Rule of the shorter term

“ Even three years, in such circumstances, are almost too long a period, and any longer term is absolutely inadmissible. Where, on the contrary, democracy is the ascendant power, and still tends to increase, requiring rather to be moderated in its exercise than encouraged to any abnormal activity ”

“ What should be the proper duration of office is matter of more doubt and speculation. On the one hand, it may be said, that the shorter the period of office, the more security there will be against any dangerous abuse of power. The longer the period, the less will responsibility be felt, and the more personal ambition will be indulged. On the other hand, the considerations above stated prove, that a very short period is, practically speaking, equivalent to a surrender of the executive power, as a check in government, or subjects it to an intolerable vacillation and imbecility. ”

“ Secondly, while a long term is intended to guard against the too frequent changes in the laws, it may also prevent, for too long a time, the amendment or the repeal of bad laws. Such amendment or repeal may be hastened by the election of new members in the place of the one-third who retire every two years. ”

“ If the state governments are found tranquil, and prosperous, and safe, with a senate of two, three, four, and five years' duration, it would seem impossible for the Union to be in danger from a term of service of six years. ”

“ And as a power in government, if it exist at all, it is perennial and universal and can give what duration it pleases to its exercise, whether for two years or for more than two years. If it can be made to endure for two years, it can be made to endure for more. There is no other power that can pronounce the limit of its duration against the time expressed in it and its justification practically marks the doom of the judicial judgment on legislative action. ”

“ Those who look for the rule of action which is to govern term, seek it no longer in the code which has been abrogated, and, having effected its temporary purpose, has become obsolete and null, but in that which has the sanction of their own legislature. ”

“ Beyond all question Civil-Service Reform must begin by a limitation of the President to one term, so that the temptation to use the appointing power for personal ends may disappear from our system, and this great disturbing force cease to exist. ”

“ The office involved powers which might become dangerous to the people, and, as it was elective, rotation was applied to protect them; when appointment was substituted for election, a definite term was provided to take the place of rotation. The justices of the peace were not usually elective, and, as their functions were such as might possibly become dangerous, it was provided that they should be commissioned for fixed periods. In both these cases limitation of term was clearly a substitute for rotation. ”

“ There is first the will of the legislature. When it confers a right, it may confer it, either for a limited, or for an unlimited time. In the term unlimited time, we include the power of tradition, or transfer, in all its shapes. If the time is limited, by the declaration of the legislature, either to a certain number of years, or the life of the party, the fact which terminates the right is obvious. If a man possesses a right, unlimited in point of time, the events are three by which it has been commonly fixed that it may be terminated: 1. ”

“ In favor of the first opinion were urged the danger of a gradual degeneracy of re-elections from time to time, into first a life and then a hereditary tenure, and the favourable effect of an incapacity to be reappointed on the independent exercise of the Executive authority. ”

“ The danger is that the indulgence and attachments of the people will keep a man in the chair after he becomes a dotard, that re-election through life shall become habitual, and election for life follow that. General Washington set the example of voluntary retirement after eight years. I shall follow it. And a few more precedents will oppose the obstacle of habit to any one after awhile who shall endeavor to extend his term. Perhaps it may beget a disposition to establish it by an amendment of the Constitution. ”

“ Gentlemen will probably judge according to their habits of mind, and according to their opportunities of observation. Those who have seen much of the evils of elections will probably incline to long Parliaments; those who have seen little or nothing of these evils will probably incline to a short term. Only observe this, that, whatever may be the legal term, it ought to be a year longer than that for which Parliaments ought ordinarily to sit. For there must be a general election at the end of the legal term, let the state of the country be what it may. ”

“ But, if the period of its continuance should thus be extended from three to seven years, the natural course of encroachment, or some momentous circumstances like the present, might lead to fresh prolongations, and gradually to an entire repeal of what had been thought so important a safeguard of its purity. Time has happily put an end to apprehensions which are not on that account to be reckoned unreasonable. ”

“ Another point of difference is in regard to the power of instant removal, many of the most pronounced reformers of the civil service holding that power to be essential, and believing that it will not be abused so long as the removing power cannot arbitrarily appoint the successor. The matured opinion of others is that a tenure of office definitely fixed for a term of years, during which the incumbent cannot be disturbed except upon substantial written charges, will secure a better class of officials. ”

“ A short term of office would scarcely suffice, either for suitable knowledge, or suitable action. And to say the least, four years employed in the executive functions of the Union would not enable any man to become more familiar with them, than half that period with those of a single state. ”

“ Let the power of the persons elected be what it may, they are only the trustees, and not the masters, of the people; yet the time ought not to be so short that they could not discharge their duty with ability. Considering this, a term of two years is short enough in this case. Many will have a considerable distance to travel from the places of their abode to the seat of the general government. ”

“ It is apparent that a declaration for a very short term, as for a single day, would defeat the design of representation. The election, in that case, would not seem to the people to be of any importance, and the person elected would think as lightly of his appointment. ”

“ There are always hurry and confusion at the end of every session of Congress, and these are multiplied severalfold, if that be possible, when the Congress dies, by Constitutional limit, with the expiration of a President's term. ”

“ The assertion that, wherever it is stated in a legislative grant or charter that it is to last for a given period of time, therefore such provision is a plain manifestation of the intention of the legislature t at the grant or charter shall not be repealed or amended for the time for which it was declared that it should exist, is fallacious, since it overlooks the consideration that the limit of time fixed for the duration of the charter or grant, like every other provision therein, is qualified by the reserved power to alter, amend, or repeal. ”

“ And a president chosen for twenty years ought not to be again eligible, upon the plain ground, that by such a term of office his responsibility would be greatly diminished, and his means of influence and patronage immensely increased, so as to check in a great measure the just expression of public opinion, and the free exercise of the elective franchise. Whether an intermediate period, say of eight years, or of seven years, as proposed in the convention, might not be beneficially combined with subsequent ineligibility, is a point, upon which great statesmen have not been agreed ”

“ When we arrive, however, at a just understanding and appreciation of the mechanism of this wondrous British constitutional watch, jewelled in ever so many holes as it is, with its levers, and escapements, and unnumbered compensation balances, the lateness of our legislative hours will not be by far so much of a mystery to us. We are altogether a sitting-up late people. ”

“ The third term tradition has no value whatever except as it applies to a third consecutive term. While it is well to keep it as a custom, it would be a mark both of weakness and unwisdom for the American people to embody it into a Constitutional provision which could not do them good and on some given occasion might work real harm. ”

“ Others, however, while they admit that short terms tend to insure responsibility on the part of a representative, consider this argument more than counterbalanced by the objections to which a short term is liable. Looking to a reëlection, he may act with a view to his popularity rather than to the public good. ”

“ Hence the real objection to the appointment of judges as such is that when appointed they have held office for life. The entire objection, therefore, to appointment may be met by limiting the tenure of the appointed judge and by a variety of provisions for his retirement. He would, of course, be subject to impeachment. He might very well in addition be subject to some mode of legislative recall such as was proposed for the chief justice. His term may be limited to five years or seven years, thus requiring a retirement at the end of each period unless a reappointment is made. ”

“ These arguments undoubtedly have considerable force, but I do not think they can support a decision invalidating this Act on its face. Section 1 of Art. II vests all of the executive power in the sitting President, and limits his term of office to four years. ”

“ Every constitution, then, and every law, naturally expires at the end of thirty-four years. If it be enforced longer, it is an act of force, and not of right. It may be said, that the succeeding generation exercising, in fact, the power of repeal, this leaves them as free as if the constitution or law had been expressly limited to thirty-four years only. ”

“ Should an honest majority result from the new and enlarged representation, should those acquiesce, whose principles or interests they may control, your wishes for retirement would be gratified with less danger, as soon as that shall be manifest, without awaiting the completion of the second period of four years. One or two sessions will determine the crisis, and I cannot but hope that you can resolve to add one or two more to the many years you have already sacrificed to the good of mankind. ”

“ The constitutional amendments shortening the Presidential term from six to four years and prescribing the tenure of the members of the Congress—four years for Representatives and six years for Senators, with one-third of the members of the Senate to be elected every two years—require the setting of a definite schedule for the holding of elections so that, including the election for provincial and municipal officials, they may not occur more than once every two years. ”

“ In a word they must decide like legislators, though they will be exempt from the responsibility to the public which controls other legislators. Such conditions you can only meet by making the judicial tenure of office ephemeral, as all legislative tenure is ephemeral. ”

“ In the next place, however well founded the maxim might be, that where no other circumstances affect the case, the greater the power is, the shorter ought to be its duration; and conversely, the smaller the power, the more safely its duration may be protracted; [68] that maxim, if it applied at all to the government of the Union, was favourable to the extension of the period of service beyond that of the state legislatures. The powers of congress are few and limited, and of a national character; those of the state legislatures are general, and have few positive limitations. ”

“ Fourth resolution, fixing election, term, qualifications, &c., of the second branch of the legislature — Motions to amend the clause relating to their term of office by making it six or five years — Disagreed to. ”

“ Notwithstanding the constantly increasing influence of the house of commons, and its popular cast of opinion and action, more than a century has elapsed without any successful effort, or even any general desire, to change the duration of parliament. ”

“ When comes the time of our overt rule, the time to manifest its blessings, we shall remake all legislatures, all our laws will be brief, plain, stable, without any kind of interpretations, so that anyone will be in a position to know them perfectly. ”

“ For the court of last resort having once declared the meaning of a clause of the Constitution, that meaning remains fixed forever, unless the court either reverses itself, which is a disaster, or the Constitution can be amended by the states, which is not only difficult, but which, even if it be possible, entails years of delay. ”

“ The advantages of a constitution, in which each measure of legislation must necessarily be twice deliberately argued by separate senates, acting under different impressions, and interposing, at the same time, a salutary delay, during which heats may subside, and erroneous views be corrected, requires no further illustration. ”

“ You have got a Congress elected for one fixed period, going out perhaps by fixed instalments, which cannot be accelerated or retarded—you have a President chosen for a fixed period, and immovable during that period: all the arrangements are for STATED times. There is no ELASTIC element, everything is rigid, specified, dated. Come what may, you can quicken nothing, and can retard nothing. You have bespoken your Government in advance, and whether it suits you or not, whether it works well or works ill, whether it is what you want or not, by law you must keep it. ”