The governing powers do not rest exclusively with the President or with the President and his ministers; they are shared in a certain degree with the Senate, which sits from time to time in executive session, laying aside at such periods its legislative character. It is this executive authority which lends so great a dignity to the Senate, gives it the privilege of preponderating over the other House, and makes it the political safeguard of the nation. The questions of government as to which the Senate is empowered to interfere are soon told. All treaties made by the President must be sanctioned by the Senate; and all appointments made by the President must be confirmed by the Senate. The list is short; and one is disposed to think, when first hearing it, that the thing itself does not amount to much. But it does amount to very much; it enables the Senate to fetter the President, if the Senate should be so inclined, both as regards foreign politics and home politics. A Secretary for Foreign Affairs at Washington may write what dispatches he pleases without reference to the Senate; but the Senate interferes before those dispatches can have resulted in any fact which may be detrimental to the nation. It is not only that the Senate is responsible for such treaties as are made, but that the President is deterred from the making of treaties for which the Senate would decline to make itself responsible. Even though no treaty should ever be refused its sanction by the Senate, the protecting power of the Senate in that matter would not on that account have been less necessary or less efficacious. Though the bars with which we protect our house may never have been tried by a thief, we do not therefore believe that our house would have been safe if such bars had been known to be wanting. And then, as to that matter of State appointments, is it not the fact that all governing power consists in the selection of the agents by whom the action of government shall be carried on? It must come to this, I imagine, when the argument is pushed home. The power of the most powerful man depends only on the extent of his authority over his agents. According to the Constitution of the United States, the President can select no agent either at home or abroad, for purposes either of peace or war, or to the employment of whom the Senate does not agree with him.
Such a rule as this should save the nation from the use of disreputable agents as public servants. It might perhaps have done much more toward such salvation than it has as yet effected, and it may well be hoped that it will in future do more.
Such are the executive powers of the Senate; and it is, I think, remarkable that the Senate has always used these powers with extreme moderation. It has never shown a factious inclination to hinder government by unnecessary interference, or a disposition to clip the President's wings by putting itself altogether at variance with him.
I am not quite sure whether some fault may not have lain on the other side; whether the Senate may not have been somewhat slack in exercising the protective privileges given to it by the Constitution. And here I cannot but remark how great is the deference paid to all governors and edicts of government throughout the United States. One would have been disposed to think that such a feeling would be stronger in an old country such as Great Britain than in a young country such as the States. But I think that it is not so. There is less disposition to question the action of government either at Washington or at New York, than there is in London. Men in America seem to be content when they have voted in their governors, and to feel that for them all political action is over until the time shall come for voting for others. And this feeling, which seems to prevail among the people, prevails also in both Houses of Congress. Bitter denunciations against the President's policy or the President's ministers are seldom heard.
Speeches are not often made with the object of impeding the action of government. That so small and so grave a body as the Senate should abstain from factious opposition to the government when employed on executive functions, was perhaps to be expected. It is of course well that it should be so. I confess, however, that it has appeared to me that the Senate has not used the power placed in its hands as freely as the Constitution has intended, But I look at the matter as an Englishman, and as an Englishman I can endure no government action which is not immediately subject to parliamentary control.
Such are the governing powers of the United States. I think it will be seen that they are much more limited in their scope of action than with us; but within that scope of action much more independent and self-sufficient. And, in addition to this, those who exercise power in the United States are not only free from immediate responsibility, but are not made subject to the hope or fear of future judgment. Success will bring no award, and failure no punishment. I am not aware that any political delinquency has ever yet brought down retribution on the head of the offender in the United States, or that any great deed has been held as entitling the doer of it to his country's gratitude. Titles of nobility they have none; pensions they never give; and political disgrace is unknown.
The line of politics would seem to be cold and unalluring. It is cold; and would be unalluring, were it not that as a profession it is profitable. In much of this I expect that a change will gradually take place. The theory has been that public affairs should be in the hands of little men. The theory was intelligible while the public affairs were small; but they are small no longer, and that theory, I fancy, will have to alter itself. Great men are needed for the government, and in order to produce great men a career of greatness must be opened to them. I can see no reason why the career and the men should not be forthcoming.
