put this one class of appointments as far as possible out of harm's way is of more consequence than the worst which can happen to all other offices in the state; for, in every other department, if the officer is unqualified, the general opinion of the community directs him in a certain degree what to do; but in the position of the administrators of a dependency where the people are not fit to have the control in their own hands, the character of the government entirely depends on the qualifications, moral and intellectual, of the individual functionaries. ”

“ If the chief-justice, the head of an independent branch of government, could be sent abroad as an Envoy Extraordinary in Executive employment, no objection could exist to sending an Executive officer on a temporary service of the same kind, unless on the score of expediency. ”

“ EXECUTIVE, n. An officer of the Government, whose duty it is to enforce the wishes of the legislative power until such time as the judicial department shall be pleased to pronounce them invalid and of no effect. ”

“ In modern usage the roles and regulations of clubs, learned societies, and other associations, are also called by-laws.]
[Sidenote: Power and responsibility.] In the selectmen and various special officers the town has an executive department; and here let us observe that, while these officials are kept strictly accountable to the people, they are entrusted with very considerable authority. Things are not so arranged that an officer can plead that he has failed in his duty from lack of power. There is ample power, joined with complete responsibility. ”

“ As the Master General was always a distinguished officer, and was often a member of the Cabinet, and further was assisted by a board, some of whom were men of military experience and in Parliament, the system apparently suited itself more or less to our constitutional form of government. ”

“ Such a minister as this is a high public officer of government, who resides at a foreign capital for the purpose of attending to the business of his own country there, and of protecting the citizens in case of danger. ”

“ May you ever become an officer of the law? Would you as a citizen be justified in withholding from an officer that obedience and moral support which you as an officer might justly demand from every citizen?
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE. The State.—For the founding of the several colonies, their charters, etc., the student may profitably consult the learned monographs in Winsor's Narrative and Critical History of America, 8 vols., Boston, 1886-89. ”

“ The Public Service Commission or any Committee thereof may delegate to a public officer, subject to such conditions as may he prescribed by the Cabinet of Ministers, its powers of appointment, transfer, dismissal or disciplinary control of any category of public officers. ”

“ Commendable as this practice was, it did foster in the service a bureaucratic feeling, and in the public an apprehension lest government officers should consider themselves a class. An examination of the various Blue Books shows, moreover, that sons were often appointed to succeed fathers, which increased the disapprobation. A bureaucracy is always aristocratic ”

“ There is no constitutional or legal requirement that the President shall take the oath of office in the presence of the people, but there is so manifest an appropriateness in the public induction to office of the chief executive officer of the nation that from the beginning of the Government the people, to whose service the official oath consecrates the officer, have been called to witness the solemn ceremonial. The oath taken in the presence of the people becomes a mutual covenant. ”

“ The officers of the Government were then a set of quiet, industrious, modest and unobtrusive gentlemen who did not try to control party politics, and did not steal, but did, as a general rule, studiously endeavor, by strict attention to their official business, to win the approval of the Government which employed them, and an honorable name for themselves. ”

“ It is, no doubt, indispensable to good government that the chiefs of the administration, whether permanent or temporary, should extend a commanding, though general, view over the ensemble of all the interests confided, in any degree, to the responsibility of the central power. ”

“ They consist of all those officials who are appointed as agents in executing the designs of government, such as postmasters, collectors of customs, civil engineers, army and navy officers, superintendents of national works, etc. ”

“ It must be borne in mind, however, that official duties were simple as compared with the functions of the modern public officer, and that, in the absence of foreign travel, standards of comparison were lacking. ”

“ Every worthy officer desires to make his official action a gain and an honor to his country; but the people themselves, far more than their officers in public station, are interested in a pure, economical, and vigorous administration. ”

“ It is idle to suppose that, operating as the system now does — with the increase of the country in extent, population and wealth, and the consequent increase of the power and patronage of the government, the head of the executive department can remain elective. ”

“ The executive, therefore, ought to be so constituted as to be the great protector of the mass of the people. It is the duty of the executive to appoint the officers, and to command the forces, of the republic—to appoint, first, ministerial officers for the administration of public affairs ”

“ There has never yet been any scarcity of proper officers in any department of the government of the United States; even during the war, when men risked their lives and property by engaging in such service, there were candidates enough. ”

“ But the public know little of the permanent official who keeps the traditions and experience of the department, whose judgment is always an element, often a preponderating element, in eventful decisions, and whose pen drafts the despatches which go forth in the name of the Government. ”

“ In both England and France a ministry composed of the chief officers of the executive departments are constituted at once the leaders of legislation and the responsible heads of administration,—a binding link between the legislative and executive branches of the government. ”

“ In the heart of a foreign country, unsupported by the Spanish government, his army wanting the very necessaries of life, he found himself obliged to commence that retreat in winter, over mountains covered with snow, [89] which proved so fatal to the British army, or wait to meet the French troops, flushed with victory, and sustained by an overwhelming force. In vain he appealed to the junta of Salamanca for aid. In vain he endeavored to arouse the spirit of patriotism, which had shone forth so brightly in the first days of the insurrection. ”

“ The executive government consists of a governor, comptroller, treasurer, commissioner of the general land office, and superintendent of education, elected biennially, with an attorney-general and a secretary of state, appointed by the governor. ”

“ Furthermore, the President of the Republic shall have the right, in cases provided by the law, to appoint civilian and military officers proposed by the Council of Ministers. Paragraph 2. Every official of the Republic is subject to the orders of the appropriate minister who is responsible to the Diet for his acts. Art. 56. The Council of Ministers as a body shall bear the constitutional and parliamentary responsibility for the policies of the Government. ”

“ The President and Secretary of State, and in case of disagreement, the Vice-President shall appoint all civil officers, but shall not have power to remove any officer. All removals shall be the result of a fair trial, whether civil or military. ”

“ The President shall appoint all public officers required by the Constitution or other written law to be appointed by the President, as well as the Attorney-General and the Heads of the Army, the Navy, the Air Force and the Police Force. ”

“ Each executive department has certain public functions and duties, the performance of which is absolutely necessary to the existence of the government, but it may temporarily, at least, operate with seeming harshness upon individuals. ”

“ The most usual source of office-holding is the humble work of the clerk, handyman or messenger, responsible for carrying out the nagging routine of government. Beyond this common labor of public service are public servants skilled in their several professions. Beyond and above them are department heads and still higher are the appointed or elected officials responsible for the success or failure of a given public policy. ”

“ I hold that a solemn duty rests upon the officers of Government in all branches, and more particularly upon the officers of the Civil Service, so to comport themselves in the inception and working of the new measures as to make the task of the people and their leaders easy. It is incumbent upon them loyally to accept the principle that these measures involve the surrender of some portion of the authority and control which they now exercise, and some modifications of the methods of administration. ”

“ I wish also to talk about the making of laws, the origin of laws, how they are put in form and finally enacted by the people. I wish to talk about our public servants, because one of the important things for each citizen to know is that from the President of the United States down to the constable of the humblest [pg 199] village, all officers are mere servants of the people and that no officer in America is in his official capacity master of any man, woman, or child. ”

“ We have very nearly exhausted the catalogue of the various official duties to which a civilian may be required to devote himself in the course of his career. There are a few miscellaneous appointments connected with the post-office and the sea-customs, and opium and survey and registration, and there are the much-prized but very laborious offices which the secretaries of Government fill. ”

“ Chief, Justice TANEY that the duties to be performe b y the head of an executive department of the government, whether imposed by act of congress or by resolution, are not, in general, mere ministerial duties; that departmental duties are executive in their nature ”

“ My views have been explained to and approved by several of the principal officers of the government and I believe are well understood by the administration and seen by it with complacency; they are such as every man of honor and every good citizen must approve. ”

“ They are not qualified to exercise themselves the executive department, but they are qualified to name the person who shall exercise it. With us, therefore, they choose this officer every four years. 2. ”

“ If the proprieties of an occasion as sad as that which now overshadows us are observed, possibly one-half of the brief time allowed is gone before, with due regard to the decencies of life, the President and those with whom he should advise can take up the consideration of the grave duty of selecting a head for one of the greatest Departments of the Government. ”

“ A Minister and a Vice Minister shall be assigned to the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs, and the Minister shall be appointed in political service and the Vice Minister shall be appointed as a state public official in extraordinary civil service who belongs to the Senior Civil Service. ”

“ When any forces are raised, they shall be under the command of the executive authority of the state in which they are so raised, unless they be joined by troops from any other state, in which the Congress, or grand council of the states, may appoint a general officer to take the command of the whole ”

“ The various departments of Government should, in my opinion, be made, as far as possible, self-sustaining, and where it is impossible, from their nature, to make them so, a rigid exaction of duty at the hands of all those who are in the employ of the Government should be required. ”

“ The President is empowered to nominate four persons of the Council to be his Deputies, and supply his place in case of sickness or absence, and the President, Council, Fellows, or any twenty-one or more, are empowered to make statutes, rules, orders and by-laws, for the government and direction of the said Society, their estates, goods, &c. ”

“ All subordinate public officers who are not appointed by some mode of public competition should be selected on the direct responsibility of the minister under whom they serve. The ministers, all but the chief, will naturally be selected by the chief; and the chief himself, though really designated by Parliament, should be, in a regal government, officially appointed by the crown. ”

“ Indeed, the value of the principle of concentrating power in the hands of a chief officer, under the name of governor, or of some equivalent term, is recognized by its adoption in large institutions of every sort in the country. ”

“ It thus appears that the only governments, not representative, in which high political skill and ability have been other than exceptional, whether under monarchical or aristocratic forms, have been essentially bureaucracies. The work of government has been in the hands of governors by profession, which is the essence and meaning of bureaucracy. Whether the work is done by them because they have been trained to it, or they are trained to it because it is to be done by them, makes a great difference in many respects, but none at all as to the essential character of the rule. ”