As Sir Henry Maine rightly says, the framers of our Constitution, consciously or unconsciously, made the President’s office like the King’s office under the English constitution of their time,--the constitution, namely, of George III., who…
Woodrow Wilson
The Public Record
Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, serving from 1913 to 1921. A member of the Democratic Party, he was born in Virginia and raised in Georgia before moving to New Jersey, where he became a prominent political figure. Wilson was a key leader of the Progressive Movement, advocating for reforms such as antitrust legislation and the establishment of the Federal Reserve System. His presidency is also noted for significant events such as the United States' involvement in World War I and his efforts to promote the League of Nations, an international organization aimed at preventing future conflicts.
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They allowed the President to choose his ministers freely, as George then seemed to have established his right to do; but they made the confirmation of the Senate a necessary condition to his appointments.
They vested in him the right of negotiating treaties with foreign governments; but he was not to sign and ratify treaties until he had obtained the sanction of the Senate.
That oversight of executive action which Parliament had not yet had the spirit or the inclination to exert, and which it had forfeited its independence by not exerting, was forever secured to our federal upper chamber by the fundamental…
In short, the transitional relations of the Crown and Parliament of that day were crystallized in our Constitution, such guarantees of executive good faith and legislative participation in the weightier determinations of government as were…
The President has never been powerful, however, except at such times as he has had Congress at his back.
But such cases prove rather the usefulness than the strength of the presidency.
In such a contest between origination and negation origination must always win, or government must stand still.
It is a much-tempered instrument, but for that reason all the more flexible and useful.
The old, blunt, antagonistic veto is no longer needed.
Since executive and legislature cannot come into relations of mutual confidence and co-operation, the former must be put in a position to maintain a creditable competition for consideration and dignity.
If Congress does not regard them, it must reckon with the people, not with him.
It is his duty to tell Congress what he thinks concerning the pending questions of the day; it is not his duty to assume any responsibility for the effect produced on Congressmen.
The English have transformed their Crown into a Ministry, and in doing so have recognized both the supremacy of Parliament and the rôle of leadership in legislation properly belonging to a responsible executive.
The result has been that they have kept a strong executive without abating either the power or the independence of the representative chamber in respect of its legislative function.
We have supposed that our President was great because his powers were specific, and that our Congress was not supreme because it could not lay its hands directly upon his office and turn him out.
In fact, neither the dignity and power of the executive nor the importance of Congress is served by the arrangement.
Singularly enough, there is sharp opposition to the introduction into Congress of any such leadership on the part of the executive as the Ministers of the Crown enjoy in Parliament, on the ground of the increase of power which would accrue…
It is said that such a change would, by centring party and personal responsibility in Congress, give too great a prominence to legislation; would make Congress the object of too excited an interest on the part of the people.
It is thought that, if such coherence of plan, definiteness and continuity of aim, and sanction of party were to be given the work of Congress, the resulting concentration of popular interest and opinion would carry Congress over all the…
In short, the potential supremacy of Congress is thought to be kept within bounds, not by the constitutional power of the executive and the judiciary, its co-ordinate branches, but by the intrinsic dulness and confusion of its own…
Any reform which should tend to give to national legislation that uniform, open, intelligent, and responsible character which it now lacks, would also create that popular interest in the proceedings of Congress which, it is said, would…
Democracy is so delicate a form of government that it must break down if given too great facility or efficacy of operation.
No one body of men must be suffered to utter the voice of the people, lest that voice become, through it, directly supreme.
Congress has often come into conflict with the Supreme Court by attempting to extend the province of the federal government as against the States; but it has seldom, I believe, been brought effectually to book for any alleged exercise of…
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