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Duties of the Executive
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The chief duties of the President
are to diligently uphold the Constitution and administer the laws enacted thereunder, to
inform the people, maintain their confidence, protect their rights and adhere to
republican and to moral principles.
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"To inform the
minds of the people, and to follow their will, is the chief duty of those placed at their
head." --Thomas Jefferson to C. W. F. Dumas, 1787. ME 6:342, Papers 12:360
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"My chief object is to let
the good sense of the nation have fair play, believing it will best take care of
itself." --Thomas Jefferson to Joseph Priestley, 1802. FE 8:181
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"I have ever thought that
forms should yield to whatever should facilitate business." --Thomas Jefferson to
James Monroe, 1801. ME 10:267
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"A rule, wise and necessary
for a legislative body, [does] not suit an executive one, which, being governed by events,
must change their purposes as those change." --Thomas Jefferson: Answers to de
Meusnier Questions, 1786. ME 17:52
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"By sending a message [to
Congress], instead of making a speech at the opening of the session, I have prevented the
bloody conflict to which the making an answer would have committed them. They consequently
were able to set into real business at once, without losing ten or twelve days in
combating an answer." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Rush, 1801. ME 10:303
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"Averse to receive
addresses, yet unable to prevent them, I have generally endeavored to turn them to some
account, by making them the occasion, by way of answer, of sowing useful truths and
principles among the people, which might germinate and become rooted among their political
tenets." --Thomas Jefferson to Levi Lincoln, 1802. ME 10:305
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"The road to that glory
which never dies is to use power for the support of the laws and liberties of our country,
not for their destruction." --Thomas Jefferson to the Earl of Buchan, 1803. ME 10:401
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"We [are] bound to
administer to others the same measure of law, not which they had meted to us, but we to
ourselves, and to extend to all equally the protection of the same constitutional
principles." --Thomas Jefferson to Gideon Granger, 1814. ME 14:116
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"Freedom of religion,
freedom of the press, trial by jury, habeas corpus, and a representative legislature... I
consider as the essentials constituting free government, and... the organization of the
executive is interesting as it may insure wisdom and integrity in the first place, but
next as it may favor or endanger the preservation of these fundamentals." --Thomas
Jefferson to Pierre Samuel Dupont de Nemours, 1815. ME 14:255
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"It was well known to have
been a tenet of the republican portion of our fellow citizens, that the sedition law was
contrary to the Constitution and therefore void. On this ground I considered it as a
nullity wherever I met it in the course of my duties; and on this ground I directed
nolle
prosequis
in all the prosecutions which had been instituted under it, and as far as
the public sentiment can be inferred from the occurrences of the day, we may say that this
opinion had the sanction of the nation." --Thomas Jefferson to Gideon Granger, 1814.
ME 14:116
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"The sedition law was
unconstitutional and null, and... my obligation to execute what was law involved that of
not suffering rights secured by valid laws to be prostrated by what was no law."
--Thomas Jefferson to Wilson Nicholas, 1809. ME 12:289
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"It is well known that on
every question the lawyers are about equally divided, and were we to act but in cases
where no contrary opinion of a lawyer can be had, we should never act." --Thomas
Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:168
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"A monarchical head should
confide the execution of its will to departments, consisting each of a plurality of hands
who would warp that will as much as possible towards wisdom and moderation, the two
qualities it generally wants. But a republican head, founding these decrees originally in
these two qualities, should commit them to a single hand for execution, giving them
thereby a promptitude which republican proceedings generally want." --Thomas
Jefferson: Answers to de Meusnier Questions, 1786. ME 17:54
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"An instant of delay in
executive proceedings may be fatal to the whole nation." --Thomas Jefferson to James
Barbour, 1812. ME 13:128
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"I am sensible how far I
should fall short of effecting all the reformation which reason would suggest and
experience approve were I free to do whatever I thought best; but when we reflect how
difficult it is to move or inflect the great machine of society, how impossible to advance
the notions of a whole people suddenly to ideal right, we see the wisdom of Solon's remark
that no more good must be attempted than the nation can bear, and that all will be chiefly
to reform the waste of public money and thus drive away the vultures who prey upon it, and
improve some little upon old routines. Some new fences for securing constitutional rights
may, with the aid of a good Legislature, perhaps be attainable." --Thomas Jefferson
to Walter Jones, 1801. ME 10:235
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"It is fortunate that our
first executive magistrate is purely and zealously republican. We cannot expect all his
successors to be so, and therefore should avail ourselves the present day to establish
principles and examples which may fence us against future heresies preached now, to be
practised hereafter." --Thomas Jefferson to James Innes, 1791. ME 8:145
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"The friends of reform,
while they remain firm, [should] avoid every act and threat against the peace of the
Union... Reason, not rashness, is the only means of bringing our fellow citizens to their
true minds." --Thomas Jefferson to Nicholas Lewis, 1799. ME 10:92
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"Firmness on our part, but a
passive firmness, is the true course." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1799. ME
10:94
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"The strictures on slavery
and on the constitution of Virginia [contained in my Notes on Virginia]... are the
parts which I do not wish to have made public, at least till I know whether their
publication would do most harm or good. It is possible that in my own country, these
strictures might produce an irritation which would indispose the people towards the two
great objects I have in view; that is, the emancipation of their slaves and the settlement
of their constitution on a firmer and more permanent basis. If I learn from thence that
they will not produce that effect, I have printed and reserved just copies enough to be
able to give one to every young man at the College. It is to them I look, to the rising
generation, and not to the one now in power, for these great reformations." --Thomas
Jefferson to General Chastellux, 1785. ME 5:3, Papers 8:184
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Appointment Powers of the
Executive
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"I am of opinion that the
Constitution has made the President the sole competent judge to what places circumstances
render it expedient that ambassadors or other public ministers should be sent and of what
grade they should be; and that it has ascribed to the Senate no executive act but the
single one of giving or withholding their consent to the person nominated." --Thomas
Jefferson: For President's Message, 1792. FE 5:415
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"Nomination to office is an
executive function. To give it to the legislature... is a violation of the principle of
the separation of powers. It swerves the members from correctness by temptations to
intrigue for office themselves and to a corrupt barter of votes; and destroys
responsibility by dividing it among a multitude. By leaving nomination in its proper place
among executive functions, the principle of distribution of powers is preserved and
responsibility weighs with its heaviest force on a single head." --Thomas Jefferson
to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:37
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"The Senate is not supposed
by the Constitution to be acquainted with the concerns of the Executive Department. It was
not intended that these should be communicated to them, nor can they therefore be
qualified to judge of the necessity which calls for a mission to any particular place or
of the particular grade, more or less marked, which special and secret circumstances may
call for. All this is left to the President. They are only to see that no unfit person be
employed." --Thomas Jefferson: Opinion on Powers of Senate, 1790. ME 3:17
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Presidential Appointments |
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"The House of
Representatives having... concluded their choice of a person for the chair of the United
States and willed me that office, it now becomes necessary to provide an administration
composed of persons whose qualifications and standing have possessed them of the public
confidence, and whose wisdom may ensure to our fellow-citizens the advantages they
sanguinely expect." --Thomas Jefferson to Henry Dearborn, 1801. ME 10:204
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"There is nothing I am so
anxious about as making the best possible appointments, and no case in which the best men
are more liable to mislead us, by yielding to the solicitations of applicants."
--Thomas Jefferson to Nathaniel Macon, 1801. ME 10:261
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"In appointments to public
offices of mere profit, I have ever considered faithful service in either our first or
second revolution as giving preference of claim, and that appointment on that principle
would gratify the public and strengthen confidence so necessary to enable the Executive to
direct the whole public force to the best advantage of the nation." --Thomas
Jefferson to John Page, 1807. ME 11:285
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"The safety of the
government absolutely [requires] that its direction in its higher departments should be
taken into friendly hands." --Thomas Jefferson to Elbridge Gerry, 1802. FE 8:169
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"It is certain that those of
the Cabinet Council of the President should be of his bosom confidence." --Thomas
Jefferson to Samuel Dexter, 1801. ME 10:208
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"It is not for an individual
to choose his post. [The President is] to marshal us as may best be for the public
good." --Thomas Jefferson to George Washington, 1789. ME 8:2
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"There is nothing I am so
anxious about as good nominations, conscious that the merit as well as reputation of an
administration depends as much on that as on its measures." --Thomas Jefferson to
Archibald Stuart, 1801. ME 10:257
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"Should I be placed in
office, nothing would be more desirable to me than the recommendations of those in whom I
have confidence, of persons fit for office; for if the good withhold their testimony, we
shall be at the mercy of the bad." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin S. Barton, 1801. ME
10:199
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"Of the various executive
duties, no one excites more anxious concern than that of placing the interest of our
fellow citizens in the hands of honest men with understanding sufficient for their
stations. No duty, at the same time, is more difficult to fulfil. The knowledge of
characters possessed by a single individual is, of necessity, limited. To seek out the
best through the whole Union, we must resort to other information, which, from the best of
men, acting disinterestedly and with the purest motives, is sometimes incorrect."
--Thomas Jefferson to a New Haven Committee, 1801. ME 10:269
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"I have firmly refused to
follow the counsels of those who have desired the giving offices to some of [the
opposition's] leaders, in order to reconcile. I have given, and will give only to
republicans, under existing circumstances." --Thomas Jefferson to James Monroe, 1801.
ME 10:220
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"I shall... return with joy
to that state of things, when the only questions concerning a candidate shall be, is he
honest? Is he capable? Is he faithful to the Constitution?" --Thomas Jefferson to a
New Haven Committee, 1801. ME 10:273
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"An officer who is entrusted
by the law with the sacred duty of naming judges of life and death for his fellow citizens
and who selects them exclusively from among his political and party enemies ought never to
have in his power a second abuse of that tremendous magnitude." --Thomas Jefferson to
Mrs. Sarah Mease, 1801. FE 8:35
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"An officer... who selects
judges for principles which necessarily lead to condemnation might as well lead his
culprits to the scaffold at once without the mockery of trial." --Thomas Jefferson to
Mrs. Sarah Mease, 1801. FE 8:35
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"In a government like ours
it was necessary to embrace in its administration as great a mass of confidence as
possible, by employing those who had a character with the public of their own, and not
merely a secondary one through the Executive." --Thomas Jefferson: The Anas, 1806. ME
1:449
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"I had endeavored to compose
an administration whose talents, integrity, names, and dispositions, should at once
inspire unbounded confidence in the public mind, and insure a perfect harmony in the
conduct of the public business." --Thomas Jefferson to Aaron Burr, 1800. ME 10:182
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"I did not think the public
offices confided to me to give away as charities." --Thomas Jefferson to James
Monroe, 1802. ME 10:332
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"Justice to [government]
officers forbids us to give credit to... imputations [of wrongdoing] till proved; but
justice... requires us so far to attend to them as to make them the subject of
inquiry." --Thomas Jefferson to Henry Dearborn, 1808. (*) ME 12:116
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"My usage is to make the
best appointment my information and judgment enable me to do, and then fold myself up in
the mantle of conscience, and abide unmoved the peltings of the storm. And oh! for the day
when I shall be withdrawn from it." --Thomas Jefferson to Benjamin Rush, 1808. ME
11:412
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Regulating Commerce with the
Embargo
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"I place immense value in
the experiment being fully made, how far an embargo may be an effectual weapon in
future." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:56
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"My principle is that the
conveniences of our citizens shall yield reasonably, and their taste greatly to the
importance of giving the present experiment so fair a trial that on future occasions our
legislators may know with certainty how far they may count on it as an engine for national
purposes." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:83
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"[By issuing a certificate
for needed internal shipping during an embargo,] we may secure a supply of the real wants
of our citizens, and at the same time prevent those wants from being made a cover for the
crimes against their country which unprincipled adventurers are in the habit of
committing." --Thomas Jefferson to the State Governors, 1808. ME 12:51
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"The laws enacted by the
general government will have made it our duty to have the embargo strictly observed for
the general good; and we are sworn to execute the laws. If clamor ensue, it will be from
the few only who will clamor whatever we do." --Thomas Jefferson to James Sullivan,
1808. ME 12:129
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"Individuals ought to yield
their private interests to this great public object." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert
Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:53
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"[It is our] desire... that
inconveniences encountered cheerfully by [our worthy citizens] for the interests of their
country, shall not be turned merely to the unlawful profits of the most worthless part of
society." --Thomas Jefferson to the State Governors, 1808. ME 12:52
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"Our good citizens having
submitted to such sacrifices under the present experiment, I am determined to exert every
power the law has vested in me for its rigorous fulfilment; that we may know the full
value and effect of this measure on any future occasion on which a resort to it might be
contemplated." --Thomas Jefferson to Charles Pinckney, 1808. ME 12:104
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"I do not wish a single
citizen in any of the States to be deprived of a meal of bread, but I set down the
exercise of commerce, merely for profit, as nothing when it carries with it the danger of
defeating the objects of the embargo... Our course should be to sacrifice everything to
secure the effect of the law, and nothing beyond that." --Thomas Jefferson to Albert
Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:66
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"The life of a citizen is
never to be endangered but as the last melancholy effort for the maintenance of order and
obedience to the laws." --Thomas Jefferson: Circular Letter, 1809. ME 12:233
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"[The embargo] has
demonstrated to foreign nations the moderation and firmness which govern our councils, and
to our citizens the necessity of uniting in support of the laws and the rights of their
country." --Thomas Jefferson: 8th Annual Message, 1808. ME 3:477
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"This embargo law is
certainly the most embarrassing one we have ever had to execute. I did not expect a crop
of so sudden and rank growth of fraud and open opposition by force could have grown up in
the United States. I am satisfied... that if orders and decrees are not repealed, and a
continuance of the embargo is preferred to war, (which sentiment is universal here,)
Congress must legalize all means which may be necessary to obtain its end."
--Thomas Jefferson to Albert Gallatin, 1808. ME 12:122
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"[By] a repeal of the
embargo... were we driven by treason among ourselves from the high and wise ground we had
taken, and which, had it been held, would have either restored us our free trade, or have
established manufactures among us." --Thomas Jefferson to William Pinckney, 1810. ME
18:265
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"I like the negative given
[by the Constitution] to the Executive with a third of either house, though I should have
liked it better had the Judiciary been associated for that purpose, or invested with a
similar and separate power." --Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787. ME 6:387
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"The negative of the
President can never be used more pleasingly to the public than in the protection of the
Constitution." --Thomas Jefferson: Opinion on Apportionment Bill, 1792. ME 3:211
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"The negative of the
President is the shield provided by the Constitution to protect against the invasion of
the legislature: 1. The right of the Executive. 2. Of the Judiciary. 3. Of the States and
State legislatures... The case of a right remaining exclusively with the States... [is]
one of those intended by the Constitution to be placed under its protection. It must be
added, however, that unless the President's mind on a view of everything which is urged
for and against [a] bill, is tolerably clear that it is unauthorized by the Constitution,
if the pro and the con hang so even as to balance his judgment, a just respect for the
wisdom of the legislature would naturally decide the balance in favor of their opinion. It
is chiefly for cases where they are clearly misled by error, ambition, or interest, that
the Constitution has placed a check in the negative of the President." --Thomas
Jefferson: Opinion on a National Bank, 1791. (*) ME 3:152
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"On my part, [Congress] may
count on a cordial concurrence in every measure for the public good, and on all the
information I possess which may enable [them] to discharge to advantage the high functions
with which [they] are invested by [their] country." --Thomas Jefferson: 2nd Annual
Message, 1802. ME 3:348
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| ME, FE = Memorial Edition, Ford Edition. |
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