Office-holding

“ He was a public officer. The General Appropriation Act of July 23d, 1866, [1] authorized the assistant treasurer, at Boston, with the approbation of the Secretary of the Treasury, to appoint a specified number of clerks, who were to receive, respectively, the salaries thereby prescribed. The indictment avers the appointment of the defendant in the manner provided in the act.
An office is a public station, or employment, conferred by the appointment of government. The term embraces the ideas of tenure, duration, emolument, and duties. ”

“ The Chamber shall have power to create departments for the transaction of all business connected with the affairs over which it has jurisdiction, and to appoint and dismiss chief and subordinate officials for such departments, to fix the term of their office, and to fix and pay their salaries ”

“ The commissioner of the general land-office has power to audit and settle all public accounts relating to the public lands, and to transmit the accounts and vouchers to the first comptroller of the treasury for his examination and decision thereon. ”

“ I submit, therefore, to your consideration whether the efficiency of the government would not be promoted, and official industry and integrity better secured, by a general extension of the law which limits appointments to four years.
“In a country where offices are created solely for the benefit of the people no one man has any more intrinsic right to official station than another. Offices were not established to give support to particular men at the public expense. No individual wrong is, therefore, done by removal, since neither appointment to nor continuance in office is matter of right. ”

“ The honorable gentleman said, that those who go to Congress will look forward to offices, as a compensation for their services, rather than salaries. Does he recollect that they shall not fill offices created by themselves? When they go to Congress, the old offices will be filled. They cannot make any probable calculation that the men in office will die, or forfeit their offices. As they cannot get any new offices, one of these contingencies must happen before they can get any office at all. ”

“ But all this information is unavailable in consequence of the regulations of the office in which the wills are kept. All the books of entry, both of ancient and modern wills, are kept together, and can only be consulted in the same department of the same office, in the same manner and subject to precisely the same restrictions and the same payments. ”

“ Where an office is created, the law usually fixes the compensation, prescribes its duties, and requires that the appointee shall give a bond with sureties for the faithful performance of the service required. To do all this, if the employment were an office, by a contract with the officer and without his bond would, to say the least, be a singular anomaly. ”

“ May an employer, during the course of an unfair labor practice hearing, show that a labor organization has not complied with § 9 (h) and thereby establish the Board's want of jurisdiction? (2) Assuming the answer to this question is 'yes,' is the Board's construction of 'officer' in § 9 (h) -viz., 'any person occupying a position identified as an office in the constitution of the labor organization'-proper? ”

“ And yet when the postmaster at New York accepted his appointment, did he not vacate his seat in the Senate? There is no doubt a contractor is an officer pro tempore—it is not an office in perpetuity, but created for a time, and for a particular purpose. And I will ask, if it is not more dangerous to the independence of the two Houses to admit commissioners and contractors within their walls than officers with legal salaries and appointments? ”

“ The Commissioner, therefore, recommends the entire reorganization of the division, upon a basis similar to the special-service of the Post-Office and Treasury Departments, and that authority be given by law for the appointment of a regular corps of special agents, at least 30 in number, who shall receive a fixed annual salary, and, when traveling on such duty, shall be entitled to per-diem allowance for subsistence and their actual traveling-expenses. ”

“ During the period in which the head of any department or agency, or any other officer or civilian employee of the Federal Government appointed by the President of the United States, holds office, no funds may be obligated or expended in excess of $5,000 to furnish or redecorate the office of such department head, agency head, officer, or employee, or to purchase furniture or make improvements for any such office, unless advance notice of such furnishing or redecoration is transmitted to the Committees on Appropriations of the House of Representatives and the Senate. ”

“ The first of those acts established a General Land Office, while the last one reorganized that office. Each of those acts made provision for the appointment of certain officers, and each limited the prohibition against the purchasing or becoming interested in the purchasing of public lands to the officers or employees named in them, respectively. ”

“ The office of Commissioner of Internal Revenue is one of the most arduous and responsible under the Government. It falls but little, if any, short of a Cabinet position in its importance and responsibilities. I would ask for it, therefore, such legislation as in your judgment will place the office upon a footing of dignity commensurate with its importance and with the character and qualifications of the class of men required to fill it properly. ”

“ The office must have been a difficult one, between the Treasury on the one hand and the Board of Works on the other, and although their relations with the architect were of the most friendly character, I cannot find that their appointment greatly facilitated the progress of the work.
Such difficulties must be expected by all who work for the public. No one can question the right of the Houses of Lords and Commons to examine, censure, and indirectly control, those who are working for their service. ”

“ The civil officials with which the public is most familiar are postal employees, officers of the federal courts, and revenue officials. Such persons usually hold office while their party is in power or during good behavior. Long tenure of office tends to conservative measures and the spirit of bureaucracy, while a system by which civil office is regarded as party spoil tends to corruption and inefficiency. The business of administration is becoming increasingly important in the modern state. ”

“ No person shall at the same time hold more than one of the offices mentioned in this article. Any officer required by law to give bond may be required to give additional security thereon, or to execute a new bond, and in default of so doing his office shall be declared vacant. ”

“ With the view to such assistance being furnished, free from injury to any one, the writer would suggest that, an office be established in each parish, or district of a parish, where the amount of the population requires it, of every city and town throughout the kingdom. The office should contain—
A Labour Department, where those requiring work, as well as those requiring workmen, might register their respective wants.
An association, for the employment of persons temporarily out of work, might very advantageously affiliate itself with this department. ”

“ And they shall enjoy the income and fees annexed and pertaining to the said office, provided that the income which said persons shall give each year be for the estates of said city, to be expended and distributed for the common welfare of the same, and not for any other thing—for which purpose we direct the present decree to be given, signed by my hand and countersigned by our secretary. ”

“ The possession of such an office confers a local distinction, which, without pay, is naturally an object of ambition; and since his duties are controlling and negative, rather than active and positive, they do not demand from the occupant a large sacrifice of his time. ”

“ One of the most important acts performed at the departments is, to settle those very large accounts which individuals have with the government; accounts amounting to millions of dollars; to settle them, an auditor and a comptroller have been appointed by law, whose official acts may affect, to the extent of hundreds of thousands of dollars, the property of individual contractors. If the pretensions of the president are well founded, his power goes further than he has exerted it. He may go into the office of the auditor, or the office of the comptroller, and may say to him, sir, Mr. ”

“ This appears to me to be undesirable: every branch of the Post Office ought, in my opinion, to defray its own expenses, although it is, at the same time, important that the ramifications should be as numerous as possible. The most equitable arrangement appears to be this: let the whole weight of taxation be thrown on the primary distribution, which ought to include every place which can be reached without absolute loss to the revenue, and let each department of the secondary distribution just defray its own expenses. ”

“ In addition to the overseers, there are one hundred and eight guardians, elected by the inhabitants who pay levies, and they continue in office for three years, during which time they possess all the power and authority of overseers, except making and collecting of rates, from both of which they are exempt, nor can they be compelled to assist therein as guardians ”

“ It has found its way into the pulpit, into the monastery, into the cloister, and into every department of life. No man seems to desire an office, or is called upon to fulfil an office for the public good, but the first thing to be considered is, What will it pay? ”

“ The objects of retrenchment should be to dispense with all the unnecessary officers, and retain those only which are necessary to the speedy and accurate transaction of business. Persons who have public business to transact in the offices will, otherwise, be detained at the seat of government at great individual expense and detriment for weeks and months. ”

“ Regarded as property, an office is peculiar in this, namely, that all the emoluments which are incident to it are conferred as a compensation for duties to be performed, and that no one can become entitled to receive the one without becoming bound to perform the other. ”

“ Doing that which it is necessary to do in order that a newly-created land office may by in a proper and fit condition at the time appointed for opening it for the transaction of public business us, as it seems to us, a part of the official duties of the person who is appointed to the office. ”

“ It is not to be understood that these one hundred thousand citizens are simply "office-seekers," using the ordinary and offensive sense of the term. The activity in affairs which we describe is distinct from a sordid desire to grab the emoluments of office. The vast majority of the places, including all those in the townships—which, with the aspirants to them, make four-fifths of the whole—are either without any pay at all or have an amount so small as to be beneath our consideration. ”

“ No person who holds an office, the salary or annual compensation attached to which amounts to the sum of two thousand five hundred dollars, shall receive compensation for discharging the duties of any other office, unless expressly authorized by law. ”

“ The office of the surveyor for the city, created during the former establishment, being of indispensable necessity, it has been continued, and to that of the superintendent, substituted instead of the board of commissioners at the last session of Congress, no salary was annexed by law. These offices being permanent, I have supposed it more agreeable to principle that their salaries should be fixed by the Legislature, and therefore have assigned them none. ”

“ Owing to the abolition by law of the offices of assessor and assistant assessor of internal revenue, in May, 1873, a large additional amount of labor was thrown on the office of the commissioner, to meet which more clerical force became necessary, and was employed during the summer, fall, and winter following. ”

“ The object contemplated by the Legislature in the establishment of the office was to secure to the men the full amount of their earnings immediately after their labour was completed, with the exception of one farthing in the shilling, which is required to be left in the office to defray necessary expenses. ”

“ Most offices are not only created by the State, but the right to hold them, as well as the tenure of them, is regulated by law; and, therefore, though they are in their nature incorporeal property, yet they are without some of the most usual and important incidents of property, as they can neither be bought nor sold. ”

“ All who want servants must go to the Registry-office for them; let all have a fair chance: this appendage to the agent's office I hope your excellency will sanction. The district Homes cannot be kept open without one, and I do hope your excellency will give them all the aid in your power. Any government buildings that are unoccupied cannot be better employed ”

“ Residence is not lost by absence in the discharge of any public trust bestowed by popular election. Article 57. The positions of Deputy and of Senator are incompatible with any Federal commission or office whatsoever for which a salary is received. Article 58. The Deputies and the Senators from the day of their election to the day on which their trust is concluded, may not accept any commission or office offered by the Federal Executive, for which a salary is received, except with the previous license of the respective house. ”