Myers v. United States (No. 2) 58 Ct.Cls. 199, affirmed.
Syllabus	Opinion [ Taft ]	Dissent [ Holmes ]	Separate [ Mcreynolds ]	Dissent [ Brandeis ]
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BRANDEIS, J., Dissenting Opinion

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

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272 U.S. 52

Myers v. United States

APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF CLAIMS

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No. 2 Argued: December 5, 1923Reargued April 13, 14, 1925 --- Decided: October 25, 1926

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MR. JUSTICE BRANDEIS, dissenting.

In 1833, Mr. Justice Story, after discussing in §§ 1537-1543 of his Commentaries on the Constitution the much debated question concerning the President's power of removal, said in § 1544:

If there has been any aberration from the true constitutional exposition of the power of removal (which the reader must decide for himself), it will be difficult, and perhaps impracticable, after forty years' experience, to recall the practice to the correct theory. But, at all events, it will be a consolation to those who love the Union and honor a devotion to the patriotic discharge of duty that, in regard to "inferior officers" (which appellation probably includes ninety-nine out of a hundred of the lucrative offices in the government), the remedy for any permanent abuse is still within the power of Congress by the simple expedient of requiring the consent of the Senate to removals in such cases.

Postmasters are inferior officers. Congress might have vested their appointment in the head of the department. ^[n1] The Act of July 12, 1876, c. 17, § 6, 19 Stat. 78, 80, reenacting earlier legislation, ^[n2] provided that

postmasters of the first, second, and third classes shall be appointed and may be removed by the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, and shall hold their offices for four years unless sooner removed or suspended according to law.

That statute has been in force unmodified [p241] for half a century. Throughout the period, it has governed a large majority of all civil offices to which appointments are made by and with the advice and consent of the Senate. ^[n3] May the President, having acted under the statute insofar as it creates the office and authorizes the appointment, ignore, while the Senate is in session, the provision which prescribes the condition under which a removal may take place?

It is this narrow question, and this only, which we are required to decide. We need not consider what power the President, being Commander in Chief, has over officers in the Army and the Navy. We need not determine whether the President, acting alone, may remove high political officers. We need not even determine whether, acting alone, he may remove inferior civil officers when the Senate is not in session. It was in session when the President purported to remove Myers, and for a long time thereafter. All questions of statutory construction have been eliminated by the language of the Act. It is settled that, in the absence of a provision expressly providing for the consent of the Senate to a removal, the clause fixing the tenure will be construed as a limitation, not as a grant, and that, under such legislation, the President, acting alone, has the power of removal. Parsons v. United States, 167 U.S. 324; Burnap v. United States, 252 U.S. 512, 515. But, in defining the tenure, this statute used words of grant. Congress clearly intended to preclude a removal without the consent of the Senate.

Other questions have been eliminated by the facts found, by earlier decisions of this Court, and by the [p242] nature of the claim made. It is settled that, where the statute creating an office provides for the consent of the Senate to both appointment and removal, a removal by the President will be deemed to have been so made if consent is given to the appointment of a successor. Wallace v. United States, 257 U.S. 541. But, in the case at bar, no successor was appointed until after the expiration of Myers' term. It is settled that, if Congress had, under clause 2 of section 2, Art II, vested the appointment in the Postmaster General, it could have limited his power of removal by requiring consent of the Senate. United States v. Perkins, 116 U.S. 483. It is not questioned here that the President, acting alone, has the constitutional power to suspend an officer in the executive branch of the government. But Myers was not suspended. It is clear that Congress could have conferred upon postmasters the right to receive the salary for the full term unless sooner removed with the consent of the Senate. Compare Embry v. United States, 100 U.S. 680, 685. It is not claimed by the appellant that the Senate has the constitutional right to share in the responsibility for the removal merely because it shared, under the Act of Congress, in the responsibility for the appointment. Thus, the question involved in the action taken by Congress after the great debate of 1789 is not before us. The sole question is whether, in respect to inferior offices, Congress may impose upon the Senate both responsibilities, as it may deny to it participation in the exercise of either function.

In Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 167, it was assumed, as the basis of decision, that the President, acting alone, is powerless to remove an inferior civil officer appointed for a fixed term with the consent of the Senate, and that case was long regarded as so deciding. ^[n4] In no [p243] case has this Court determined that the President's power of removal is beyond control, limitation, or regulation by Congress. Nor has any lower federal court ever so decided. ^[n5] This is true of the power as it affects officers in the Army or the Navy and the high political officer like heads of departments, as well as of the power in respect to inferior statutory offices in the executive branch. Continuously for the last fifty-eight years, laws comprehensive in character, enacted from time to time with the approval of the President, have made removal from the [p244] great majority of the inferior presidential offices dependent upon the consent of the Senate. Throughout that period these laws have been continuously applied. We are requested to disregard the authority of Marbury v. Madison and to overturn this long established constitutional practice.

The contention that Congress is powerless to make consent of the Senate a condition of removal by the President from an executive office rests mainly upon the clause in § 1 of Article II which declares that "The executive Power hall be vested in a President." The argument is that appointment and removal of officials are executive prerogatives; that the grant to the President of "the executive Power" confers upon him, as inherent in the office, the power to exercise these two functions without restriction by Congress, except insofar a the power to restrict his exercise of them is expressly conferred [p245] upon Congress by the Constitution; that, in respect to appointment, certain restrictions of the executive power are so provided for; but that, in respect to removal, there is no express grant to Congress of any power to limit the President's prerogative. The simple answer to the argument is this: the ability to remove a subordinate executive officer, being an essential of effective government, will, in the absence of express constitutional provision to the contrary, be deemed to have been vested in some person or body. Compare Ex parte Hennen, 13 Pet. 230, 259. But it is not a power inherent in a chief executive. The President's power of removal from statutory civil inferior offices, like the power of appointment to them, comes immediately from Congress. It is true that the exercise of the power of removal is said to be an executive act, and that, when the Senate grants or withholds consent to a removal by the President, it participates in an executive act. ^[n6] But the Constitution has confessedly granted to Congress the legislative power to create offices, and to prescribe the tenure thereof, and it has not in terms denied to Congress the power to control removals. To prescribe the tenure involves prescribing the conditions under which incumbency shall cease. For the possibility of removal is a condition or qualification of the tenure. ^[n7] When Congress provides that the incumbent [p246] shall hold the office for four years unless sooner removed with the consent of the Senate, it prescribes the term of the tenure.

It is also argued that the clauses in Article II, § 3, of the Constitution, which declare that the President "shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the Officers of the United States" imply a grant to the President of the alleged uncontrollable power of removal. I do not find in either clause anything which supports this claim. The provision that the President "shall Commission all the Officers of the United States" clearly bears no such implication. Nor can it be spelled out of the direction that "he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed." There is no express grant to the President of incidental powers resembling those conferred upon Congress by clause 18 of Article I, § 8. A power implied on the ground that it is inherent in the executive, must, according to established principles [p247] of constitutional construction, be limited to "the least possible power adequate to the end proposed." Compare Marshall v. Gordon, 243 U.S. 521, 541; Michaelson v. United States, 266 U.S. 42, 66. The end to which the President's efforts are to be directed is not the most efficient civil service conceivable, but the faithful execution of the laws consistent with the provisions therefor made by Congress. A power essential to protection against pressing dangers incident to disloyalty in the civil service may well be deemed inherent in the executive office. But that need, and also insubordination and neglect of duty, are adequately provided against by implying in the President the constitutional power of suspension. ^[n8] Such provisional executive power is comparable to the provisional judicial power of granting a restraining order without notice to the defendant and opportunity to be heard. Power to remove, as well as to suspend, a high political officer might conceivably be deemed indispensable to democratic government and, hence, inherent in the President. But power to remove an inferior administrative officer appointed for a fixed term cannot conceivably be deemed an essential of government.

To imply a grant to the President of the uncontrollable power of removal from statutory inferior executive offices involves an unnecessary and indefensible limitation upon the constitutional power of Congress to fix the tenure of inferior statutory offices. That such a limitation cannot be justified on the ground of necessity is demonstrated by the practice of our governments, state and national. In none of the original thirteen States did the chief executive [p248] possess such power at the time of the adoption of the Federal Constitution. In none of the forty-eight States has such power been conferred at any time since by a state constitution, ^[n9] with a single possible exception. ^[n10] In a few States, the legislature has granted to the governor, or other [p249] appointing power, the absolute power of removal. ^[n11] The legislative practice of most States reveals a decided tendency to limit, rather than to extend, the governor's power of removal. ^[n12] The practice of the Federal Government will be set forth in detail. [p250]

Over removal from inferior civil offices, Congress has, from the foundation of our Government, exercised continuously some measure of control by legislation. The instances of such laws are many. Some of the statutes were directory in character. Usually, they were mandatory. Some of them, comprehensive in scope, have endured for generations. During the first forty years of our Government, there was no occasion to curb removals. ^[n13] Then, the power of Congress was exerted to ensure removals. Thus, the Act of September 2, 1789, c. 12, 1 Stat. 65, 67, establishing the Treasury Department, provided by § 8 that, if any person appointed to any office by that Act should be convicted of offending against any of its provisions, he shall "upon conviction be removed from office." The Act of March 3, 1791, c. 18, § 1, 1 Stat. 215, extended the provision to every clerk employed in the Department. [p251] The Act of May 8, 1792, c. 37, § 12, 1 Stat. 279, 281, extended it further to the Commissioner of the Revenue and the Commissioners of Loans, presidential appointments. The first Tenure of Office Act, May, 15, 1820, c. 102, 3 Stat. 582, introduced the four-year term, which was designed to ensure removal under certain conditions. ^[n14] The Act of January 31, 1823, c. 9, § 3, 3 Stat. 723, directed that officers receiving public money and failing to account quarterly shall be dismissed by the President unless they shall account for such default to his satisfaction. The Act of July 2, 1836, c. 270, §§ 26, 37, 5 Stat. 80, 86, 88, which first vested the appointment of postmasters in the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, directed that postmasters and others offending against certain prohibitions "be forthwith dismissed from office;" and as to other offences provided [p252] for such dismissal upon conviction by any court. The Act of July 17, 1854, c. 84, § 6, 1 Stat. 305, 306, which authorized the President to appoint registers and receivers, provided that,

on satisfactory proof that either of said officers, or any other officer, has charged or received fees or other rewards not authorized by law, he shall be forthwith removed from office. ^[n15]

In the later period, which began after the spoils system had prevailed for a generation, ^[n16] the control of Congress over inferior offices was exerted to prevent removals. The removal clause here in question was first introduced by the Currency Act of February 25, 1863, c. 58, § 1, 12 Stat. 665, which was approved by President Lincoln. That statute provided for the appointment of the Comptroller, [p253] and that he "shall hold his office for the term of five years unless sooner removed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate." In 1867, this provision was inserted in the Tenure of Office Act, March 2, 1867, c. 154, §§ 1, 3, 6, 14 Stat. 431, which applied, in substance, to all presidential offices. It was passed over President Johnson's veto. ^[n17] In 1868, after the termination of the impeachment proceedings, the removal clause was inserted in the Wyoming Act of July 25, 1868, c. 235, §§ 2, 3, 9, 10, 15 Stat. 178-181, which was approved by President Johnson.

By Act of June 8, 1872, c. 335, 17 Stat. 283, a consolidation and revision of the postal laws was made. T he removal clause was inserted in § 63 in the precise form in which it had first appeared in the Currency Act of 1863. From the Act of 1872, it was carried as § 3830 into Revised Statutes, which consolidated the statutes in force December 1, 1873. The Act of 1872 was amended by the Act of June 23, 1874, c. 456, § 11, 18 Stat. 231, 234, so as to reduce the classes of postmasters outside New York City from five to four. The removal clause was again inserted. When the specific classification of New York City in § 11 of the Act of 1874 was repealed by the Act of July 12 1876, c. 179, § 4, 19 Stat. 80, the removal clause was retained. Thus, postmasters of the first three classes were made, independently of the Tenure of Office Act, subject to the removal clause. Each of these postal statutes was approved by President Grant. When President Cleveland secured, by Act of March 3, 1887, c. 353, 24 Stat. 500, the repeal of §§ 1767 to 1772 of Revised Statutes (which had reenacted as to all presidential offices the removal provision of the Tenure of Office Act), he made no attempt to apply the repeal to postmasters, although postmasters constituted then, as they have ever since, a large majority of all presidential appointees. The removal clause, which [p254] had become operative as to them by specific legislation, was continued in force. For more than half a century, this postal law has stood unmodified. No President has recommended to Congress that it be repealed. A few proposals for repeal have been made by bills introduced in the House. Not one of them has been considered by it. ^[n18] It is significant that President Johnson, who vetoed in 1867 the Tenure of Office Act which required the Senate's consent to the removal of high political officers, approved other acts containing the removal clause which related only to inferior officers. Thus, he had approved the Act [p255] of July 13, 1866, c. 176, § 5, 14 Stat. 90, 92, which provided that

no officer in the military or naval service shall, in time of peace, be dismissed from service except upon and in pursuance of the sentence of a court-martial to that effect, or in commutation thereof. ^[n19]

And in 1868, he approved the Wyoming Act, which required such consent to the removal of inferior officers who had been appointed for fixed terms. It is significant also that the distinction between high political officers and inferior ones had been urged in the Senate in 1867 by Reverdy Johnson, when opposing the passage of the Tenure of Office Act. ^[n20] It had apparently been recognized in 1789 at the time of the great debate in the First Congress, and by Chief Justice Marshall in 1807. ^[n21] [p256] It had been repeatedly pointed out in later years. ^[n22] [p257]

The administrative action of President Johnson under the Tenure of Office Act indicates likewise a recognition of this distinction between inferior and high political offices. The procedure prescribed in § 2 required of the President a report to the Senate of the reasons for a suspension, and also made its consent essential to a removal. In respect to inferior officers, this course appears to have been scrupulously observed by the President in every case. This is true for the period before the institution of the impeachment proceedings ^[n23] as well as for the later period. ^[n24] On the other hand, in the case of a high political officer, Secretary of War Stanton, President Johnson declined on several grounds to follow the procedure prescribed by the Act. 16 Ex.Journ. 95. The requirement that the President should report reasons for suspension to the Senate was not retained by the amended Tenure of Office Act of April 5, 1869, c. 10, 16 Stat. 6; the other provisions, however, were substantially reenacted, and affirmative evidence of compliance by succeeding Presidents with its requirements as to inferior officers is recorded between 1869 and the repeal of the Act in 1887. Suspensions, and not removals, were made during recess. ^[n25] In those rare instances where removals [p258] were sought by means other than the appointment of a "successor," Presidents Grant, Hayes, Garfield and Arthur requested the Senate's consent to the removals. ^[n26] Where the Senate failed to confirm the nomination of a successor, the former incumbent retained office until either the expiry of his commission or the confirmation of a successor. ^[n27] [p259]

From the foundation of the Government to the enactment of the Tenure of Office Act, during the period while it remained in force, and from its repeal to this time, the administrative practice in respect to all offices has, so far as appears, been consistent with the existence in Congress of power to make removals subject to the consent of the Senate. ^[n28] The practice during the earlier period was described by Webster in addressing the Senate on February 16, 1835:

If one man be Secretary of State, and another be appointed, the first goes out by the mere force of the appointment [p260] of the other, without any previous act of removal whatever. And this is the practice of the government, and has been from the first. In all the removals which have been made, they have generally been effected simply by making other appointments. I cannot find a case to the contrary. There is no such thing as any distinct official act of removal. I have looked into the practice and caused inquiries to be made in the departments, and I do not learn that any such proceeding is known as an entry or record of the removal of an officer from office, and the President could only act, in such cases, by causing some proper record or entry to be made, as proof of the [p261] fact of removal. I am aware that there have been some cases in which notice has been sent to persons in office that their services are, or will be, after a given day, dispensed with. These are usually cases in which the object is not to inform the incumbent that he is removed, but to tell him that a successor either is, or by a day named will be, appointed.

4 Works, 8th ed., 189.

In 1877, President Hayes, in a communication to the Senate in response to a resolution requesting information as to whether removals had been made prior to the appointment of successors, said:

In reply, I would respectfully inform the Senate that, in the instances referred to, removals had not been made at the time the nominations were sent to the Senate. The form used for such nominations was one found to have ben in existence and heretofore used in some of the Departments, and was intended to inform the Senate that, if the nomination proposed were approved, it would operate to remove an incumbent whose name was indicated. R. B. Hayes.

7 Messages and Papers of the President, 481.

Between 1877 and 1899, the latest date to which the records of the Senate are available for examination, the practice has, with few exceptions, been substantially the same. ^[n29] It is doubtless because of this practice, and the long settled rule recently applied in Wallace v. United States, 257 U.S. 541, 545, that this Court has not had occasion heretofore to pass upon the constitutionality of the removal clause. [p262]

The practice of Congress to control the exercise of the executive power of removal from inferior offices is evidenced by many statutes which restrict it in many ways besides the removal clause here in question. Each of these restrictive statutes became law with the approval of the President. Every President who had held office since 1861, except President Garfield, approved one or more of such statutes. Some of these statutes, prescribing a fixed term, provide that removal shall be made only or one of several specified causes. ^[n30] Some provide a fixed term, subject generally to removal for cause. ^[n31] Some provide [p263] for removal only after hearing. ^[n32] Some provide a fixed term, subject to removal for reasons to be communicated by the President to the Senate. ^[n33] Some impose the restriction in still other ways. Thus, the Act of August 24, 1912, c. 389, § 6, 37 Stat. 539, 555, which deals only with persons in the classified civil service, prohibits removal "except for such cause as will promote the efficiency of the service and for reasons given in writing," and forbids removal for one cause which had theretofore been specifically prescribed by President Roosevelt and President Taft as a ground for dismissal. ^[n34] The Budget [p264] Act of June 10, 1921, c. 18 § 303, 42 Stat. 20, 24, provides a fixed term for the Comptroller General and the Assistant Comptroller General, and makes these officers removable only by impeachment or by Joint resolution of Congress, after hearing, for one of the causes specified. It should be noted that, while President Wilson had, on June 4, 1920, vetoed an earlier Budget Act, which, like this, denied to the President any participation in the removal, he had approved the Mediation and Conciliation Act of July 15, 1918, and the Railroad Labor Board Act of February 28, 1920, which prohibited removals except for the causes therein specified.

The assertion that the mere grant by the Constitution of executive power confers upon the President as a prerogative the unrestricted power of appointment and of removal from executive offices, except so far as otherwise expressly provided by the Constitution, is clearly inconsistent also with those statutes which restrict the exercise by the President of the power of nomination. There is not a word in the Constitution which, in terms, authorizes [p265] Congress to limit the President's freedom of choice in making nominations for executive offices. It is to appointment, as distinguished from nomination, that the Constitution imposes in terms the requirement of Senatorial consent. But a multitude of laws have been enacted which limit the President's power to make nominations, and which, through the restrictions imposed, may prevent the selection of the person deemed by him best fitted. Such restriction upon the power to nominate has been exercised by Congress continuously since the foundation of the Government. Every President has approved one or more of such acts. Every President has consistently observed them. This is true of those offices to which he makes appointments without the advice and consent of the Senate, as well as of those for which its consent is required.

Thus, Congress has, from time to time, restricted the President's selection by the requirement of citizenship. ^[n35] [p266] It has limited the power of nomination by providing that the office may be held only by a resident of the United States; ^[n36] of a State; ^[n37] of a particular State; ^[n38] of a particular [p267] district; ^[n39] of a particular territory; ^[n40] of the District of Columbia; ^[n41] of a particular foreign country. ^[n42] It has limited the power of nomination further by prescribing specific professional attainments, ^[n43] or occupational [p268] experience. ^[n44] It has, in other cases, prescribed the test of examinations. ^[n45] It has imposed the requirement of [p269] age; ^[n46] of sex ; ^[n47] of race; ^[n48] of property; ^[n49] and of habitual temperance in the use of intoxicating liquors. ^[n50] Congress [p270] has imposed like restrictions on the power of nomination by requiring political representation; ^[n51] or that the selection [p271] be made on a nonpartisan basis. ^[n52] It has required in some cases that the representation be industrial; ^[n53] in [p272] others, that it be geographic. ^[n54] It has at times required that the President's nominees be take from, or include [p273] representatives from, particular branches or departments of the Government. ^[n55] By still other statutes, Congress [p274] has confined the President's selection to a small number of persons to be named by others. ^[n56]

The significance of this mass of legislation restricting the power of nomination is heightened by the action which President Jackson and the Senate took when the right to impose such restrictions was, so far as appears, first mooted. On February 3, 1831, the Senate resolved that it was inexpedient to appoint a citizen of one State to an office created or made vacant in another State of which such citizen was not a resident, unless an apparent necessity for such appointment existed. 4 Ex.Journ. 150. [p275] Several nominations having been rejected by the Senate in accordance with the terms of this resolution, President Jackson communicated his protest to the Senate, on March 2, 1833, saying that he regarded "that resolution, in effect, as an unconstitutional restraint upon the authority of the President in relation to appointments to office." Thereupon, the Senate rescinded the resolution of 1831. 4 Ex.Journ. 331. But that Congress had the power was not questioned. The practice of prescribing by statute that nominations to an inferior presidential office shall be limited to residents of a particular State or district has prevailed, without interruption, for three-quarters of a century. ^[n57]

The practical disadvantage to the public service of denying to the President the uncontrollable power of removal from inferior civil offices would seem to have been exaggerated. Upon the service, the immediate effect would ordinarily be substantially the same whether the President, acting alone, has or has not the power of removal. For he can, at any time, exercise his constitutional right to suspend an officer and designate some other person to act temporarily in his stead, and he cannot, while the Senate is in session, appoint a successor without its consent. Compare Embry v. United States, 100 U.S. 680. On the other hand, to the individual in the public service, and to the maintenance of its morale, the existence of a power in Congress to impose upon the Senate the duty to share in the responsibility for a removal is of paramount importance. The Senate's consideration of [p276] a proposed removal may be necessary to protect reputation and emoluments of office from arbitrary executive action. Equivalent protection is afforded to other inferior officers whom Congress has placed in the classified civil service and which it authorizes the heads of departments to appoint and to remove without the consent of the Senate. Act of August 24, 1912, c. 389, § 6, 37 Stat. 539, 55. The existence of some such provision is a common incident of free governments. In the United States, where executive responsibility is not safeguarded by the practice of parliamentary interpellation, such means of protection to persons appointed to office by the President with the consent of the Senate is of special value.

Until the Civil Service Law, January 16, 1883, c. 27, 22 Stat. 403, was enacted, the requirement of consent of the Senate to removal and appointment was the only means of curbing the abuses of the spoils system. The contest over making Cabinet officers subject to the provisions of the Tenure of Office Act of 1867 has obscured the significance of that measure as an instrument designed to prevent abuses in the civil service. ^[n58] But the importance of the measure as a means of civil service reform was urged at the time of its passage; ^[n59] again, [p277] when its repeal was resisted in 1869 ^[n60] and in 1872; ^[n61] and finally in 1887, when its repeal was effected. ^[n62] That Act [p278] was one of two far reaching measures introduced in 1866 aimed at the abuses of executive patronage. The Jenckes bill was to establish the classified service. The Tenure of Office bill was to control removals from presidential offices. Like the Jenckes bill, it applied, when introduced, only to inferior offices. The Jenckes bill, reported by the House Committee on June 13, 1866, was finally tabled in the House on February 6, 1867. ^[n63] The Tenure of Office bill was reported out in the House on December 5, 1866, [p279] was amended by the Conference Committee so as to apply to Cabinet officers, and, having passed both Houses, was sent to the President on February 20, 1867, and passed over his veto on March 2, 1867.

The fact that the removal clause had been inserted in the Currency bill of 1863, shows that it did not originate in the contest of Congress with President Johnson, as has been sometimes stated. Thirty years before that, it had been recommended by Mr. Justice Story as a remedial measure, after the wholesale removals of the first Jackson administration. The Post Office Department was then the chief field for plunder. Vacancies had been created in order that the spoils of office might be distributed among political supporters. Fear of removal had been instilled in continuing office holders to prevent opposition or lukewarmness in support. Gross inefficiency and hardship had resulted. Several remedies were proposed. One of the remedies urged was to require the President to report to the Senate the reasons for each removal. ^[n64] The second was to take the power of appointing postmasters from the Postmaster General and to confer it upon the President, subject to the consent of the Senate. ^[n65] A third [p280] proposal was to require consent of the Senate also to removals. ^[n66] Experience since has taught that none of these remedies is effective. Then, however, Congress adopted the second measure. The evil continued, and the struggle against the spoils system was renewed. The [p281] other crude remedies which had been rejected -- accountability of the President to the Senate ^[n67] and the requirement of its consent to removals ^[n68] -- were again considered. [p282] And both continued to be urged upon Congress, even after the fourth and the more promising remedy enquiry into fitness for office and competitive examinations had been proposed. For a generation, the reformers failed to secure the adoption of any further measure.

The first substantial victory of the civil service reform movement, though a brief one, was the insertion of the removal clause in the Currency bill of 1863. ^[n69] The next forward step was taken by the Consular and Diplomatic Appropriation Act, June 20, 1864, c. 136, § 2, 13 Stat. 137, 139-140, also approved by President Lincoln, which contained a provision that consular clerks should be appointed by the President after examination, and that

no clerk so appointed shall be removed from office except for cause stated in writing, which shall be submitted to congress at the session first following such removal. ^[n70]

It was in the next Congress that the removal clause was applied generally by the Tenure of Office Act. The long delay in adopting legislation to curb removals was not because Congress accepted the doctrine that the Constitution [p283] had vested in the President uncontrollable power over removal. It was because the spoils system held sway.

The historical data submitted present a legislative practice, established by concurrent affirmative action of Congress and the President, to make consent of the Senate a condition of removal from statutory inferior, civil, executive offices to which the appointment is made for a fixed term by the President with such consent. They show that the practice has existed, without interruption, continuously for the last fifty-eight years; that, throughout this period, it has governed a great majority of all such offices; that the legislation applying the removal clause specifically to the office of postmaster was enacted more than half a century ago, and that recently the practice has, with the President's approval, been extended to several newly created offices. The data show further that the insertion of the removal clause in acts creating inferior civil offices with fixed tenure is part of the broader legislative practice, which has prevailed since the formation of our Government, to restrict or regulate in many ways both removal from and nomination to such offices. A persistent legislative practice which involves a delimitation of the respective powers of Congress and the President, and which has been so established and maintained, should be deemed tantamount to judicial construction in the absence of any decision by any court to the contrary. United States v. Midwest Oil Co., 236 U.S. 459, 469.

The persuasive effect of this legislative practice is strengthened by the fact that no instance has been found, even in the earlier period of our history, of concurrent affirmative action of Congress and the President which is inconsistent with the legislative practice of the last fifty-eight years to impose the removal clause. Nor has any instance been found of action by Congress which involves [p284] recognition in any other way of the alleged uncontrollable executive power to remove an inferior civil officer. The action taken by Congress in 1789 after the great debate does not present such an instance. The vote then taken did not involve a decision that the President had uncontrollable power. It did not involve a decision of the question whether Congress could confer upon the Senate the right, and impose upon it the duty, to participate in removals. It involved merely the decision that the Senate does not, in the absence of legislative grant thereof, have the right to share in the removal of an officer appointed with its consent, and that the President has, in the absence of restrictive legislation, the constitutional power of removal without such consent. Moreover, as Chief Justice Marshall recognized, the debate and the decision related to a high political office, not to inferior ones. ^[n71]

Nor does the debate show that the majority of those then in Congress thought that the President had the uncontrollable power of removal. The Senators divided equally in their votes. As to their individual views, we lack knowledge; for the debate was secret. ^[n72] In the House, only 24 of the 54 members voting took part in the debate. Of the 24, only 6 appear to have held the opinion that the President possessed the uncontrollable power of removal. The clause which involve a denial of the claim that the Senate had the constitutional right to participate in removals was adopted, so far as appears, by aid of the votes of others who believed it expedient for [p285] Congress to confer the power of removal upon the President alone. ^[n73] This is indicated both by Madison's appeal for support ^[n74] and by the action taken on Benson's motions. ^[n75] [p286]

It is true that several Presidents have asserted that the Constitution conferred a power of removal uncontrollable [p287] by Congress. ^[n76] But, of the many statutes enacted since the foundation of our Government which in express terms controlled the power of removal, either by the clause here in question or otherwise, only two were met with a veto: The Tenure of Office Act of 1867, which related to high political officers among others, and the Budget Act of 1920, which denied to the President any participation in the removal of the Comptroller and Assistant Comptroller. One was passed over the President's veto; the other was approved by the succeeding President. It is true also that several Presidents have at times insisted that, for the exercise of their power they were not accountable to the Senate. ^[n77] But even these Presidents [p288] have at other times complied with requests that the ground of removal of inferior officers be stated. ^[n78] Many of the Presidents have furnished the desired information [p289] without questioning the right to request it. ^[n79] And neither the Senate nor the House has at any time receded [p290] from the claim that Congress has power both to control by legislation removal from inferior offices and to require the President to report to it the reasons for removals made therefrom. ^[n80] Moreover, no instance has been found in which President refused to comply with an Act of Congress requiring that the reasons for removal of an inferior officer be given. On the contrary, President Cleveland, who refused to accede to the request of the Senate that he state the reasons for the removal of Duskin, had, in the case of Burchard, complied, without protest or reservation, [p291] with the requirement of the Act of February 12, 1873, c. 131, § 1, 17 Stat. 424 (now Rev.Stat. § 343) that the reasons for the removal of the Director of the Mint be communicated by him to the Senate. 25 Ex.Journ. 242. A construction given to the Constitution by the concurrent affirmative action of Congress and the President continued throughout a long period without interruption should be followed despite the isolated utterances, made in the heat of political controversies not involving the question here in issue by individual Presidents supported only by the advice of the Attorney General. ^[n81]

The separation of the powers of government did not make each branch completely autonomous. It left each in some measure dependent upon the others, as it left to each power to exercise, in some respects, functions in their nature executive, legislative and judicial. Obviously the President cannot secure full execution of the [p292] laws, if Congress denies to him adequate means of doing so. Full execution may be defeated because Congress declines to create offices indispensable for that purpose. Or because Congress, having created the office, declines to make the indispensable appropriation. Or because Congress, having both created the office and made the appropriation, prevents, by restrictions which it imposes, the appointment of officials who in quality and character are indispensable to the efficient execution of the law. If, in any such way, adequate means are denied to the President, the fault will lie with Congress. The President performs his full constitutional duty if, with the means and instruments provided by Congress and within the limitations prescribed by it, he uses his best endeavors to secure the faithful execution of the laws enacted. Compare Kendall v. United States, 12 Peters 524, 613, 626.

Checks and balances were established in order that this should be "a government of laws, and not of men." As White said in the House in 1789, an uncontrollable power of removal in the Chief Executive "is a doctrine not to be learned in American governments." Such power had been denied in Colonial Charters, ^[n82] and even under Proprietary [p293] Grants{83} and Royal Commissions. ^[n84] It had been denied in the thirteen States before the framing of the Federal Constitution. ^[n85] The doctrine of the separation of powers was adopted by the convention of 1787 not to promote efficiency, but to preclude the exercise of arbitrary power. The purpose was not to avoid friction but, by means of the inevitable friction incident to the distribution of the governmental powers among three departments, to save the people from autocracy. In order to prevent arbitrary executive action, the Constitution provided in terms that presidential appointments be made with the consent of the Senate, unless Congress should otherwise provide, and this clause was construed by Alexander Hamilton in The Federalist, No. 77, as requiring like consent to removals. ^[n86] Limiting further executive [p294] prerogatives customary in monarchies, the Constitution empowered Congress to vest the appointment of inferior officers, "as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments." Nothing in support of the claim of uncontrollable power can be inferred from the silence of the Convention of 1787 on the subject of removal. For the outstanding fact remains that every specific proposal to confer such uncontrollable power upon the President was rejected. ^[n87] In America, as in England, the conviction prevailed then that the people must look to representative [p295] assemblies for the protection of their liberties. And protection of the individual, even if he be an official, from the arbitrary or capricious exercise of power was then believed to be an essential of free government.

1. Prior to the Act of July 2, 1836, c. 270, § 33, 5 Stat. 80, 87, all postmasters were appointed by the Postmaster General. Fourth class postmasters are still appointed by him. See Acts of May 8, 1794, c. 23, § 3, 1 Stat. 354, 357; April 30, 1810, c. 37, §§ 1, 5, 28, 40, 42, 2 Stat. 592; March 3, 1825, c. 64, § 1, 4 Stat. 102; March 3, 1863, c. 71, § 1, 12 Stat. 701; July 1, 1864, c.197, § 1, 13 Stat. 335.

2. The removal provision was introduced specifically into the postal legislation by Act of Jan 8, 1872, c. 335, § 63, 17 Stat. 283, 292, and reenacted, in substance, in Act of June 23, 1874, c. 456, § 11, 18 Stat. 231, 234; in the Revised Statutes, § 3830, and the Act of 1876.

3. During the year ending June 30, 1913, there were in the civil service 10,543 presidential appointees. Of these 8,423 were postmasters of the first, second and third classes. Report of U.S. Civil Service Commission for 1913, p. 8. During the year ending June 30, 1923, the number of presidential appointees was 16,148. The number of postmasters of the first, second and third classes was 14,261. Report for 1923, pp. 272ii, 100.

4. In McAllister v. United States, 141 U.S. 174, 189, it was said by this Court of the decision in Marbury v. Madison:

On the contrary, the Chief Justice asserted the authority of Congress to fix the term of a Justice of the Peace in the District of Columbia beyond the power of the President to lessen it by removal. . . .

The same significance is attached to the decision in 1 Kent, Commentaries, 12th ed., 311, note 1.

Reverdy Johnson, who had been Attorney General, said of Marbury v. Madison while addressing the Senate on Jan. 15, 1867, in opposition to the Tenure of Office bill:

But, says my brother and friend from Oregon, that case decided that the President had no right to remove. Surely that is an entire misapprehension. The Constitution gives to the President the authority to appoint, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to certain high offices, but gives to Congress the power to vest the appointment and to give the removal of inferior officers to anybody they think proper, and these justices of the peace were inferior, and not high, officers within the meaning of those two terms in the Constitution. Congress, therefore, by providing that such an officer should hold his commission for four years, removed the officer from the power of removal of the President, as they could have taken from him the power to appoint. Nobody doubts that, if they were inferior officers, as they were, Congress might have given the power to appoint those officers to the people of the district by election, or to any individual that they might think proper, or to any tribunal other than the executive department of the Government. They had a right, although they thought proper to give it to the President himself, to provide that it should endure for four years against any such power of removal. That is all the case decided upon that question.

Cong.Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., 461. See Note 71, infra.

5. In United States v. Avery, 1 Deady 204, the statute creating the office did not prescribe a fixed tenure and there was no provision for removal only by and with the consent of the Senate. In United States v. Guthrie, 17 How. 284, 305, Mr. Justice McLean, dissenting, denied that the President's power of removal was uncontrollable. In Ex parte Hennen, 13 Pet. 230, 238, it was stated that, where the power of appointment is vested in the head of a department "the President has certainly no power to remove."

State courts have uniformly held that, in the absence of express provision in their constitution to the contrary, legislative restrictions upon the power of removal by the governor, or other appointing power, are valid as applied to persons holding statutory offices. Commonwealth v. Sutherland, 3 Serg. & R. 145, 155; Commonwealth v. Bussier, 5 Serg. & R. 451; also Bruce v. Matlock, 86 Ark. 555; People v. Jewett, 6 Cal. 291; Gray v. McLendon, 134 Ga. 224; Dubuc v. Voss, 19 La.Ann. 210; State v. Cowen, 96 Ohio St. 277; Att'y Gen'l v. Brown, 1 Wis. 513. Compare Rankin v. Jauman, 4 Ida. 53; State v. Curtis, 180 Ind.191; Shira v. State, 187 Ind. 441; State v. Henderson, 145 Ia. 657; Markey v. Schunk, 152 Ia. 508; State v. Martin, 87 Kan. 817; State v. Sheppard, 192 Mo. 497; State v. Sanderson, 280 Mo. 258; State v. District Court, 53 Mont. 350;.State v. Archibald, 5 N.D. 359; State v. Canson, 58 Ohio St. 313; Cameron v. Parker, 2 Okla. 277; Christy v. City of Kingfisher, 13 Okla. 585; State v. Hewitt, 3 S.D. 187; State v. Kipp, 10 S.D. 495; Skeen v. Paine, 32 Utah 295; State v. Burke, 8 Wash. 412; State v. Grant, 14 Wyo. 41.

6. Power to remove has been held not to be inherently an executive power in States whose constitution provides in terms for separation of the powers. See note 12 infra; also Dullan v. Willson, 53 Mich. 392.

7.

If a law were to pass declaring that district attorneys or collectors of customs should hold their offices four years unless removed on conviction for misbehavior, no one could doubt its constitutional validity, because the legislature is naturally competent to prescribe the tenure of office. And is a reasonable check on the power of removal anything more than a qualification of the tenure of office?

Webster, Feb. 16, 1835, 4 Works, 8th ed., 197.

It is the legislative authority which creates the office, defines its duties, and may prescribe its duration. I speak, of course, of offices not created by the constitution, but the law. The office, coming into existence by the will of Congress, the same will may provide how and in what manner the office and the officer shall both cease to exist. It may direct the conditions on which he shall hold the office, and when and how he shall be dismissed.

Clay, Feb. 18, 1835, 11 Cong. Deb. 518.

Congress shall have power to make all laws not only to carry into effect the powers expressly delegated to itself, but those delegated to the Government, or any department or office thereof, and, of course, comprehends the power to pass laws necessary and proper to carry into effect the powers expressly granted to the executive department. It follows, of course, to whatever express grant of power to the Executive the power of dismissal may be supposed to attach, whether to that of seeing the law faithfully executed, or to the still more comprehensive grant, as contended for by some, vesting executive powers in the President, the mere fact that it is a power appurtenant to another power, and necessary to carry it into effect, transfers it, by the provisions of the constitution cited, from the Executive to Congress, and places it under the control of Congress, to be regulated in the manner which it may judge best.

Calhoun, Feb. 20, 1835, 11 Cong.Deb. 553.

8. See Debate of 1789 (June 17), Stone:

All the difficulties and embarrassments that have been mentioned can be removed by giving to the President the power of suspension during the recess of the Senate, and I think that an attention to the Constitution will lead us to decide that this is the only proper power to be vested in the President of the United States.

1 Ann.Cong. 495; also Gerry, 1 Ann.Cong. 504; Sherman, 1 Ann.Cong. 492; Jackson, 1 Ann.Cong. 489.

9. New York: Constitution of 1777, amended 1801. The powers of appointment and removal were vested in the Council of Appointment. People v. Foot, 19 Johns. 58. By later constitutions or amendments, varying restrictions were imposed on the governor's power of removal. 4 Lincoln, Constitutional History of New York, 554-594, 724-733. Massachusetts: Constitution of 1780. Appointments to be made by governor with the advice and consent of the council. No express provision for removals. By early practice, the council was associated with the governor in removals. The Constitutional Amendment of 1855 altering the manner of appointment left the practice as to removals unchanged. Opinion of the Justices, 3 Gray 601, 605. New Hampshire: Constitution of 1784. Provision and practice the same as Massachusetts. By Laws of 1850, c. 189, § 4, the legislature further limited the governor's power of removal over certain inferior offices. New Jersey: Constitution of 1776. The "supreme executive power" of the governor was limited to commissioning officers appointed by the council and assembly. Pennsylvania: Constitution of 1790. Appointing power vested in the governor alone. In the absence of restrictive legislation, he exercised the power of removal. Biddle, Autobiography, 283. Control by the legislature of his power of removal from inferior offices had early judicial sanction. Commonwealth v. Sutherland, 3 Serg. & R. 145. Maryland: The governor seems to have had such power under the constitution of 1776, but it was later taken away. The Constitutional Convention of 1851 considered but refused to grant the governor the sole power of removal. Cull v. Wheltle, 114 Md. 58, 80. Illinois: Constitution of 1818 was construed as denying the power of removal to the governor acting alone. Field v. People, 2 Scam. 79. The Constitution of 1870, Art. 5, § 12, conferred the power, but only for certain specified causes. In Maine and Florida, concurrent action of the senate is a constitutional requirement. Opinion of the Justices, 72 Me. 542; Advisor Opinion to the Governor, 69 Fla. 508.

10. The Pennsylvania Constitution of 1873 provided that "appointed officers . . . may be removed at the pleasure of the power by which they shall have been appointed." Art. VI, § 4. The Supreme Court held as to petty officers or subordinate ministerial agents appointed by the governor, that his power of removal is controllable, and that a statute prohibiting removal except for specified causes is valid. Commonwealth v. Black, 201 Pa.St. 433. Officials deemed agents of the legislature are also held to be without the scope of the governor's power of removal. Commonwealth v. Benn, 284 Pa.St. 421.

11. Oregon has, by statute, conferred a general power of removal upon the governor. 1920 Olson's Oregon Laws, § 4043. Vermont had also vested the power of removal with the governor. 1917 Vt.Gen.Laws, § 356. It later, however, placed restrictions upon the governor's power of removing members of the State Board of Education. 1917 Vt.Gen.Laws, § 1170. See Wyoming Act of Feb. 20, 1905, c. 59, State v. Grant, 14 Wyo. 41, 59-60. Compare State v. Peterson, 50 Minn. 239; State v. Hawkins, 44 Ohio St. 98.

12. By statute, in some States, removals can be made only upon concurrence of the senate or legislature with the governor. 1914 Ga.Civ.Code, § 2618; 1924 Ia.Code, § 315; N.Y.Consol.Laws, c. 47, § 3?; 1921 Throckmorton Ohio Gen.Code, § 13; 1913 Pa.Laws, 1374, 1401; 1923 R.I. Gen Laws, § 384; 1924 Va.Code, § 330. In some, the governor is required merely to record his reasons for dismissal. Conn.Rev.Stats. § 86; 1905 Wyo.Laws, c. 59. In many States, the power of removal is limited by statute to specific instances of misconduct or misbehavior in office. 1921 Colo.Comp.Laws, § 138; Carroll's Ky.Stats. § 3750; 1915 Mich.Comp.Laws, §§ 243, 252 (during recess of legislature only); 1913 N.D.Comp.Laws, § 685; 1910 Okla.Rev.Stats. § 8052; 1919 S.D.Rev.Code, §§ 7009, 7010; 1917 Utah Comp.Laws, § 5684 (during recess of legislature only); 1893 Wash.Laws, c. 101. In addition, a statement of record of the reasons for dismissal is often required. 1913 Ariz.Civ.Code, § 247 (inspector of apiaries), § 4757 (board of dental examiners), § 4769 (board of embalmers); 1914 Ga.Code, § 1697(b) (board of medical examiners), § 1963 (state geologist); 1919 Ida.Comp.Stats. § 793 (board of education), § 2398 (utility commissioners); 1855 La.Acts, No. 297, § 13 (public weighers); 1910 Md.Laws, c. 180, § 2 (utility commissioners); 1923 Minn.Gen.Stats. § 2229 (tax officers), § 2356 (tax commission); 1912 Nev.Rev.Laws, § 4432 (dental examiners); 1910 N.Y.Laws, c. 480, § 4 (Public Service Commission); 1921 N.Y.Laws, c. 134 (transit commission); 1921 Throckmorton Ohio Gen.Laws, § 88 (board of clemency), § 488 (utility commissioners), 486-3 (civil service commissioners), § 710-6 (superintendent of banks), § 744-16 (commissioner of securities), § 871-2 (industrial commission), § 1337 (board of embalming examiners), § 1465-2 (tax commission); 1917 Vt.Gen.Laws, § 1170 (board of education). In other States, or for other officers, the laws require the existence of "cause" or provide for notice and hearing. 1919 Mo.Rev.Stat. § 10414 (utility commissioners); 1921 Mont.Pol.Code, § 2820 (industrial accident commission); N.Y.Consol.Laws, c. 46, § 33 (officials appointed by governor alone); 1921 Throckmorton Ohio Gen.Laws, § 1236-4 (board of health), § 1380 (commissioners of state laws); 1920 Tex. Comp.Stats. Art. 4995b (board of water engineers), Art. 6027 (appointees of governor), Art. 6195 (board of prison commissioners), Art. 6286 (board of pharmacy); 1923 Wis.Stats. § 17.07 (appointees of governor). Some statutes make removal dependent upon the recommendation of a board. 1920 Tex. Comp.Stats. Art. 5927 (mining inspectors).

13. Removals made from 1789 to 1829 of Presidential appointees, exclusive of military officers, were as follows: Washington -- 17, Adams -- 19, Jefferson -- 62, Madison -- 24, Monroe -- 27, J. Q. Adams -- 7, being a total of 156. Fish, Removal of Officials, 1899 Am.Hist.Ass'n Rep. 67. Compare Sen.Rep. No. 576, 47th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 2006, p. iv.

It was the intention of the founders of our Government that administrative officers should hold office during good behavior. . . . Madison, the expounder of the Constitution, said that the wanton removal of a meritorious officer was an impeachable offense. It was the established usage without question or variation during the first forty years of our Government to permit executive officers, except members of the Cabinet, to hold office during good behavior, and this practice was only changed by the four-year tenure act of 1820, which was passed at the instance of an appointing officer for the purpose of using this power to secure his nomination as a Presidential candidate.

Report of U.S. Civil Service Commission for 1896, pp. 28-29.

14. Fish, Civil Service and Patronage, 66-70. Madison, in commenting upon the Four Year Limitation Act of 1820 to President Monroe, recognized the necessary identity of a power to prescribe qualifications of tenure and a power to remove from office.

Is not the law vacating periodically the described offices an encroachment on the Constitutional attributes of the Executive? . . . If a law can displace an officer at every period of four years, it can do so at the end of every year, or at every session of the Senate, and the tenure will then be the pleasure of the Senate as much as of the President, and not of the President alone.

3 Letters and Writings, 200.

15. The provisions of the Acts of 1789, 1791, 1792, 1836 and 1854, were reenacted in the Revised Statutes, and are still in force. Rev.Stats. §§ 243, 244, 2242, 3947 as amended. Mandatory directions of dismissal for specified offenses are also contained in the Act of Mar. 2, 1867, c. 172, § 3, 14 Stat. 489, 492, reenacted in Rev.Stats. § 1546; Act of Feb. 1, 1870, c. 11, 16 Stat. 63, reenacted in Rev.Stats. § 1784 and Act of Aug. 15, 1876, c. 287, § 6, 19 Stat. 143, 169. From the operation of the latter Act executive officers and employees appointed by the President by and with the advice and consent of the Senate are significantly excepted.

16. Removals made from 1829 to 1869 of Presidential appointees, exclusive of military officers, were as follows: Jackson -- 180, Van Buren -- 43, Harrison and Tyler -- 389, Polk -- 228, Taylor -- 491, Fillmore -- 73, Pierce -- 771, Buchanan -- 253, Lincoln -- 1400, Johnson -- 726, being a total of 4,554. Fish, Removal of Officials, 1899 Am.Hist.Ass'n Rep. 67. The great increase in removals under President Jackson included offices besides those to which appointments were made by the President and Senate, the accepted estimate during the first year of his administration being 2,000. 2 Story, Constitution, § 1543; House Rep, No 47, 40th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 1352, p. 8. Of these, 491 were postmasters. 1 Am.State Papers, Post Office, 242. The increase in the number of such removals is testified to by the incomplete reports of the following years. The Post Office Department consistently suffered most. See Lucy Salmond, History of the Appointing Power, 1 Am.Hist.Ass'n Papers, No. 5, pp. 67-86.

17. It was amended by Act of April 5, 1869, c. 10, 16 Stat. 6.

18. On Feb. 8, 1887, while the bill for the repeal of the Tenure of Office Act was pending, the Committee on Post Offices and Post Roads reported a bill, H.R. 11108, for reclassifying postmasters into three classes, and provided (§ 1) that:

Postmasters of the first and second classes shall be appointed by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, for a term of four years, subject to the provisions of law respecting their removal or suspension, and the filling of vacancies occurring when the Senate shall not be in session. . . . Postmasters of the third class shall be appointed and commissioned by the Postmaster General, and hold their offices during his pleasure.

18 Cong.Rec. 1498. The bill was not considered by Congress.

On Jan. 5, 1892, Sherman Hoar introduced a bill (H.R.196) to provide that all postmasters should hold office during good behavior 23 Cong.Rec. 130. § 1 contained the following proviso: "Provided, however, That the President may at any time remove or suspend a postmaster for cause stated." On Dec. 22, 1895, De Forest introduced H.R. 8328, 27 Cong.Rec. 576. Section 2 provided:

That postmasters of all classes now in office or hereafter to be appointed shall be appointed to hold their offices for good behavior; Provided, That the President may at any time remove or suspend a postmaster of the first, second or third class for cause, communicated in writing to the Senate at the next subsequent session of Congress after such removal, and that the Postmaster General may at any time remove or suspend a postmaster of the fourth class for cause, communicated in the letter of removal.

Sec. 3 forbade appointment, removal or suspension for political reasons. On Jan. 28, 1896, Gillett introduced the identical bill (H.R. 8328). 28 Cong.Rec. 1061. None of these three bills was considered even by a committee.

19. This provision was reenacted by Rev.Stats. § 1229. Comp.Sen.Rep. Apr. 4, 1864, No. 42, 38th Cong. 1st sess., Ser. No. 1178. In Blake v. United States, 103 U.S. 227, 237, this provision was interpreted as not denying "the power of the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to displace them by the appointment of others in their places." The Act of June 4, 1920, c. 227, Art. 118, 41 Stat. 759, 811, provides:

ART. 118. OFFICERS, SEPARATION FROM SERVICE. -- No officer shall be discharged or dismissed from the service, except by order of the President or by sentence of a general court-martial, and in time of peace no officer shall be dismissed except in pursuance of the sentence of a general court-martial or in mitigation thereof; but the President may at any time drop from the rolls of the Army any officer who has been absent from duty three months without leave or who has been absent in confinement in a prison or penitentiary for three months after final conviction by a court of competent jurisdiction.

20. See Note 4, p. 242, supra.

21. See Lawrence, June 17, 1 Ann.Cong. 483-484; Smith, June 17, 1 Ann.Cong. 508-9; Madison, June 18, 1 Ann.Cong., 547-548. A few days subsequent to the debate on the removal provision in the Act establishing a Department of Foreign Affairs, Madison, although he believed that the power to prescribe the tenure of office and the power of removal were, in essence, the same, moved to amend the Act establishing a Treasury Department by providing that the Comptroller should hold office for a limited period of years. To the objection that such a provision was not within the power of Congress he replied:

When I was up before . . . , I endeavored to show that the nature of this office differed from the others upon which the House had decided; and, consequently, that a modification might take place, without interfering with the former distinction; so that it cannot be said we depart from the spirit of the Constitution.

1 Ann.Cong. 614. Stone, in support of Madison, added:

As the Comptroller was an inferior officer, his appointment might be vested in the President by the Legislature; but, according to the determination which had already taken place, it did not necessarily follow that he should have the power of dismissal, and before it was given, its propriety ought to be apparent.

1 Ann.Cong. 613. See Note 71, infra.

22. In 1830, Senator Barton, in defense of his resolutions denying an uncontrollable Presidential power of removal, said:

It is no question whether a President may remove, at his own will and pleasure, his Secretary of State. That was the very question before Congress in the great debate of 1789. . . . Nobody would wish to force a disagreeable member of the cabinet on the President. . . . But the class of officers now before the Senate, and their predecessors, attempted to be removed by the President, were not under consideration in the debate of 1789. This is a class of public officers -- or officers of the law -- whose term, tenure, and duties of office are fixed and prescribed by the laws of the land, and not by the Executive will, as in the other class. . . . The power is now boldly asserted on this floor by the majority, for the first time since the foundation of the republic, of removing this class of federal officers by the President at discretion, without the slightest restraint by the Senate.

6 Cong. Deb. 458-459. The same distinction was taken in 1835, by Senators Wright and White, in the debate on the Executive Patronage Bill. 11 Cong.Deb. 480, 487.

On June 15, 1844, the Senate Committee on Retrenchment dealing with the evils of executive patronage said:

It will be sufficient for the committee to show that Congress may regulate, by law, as well the power to appoint inferior officers as to remove them. . . . The committee will not protract the argument. It is not known to them that the power of Congress to regulate the appointment and removal of inferior officers has been questioned. It is very certain that the authority of the President to control the departments in the exercise of the power has not at any time been recognised by law.

Sen.Doc. No. 399, 28th Cong. 1st sess., Ser. No. 437, p. 29-30.

23. In six instances, President Johnson, in separate messages, communicated his reasons for suspension. 16 Ex.Journ. 3, 109-110, 122, 133. In two further instances, misconduct was given as the ground for suspension. 16 ibid. 1.

24. Five cases of this nature are on record. 16 Ex.Journ. 411-412.

25. From President Grant's administration to the close of the first two years of President Cleveland's first administration, nominations of officials to succeed those who had been suspended during the recess follow one of two forms: "I nominate A.B., who was designated during the recess of the Senate, to be ___, vice C.D. suspended," or "I nominate A.B. to be postmaster at ___ in place of C.D., suspended under the provisions of the seventeen hundred and sixty-eighth section of the Revised Statutes of the United States." These forms are not used after Mar. 3, 1887. The case of A.C. Botkin, marshal of Montana Territory, is illustrative of the fact that suspension, and not removal, could be effected during the recess. On Jan. 28, 1885, President Arthur nominated E. A. Kreidler in place of A.C. Botkin to be removed. 24 Ex.Journ. 425. The Senate failed to act upon the nomination, and, on Dec. 21, 1885, President Cleveland nominated R.S. Kelly vice A.C. Botkin suspended. For several months, action upon the nomination was delayed, and, on April 28, 1886, the President sent the following message to the Senate:

I nominated Robert S. Kelly, of Montana, to the Senate on the 21st day of December, 1885, . . . in the place of A.C. Botkin, who was by me suspended under the provisions of section 1708 of the Revised Statutes. On the 12th day of April, 1886, the term of office for which said A.C. Botkin was originally appointed expired. And I renew the nomination of Robert S. Kelly, of Montana, . . . in the place of the said A.C. Botkin, whose term of office has so expired as aforesaid.

25 Ex.Journ. 441. These years of President Cleveland disclose 78 other cases of a similar nature. 25 ibid. 396-410, 426, 436, 441, 488, 490-494, 497, 501, 516, 539, 563, 714-715.

26. On Dec. 6, 1869, President Grant requested the consent of the Senate to the removal of certain Indian agents, to whose posts army officers had been assigned. 17 Ex.Journ. 289. On May 17, 1872, the Senate gave its consent to the removal of T. H. Bazin, appraiser of merchandise at Charleston, S.C., 18 ibid. 251. On Dec. 4, 1878, President Hayes requested the Senate's consent to the removal of A.M. Devereux, a third lieutenant in the revenue service. 21 ibid. 393. The Senate during that session took no action. To the three succeeding sessions of the Senate, the same request was made without securing its consent. 22 ibid. 23, 108, 410. President Garfield likewise made the same request, but failed to secure any action by the Senate. 23 ibid. 9, 29. On April 15, 1884, President Arthur recommended to the Senate the removal of F. N. Wicker as collector of customs at Key West. 24 ibid. 246. The Senate concurred in his removal without expressing an opinion upon the constitutional powers of the President and Senate upon the subject of removal. 24 ibid. 249.

27. The instances are numerous, and a few illustrations will suffice. On Mar. 2, 1883, Paul Strobach was nominated as a marshal vice M.C. Osborn to be removed. 23 Ex.Journ. 711. The Senate took no action during that session, and, in the recess, Osborn was suspended. Strobach was again nominated, but was rejected at the next session of the Senate. Thereupon, on May 8, 1884, J. H. Speed was nominated "vice Paul Strobach, temporarily appointed during the recess of the Senate." 24 Ex.Journ. 265. Pending action upon the nomination, President Arthur, on May 14, 1884, again nominated J. H. Speed

vice M.C. Osborn, whose term has expired. This nomination is made to correct an error in the nomination of Joseph H. Speed to the above-named office, which was delivered to the Senate on the 8th instant, and which is hereby withdrawn.

24 Ex.Journ. 267. The correction expressly recognizes that Osborn had never ceased to hold office. Compare 15 Op.A.G. 375. Again, on Mar. 2, 1884, Windus was nominated as a postmaster vice Lambert "whose removal for cause is hereby proposed." 24 Ex.Journ. 220. The Senate rejected Windus, and, on Dec. 17, 1885, President Cleveland nominated Gildea vice Lambert, "whose commission expired May 13, 1885." 25 ibid. 228. On Jan. 6, 1885, Richardson was nominated as a postmaster vice Corson "whose removal for cause is hereby proposed." 24 ibid. 412. The Senate failed to act upon the nomination, and, on April 1, 1885, Cleveland nominated Bonner to the post vice Corson "whose removal for cause is hereby proposed." 25 ibid. 45.

28. Since the enactment of the Tenure of Office Act, various forms have been used to nominate officials to succeed those whose removal is thereby sought. Examination of their use over a period of thirty-two years indicates that no significance is to be attached to the use of any particular form. Thus, the nomination is sometimes in the form A. B. vice C. D. "removed"; sometimes it is "to be removed"; sometimes "removed for cause "; sometimes "whose removal for cause is hereby proposed."

                                                         "whose

                                             "removed  removal for

                              "re-   "to be     for   cause is here

                              moved" removed"  cause"  by proposed"

1867-1869 (Johnson). . . . .    37      72       3

1869-1873 (Grant). . . . . .   468     464      17

1873-1877 (Grant). . . . . .   120     144      19

1877-1881 (Hayes). . . . . .     8     102      10         42

1881 (Garfield). . . . . . .     1                         19

1881-1885 (Arthur) . . . . .     4      78                 69

1885-1887 (Cleveland). . . .    15      19                 24

1887-1889 (Cleveland). . . .   178       1 

1889-1893 (Harrison) . . . .  1080     118       9

1893-1897 (Cleveland). . . .   808     101

1897-1899 (McKinley) . . . .   813      26

Postmasters will be found included within all these categories. 16-31 Ex.Journ., passim. The form "who has been removed" was twice used by President Grant and once by President Harrison. On one occasion, President Grant used the form "whom I desire to remove," and on six occasions President Hayes used the form "to be thus removed." The simple form "removed," which has been exclusively used for postmasters since 1887, does not imply that removal has already been accomplished. That form was used in the Parsons and Shurtleff cases, where the notification of removal sent to the incumbent stated that the removal would take effect upon the qualification of a successor. 29 Ex.Journ. 11; 31 ibid. 1328.

29. Cases in this Court dealing with the removal of civil officers appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate illustrate the practice of securing their removal by the appointment of a successor. In recent years, the formal notification of removal commonly reads: "Sir: You are hereby removed from the office of ___, to take effect upon the appointment and qualification of your successor." Parsons v. United States, 167 U.S. 324, 325; Shurtleff v. United States, 189 U.S. 311, 312.

30. Provisions authorizing removal for

(a) Inefficiency, neglect of duty, malfeasance in office, but for no other cause: Act of May 27, 1908, c. 205, § 3, 35 Stat. 403, 406, amending Act of June 10, 1890, c. 407, § 12, 26 Stat. 131, 136, Board of General Appraisers; Act of July 15, 1913, c. 6, § 11, 38 Stat. 103, 108, Commissioner of Mediation and Conciliation (misconduct in office only); Act of June 2, 1924, c. 234, § 900b, 43 Stat. 253, 336, Board of Tax Appeals.

(b) Neglect of duty or malfeasance in office, but for no other cause: Act of Feb. 28, 1920, c. 91, § 306(b), 41 Stat. 456, 470, Railroad Labor Board; Act of Sept. 22, 1922, c. 412, § 1, 42 Stat. 1023, amended by Act of Mar. 4, 1923, c. 248, § 1, 42 Stat. 1446, United States Coal Commission.

(c) Inefficiency, neglect of duty, malfeasance in office, not restricting, however, under Shurtleff v. United States, 189 U.S. 311, the President's power to remove for other than the causes specified: Act of Feb. 4, 1887, c. 104, § 11, 24 Stat. 379, 383, Interstate Commerce Commission; Act of June 10, 1890, c. 407, § 12, 26 Stat. 131, 136, Board of General Appraisers; Act of Sept. 26, 1914, c. 311, 1, 38 Stat. 717, 718, Federal Trade Commission; Act of Sept. 7, 1916, c. 451, § 3, 39 Stat. 728, 729, United States Shipping Board; Act of Sept. 8, 1916, c. 473, § 700, 39 Stat. 756, 795, United States Tariff Commission.

31. Act of June 7, 1878, c. 162, § 1, 20 Stat. 100, justices of the peace of the District of Columbia; Act of June 6, 1900, c. 786, § 10, 31 Stat. 321, 325, governor, surveyor-general, attorneys, marshals of Alaska; Act of Aug. 24, 1912, c. 389, § 6, 37 Stat. 539, 555, removals from the classified civil service to be only for such cause as will promote the efficiency of the service and for reasons stated in writing; Act of July 17, 1916, c. 245, § 3, 39 Stat. 360, Federal Farm Loan Board; Act of June 3, 1922, c. 205, 42 Stat. 620, Federal Reserve Board. The provision is also common with respect to judgeships. Act of Mar.19, 1906, c. 960, § 1, 34 Stat. 73 (Juvenile Court of the District of Columbia); Act of June 30, 1906, c. 3934, § 7, 34 Stat. 814, 816 (United States Court for China); Act of Mar. 3, 1925, c. 443, § 3a, 43 Stat. 1119 (Police Court of the District of Columbia).

32. Act of May 27, 1908, c. 205, § 3, 35 Stat. 403, 406, does so in express terms. Shurtleff v. United States, 189 U.S. 311, 314, 317, declares that, by construction, every Act which prescribes specific causes for removal requires that removal be not made for such cause without a hearing. In Reagan v. United States, 182 U.S. 419, 425, it was said:

The inquiry is therefore whether there were any causes of removal prescribed by law, March 1, 1895, or at the time of the removal. If there were, then the rule would apply that, where causes of removal are specified by constitution or statute, as also where the term of office is for a fixed period, notice and hearing are essential. If there were not, the appointing power could remove at pleasure or for such cause as it deemed sufficient.

State courts have held that statutes providing for removal "for cause" require that the appointee be given notice and an opportunity to defend himself. State v. Frazier, 47 N.D. 314; Street Commissioners v. Williams, 96 Md. 232; Ham v. Board of Police, 142 Mass. 90; Haight v. Love, 39 N.J.L. 14, aff'd. 39 N.J.L. 476; Biggs v. McBride, 17 Oreg. 640.

33. Act of June 3, 1864, c. 106, § 1, 13 Stat. 99, Comptroller of the Currency; Act of Feb. 12, 1873, c. 131, § 1, 17 Stat. 424, Director of the Mint.

34. The executive orders of Jan. 31, 1902, and Jan. 25, 1906, prescribed dismissal as a penalty for agitation by civil employees for an increase in wages. The executive orders of Nov. 26, 1909, and April 8, 1912, forbade communications to members of Congress save through heads of departments. Report of U.S. Civil Service Commission, for 1912, pp. 23-24. Section 6 of the Act of 1912 was intended to override these orders. See 48 Cong.Rec. 5634-5636. On Feb.19, 1886, the National Civil Service Reform League, in a series of resolutions, recommended that the reasons for removal be treated as "part of the public record." 5 Civ.Serv. Rec. 92. On Aug. 9, 1890, Commissioner Roosevelt advocated such a restriction upon removals. 10 Civ.Serv.Rec. 26. A bill reported from the Select Committee of the House on Civil Service Reform in 1891 contained such a provision. House Rep. No. 4038, 51 Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 2890. The Attorney General, in 1913, ruled, against an earlier opinion of the Civil Service Commission, that Presidential appointees were excluded from the terms of the Act of 1912. 30 Op.A.G. 181. The Civil Service Act of Jan. 16, 1883, c. 27, § 2, 22 Stat. 403, 404, which was approved by President Arthur, had also provided that failure to subscribe to political funds should not be a ground of dismissal.

35. Citizens of

(a) The United States: Act of May 3, 1802, c. 53, § 5, 2 Stat. 195, 196, mayor of the District of Columbia; Act of Mar. 1, 1855, c. 133, § 9, 10 Stat. 619, 623, ministers and their subordinates; Act of Aug. 18, 1856, c. 127, § 7, 11 Stat. 52, 55, consular pupils; Act of June 20, 1864, c. 136, § 2, 13 Stat. 137, 139, consular clerks; Act of Mar. 22, 1902, c. 272, 32 Stat. 76, 78, Act of Feb. 9, 1903, c. 530, 32 Stat. 807, 809, Act of Mar. 12, 1904, c. 543, 33 Stat. 67, 69, Act of Mar. 3, 1905, c. 1407, 33 Stat. 915, 917, Act of June 16, 1906, c. 3337, 34 Stat. 286, 288, Act of Feb. 22, 1907, c. 1184, 34 Stat. 916, 918, Act of May 21, 1908, c. 183, 35 Stat. 171, 172, Act of Mar. 2, 1909, c. 235, 35 Stat. 672, 674, Act of May 6, 1910, c. 199, 36 Stat. 337, 339, Act of Mar. 3, 1911, c. 208, 36 Stat. 1027, 1029, Act of April 30, 1912, c. 97, 37 Stat. 94, 96, Act of Feb. 28, 1913, c. 86, 37 Stat. 688, 689, Act of June 30, 1914, c. 132, 38 Stat. 442, 444, Act of Mar. 4, 1915, c. 145, 38 Stat. 1116, 1117, Act of July 1, 1916, c. 208, 39 Stat. 252, 253, Act of Mar. 3, 1917, c. 161, 39 Stat. 1047, 1049, Act of April 15, 1918, c. 52, 40 Stat. 519, 520, Act of Mar. 4, 1919, c. 123, 40 Stat. 1325, 1327, Act of June 4, 1920, c. 223, 41 Stat. 739, 741, Act of Mar. 2, 1921, c. 113, 41 Stat. 1205, 1207, Act of June 1, 1922, c. 204, 42 Stat. 599, 601, Act of Jan. 3, 1923, c. 21, 42 Stat. 1068, 1070, student interpreters for China, Japan and Turkey; Act of April 5, 1906, c. 1366, § 5, 34 Stat. 99, 101, clerks in consular office receiving more than $1,000 per annum; Act of July 17, 1916, c. 245, § 3, 39 Stat. 360, Federal Farm Loan Board; Act of Feb. 23, 1917, c. 114, § 6, 39 Stat. 929, 932, Federal Board for Vocational Education; Act of May 24, 1924, c. 182, § 5, 43 Stat. 140, 141, Foreign Service officers; Act of June 7, 1924, c. 287, § 7, 43 Stat. 473, 474, board of advisors to the Federal Industrial Institution for Women.

(b) A State: Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 539, § 2, 26 Stat. 854, 855, attorney and interpreter for the Court of Private Land Claims.

(c) A Particular State: Act of July 27, 1854, c. 110, § 1, 10 Stat. 313, commissioner to adjust Indiana land claims; Act of Mar. l, 1907, c. 2285, 34 Stat. 1015, 1036, Act of May 30, 1910, c. 260, § 4, 36 Stat. 448, 450, Act of June 1, 1910, c. 264, § 7, 36 Stat. 455, 457, Act of Aug. 3, 1914, c. 224, § 3, 38 Stat. 681, 682, various commissions to appraise unallotted Indian lands.

(d) A Particular Territory: Act of April 12, 1900, c.191, § 40, 31 Stat. 77, 86, commission to revise the laws of Porto Rico; Act of April 30, 1900, c. 339, §§ 66, 69, 31 Stat. 141, 153, 154, governor and secretary of Hawaii; Act of July 9, 1921, c. 42, §§ 303, 313, 42 Stat. 108, 116, 119, governor, attorney and marshal of Hawaii.

(e) District of Columbia: Act of Mar. 3, 1855, c.199, § 2, 10 Stat. 682, board of visitors for Government Hospital for the Insane; Act of Feb. 21, 1871, c. 62, § 37, 16 Stat. 419, 426, Board of Public Works; Act of June 11, 1878, c. 180, § 2, 20 Stat. 102, 103, commissioners of the District; Act of Sept. 27, 1890, c. 1001, § 2, 26 Stat. 492, Rock Creek Park Commission.

36. Act of Mar. 1, 1855, c. 133, § 9, 10 Stat. 619, 623, ministers and their subordinates.

37. Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 539, § 2, 26 Stat. 854, 855, attorney and interpreter for the Court of Private Land Claims.

38. Act of Mar. 29, 1867, c. 14, § 1, 15 Stat. 9, commissioners to ascertain the amount raised in Indiana in enrolling the militia; Act of Mar. 1, 1907, c. 2285, 34 Stat. 1015, 1036, Act of May 30, 1910, c. 260, § 4, 36 Stat. 448, 450, Act of June 1, 1910, c. 264, § 7, 36 Stat. 455, 457, Act of Aug. 3, 1914, c. 224 § 3, 38 Stat. 681, 682, various commissions for the appraisal of unallotted Indian lands.

39. Act of July 1, 1862, c. 119, § 2, 12 Stat. 432, 433, assessors and collectors of internal revenue, and semble, Act of July 2, 1836, c. 270, § 36, 5 Stat. 80, 88, postmasters.

40. Act of Mar. 26, 1804, c. 38, § 4, 2 Stat. 283, 284, legislative council of Louisiana; Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 564, § 2, 26 Stat. 1104, territorial mine inspectors; Act of July 9, 1921, c. 42, §§ 303, 313, 42 Stat. 108, 116, 119, governor, attorney and marshal of Hawaii.

41. Act of May 3, 1802, c. 53, § 5, 2 Stat. 195, 196, mayor of the District of Columbia; Act of April 16, 1862, c. 54, § 3, 12 Stat. 376, commissioners for claims arising from the abolition of slavery; Act of Feb. 21, 1874, c. 62, § 37, 16 Stat. 419, 426, Board of Public Works; Act of June 7, 1878, c. 162, § 5, 20 Stat. 100, 101, notaries public; Act of June 11, 1878, c. 180, § 2, 20 Stat. 102, 103, commissioners of the District.

42. Act of Mar. 3, 1819, c. 101, § 2, 3 Stat. 532, 533, agents on the coast of Africa to receive negroes from vessels seized in the slave trade.

43. Professional qualifications:

(a) Learning in the Law: Act of Sept. 24, 1789, c. 20, § 35, 1 Stat. 73, 92, Attorney General and district attorneys; Act of Mar. 26, 1804, c. 38, § 8, 2 Stat. 283, 286, attorney for Louisiana Territory; Act of April 3, 1818, c. 29, § 4, 3 Stat. 413, attorney for Mississippi; Act of Mar. 3, 1819, c. 70, § 4, 3 Stat. 502, 503, attorney for Illinois; Act of April 21, 1820, c. 47 § 6, 3 Stat. 564, 565, attorney for Alabama; Act of Mar. 16, 1822, c. 12, § 4, 3 Stat. 653, attorney for Missouri; Act of Mar. 30, 1822, c. 13, § 7, 3 Stat. 654, 656, attorney for Florida Territory; Act of Mar. 3, 1823, c. 28, § 9, 3 Stat. 750, 752, attorney for Florida Territory; Act of May 26, 1824, c. 163, § 3, 4 Stat. 45, 46, attorney for Florida Territory; Act of May 29, 1830, c. 153, § 1, 4 Stat. 414, solicitor of the Treasury; Act of June 15, 1836, c. 100, § 6, 5 Stat. 50, 51, attorney for Arkansas; Act of July 1, 1836, c. 234, § 4, 5 Stat. 61, 62, attorney for Michigan; Act of Mar. 3, 1845, c. 75, § 7, 5 Stat. 788, attorney for Florida; Act of Mar. 3, 1845, c. 76, § 4, 5 Stat. 789, attorney for Iowa; Act of Dec. 29, 1845, c. 1, § 3, 9 Stat. 1, attorney for Texas; Act of Aug. 6, 1846, c. 89, § 5, 9 Stat. 56, 57, attorney for Wisconsin; Act of Feb. 23, 1847, c. 20, § 5, 9 Stat. 131, attorney for Florida; Act of Sept. 28, 1850, c. 86, § 8, 9 Stat. 521, 522, attorney for California; Act of Mar. 3, 1851, c. 41, § 4, 9 Stat. 631, agent for California Land Commission; Act of Aug. 31, 1852, c. 108, § 12, 10 Stat. 76, 99, law agent for California; Act of July 27, 1854, c. 110, § 1, 10 Stat. 313, commissioner to adjust land claims; Act of Mar. 4, 1855, c. 174, § 1, 10 Stat. 642, commissioners to revise District of Columbia laws; Act of Mar. 3, 1859, c. 80, 11 Stat. 410, 420, Assistant Attorney General; Act of Mar. 2, 1861, c. 88, § 2, 12 Stat. 246, examiners in chief in Patent Office; Act of May 20, 1862, c. 79, § 1, 12 Stat. 403, commissioners to revise District of Columbia laws; Act of Mar. 3, 1863, c. 91, § 17, 12 Stat. 762, 765, commissioners to revise District of Columbia laws; Act of Mar. 3, 1863, c. 101, § 2, 12 Stat. 795, solicitor to Peruvian Commissioners; Act of June 27, 1866, c. 140, § 1, 14 Stat. 74, commissioners to revise United States laws, Joint Res. of May 27, 1870, No. 66, § 1, 16 Stat. 378, examiner of claims for the Department of State; Act of June 22, 1870, c. 150, §§ 2, 3, 16 Stat. 162, Solicitor General and Assistant Attorney Generals; Act of July 8, 1870, c. 230, § 10, 16 Stat. 198, 200, examiners in chief in Patent Office; Act of Mar. 2, 1877, c. 82, § 1, 19 Stat. 268, commissioner for a new edition of the Revised Statutes; Act of Mar. 6, 1890, c. 27, § 1, 26 Stat. 17, delegates to the International Conference at Madrid in patent and trademark laws; Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 539, § 2, 26 Stat. 854, 855, attorney of the Court of Private Land Claims; Act of Mar. 2, 1901, c. 800, § 1, 31 Stat. 877, Spanish claims commissioners; Act of June 13, 1902, c. 1079, § 4, 32 Stat. 331, 373, commission on Canadian boundary waters to include one lawyer experienced in international and riparian law.

(b) Versed in Spanish and English Languages: Act of Mar. 3, 1849, c. 107, § 2, 9 Stat. 393, secretary to Mexican Treaty Commissioners; Act of Mar. 3, 1851, c. 41, § 4, 9 Stat. 631, agent for California Land Commission; Act of Aug. 31, 1852, c. 108, § 12, 10 Stat. 76, 99, law agent in California; Act of May 16, 1860, c. 48, § 2, 12 Stat. 15, secretary of Paraguay Commission; Act of Feb. 20, 1861, c. 45, § 2, 12 Stat. 145, secretary of New Granada Commission; Act of Mar. 3, 1863, c. 101, §§ 2, 3, 12 Stat. 795, solicitor and secretary of Peruvian Commissioners; Joint Res. of Jan. 12, 1871, No. 7, § 1, 16 Stat. 591, secretary of San Domingo Commissioners; Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 539, § 2, 26 Stat. 854, 855, interpreter to the Court of Private Land Claims.

(c) Engineering: Act of Feb. 21, 1871, c. 62, 37, 16 Stat. 19, 426, District of Columbia Board of Public Works: Act of April 4, 1871, c. 9, § 1, 17 Stat. 3, commission to examine Sutro Tunnel; Act of June 22, 1874, c. 411, § 1, 18 Stat. 199, commission to examine alluvial basin of Mississippi River; Act of June 28, 1879, c. 43, § 2, 21 Stat. 3?, Mississippi River Commission; Act of June 4, 1897, c. 2, 30 Stat. 11, 59, Nicaragua Canal Commission; Act of June 13, 1902, c. 1079, § 4, 32 Stat. 331, 373, commission on Canadian boundary waters; Act of June 28, 1902, c. 1302, § 7, 32 Stat. 481, 483, Isthmian Canal Commission; Act of Aug. 24, 1912, c. 387, § 18, 37 Stat. 512, 517, Alaskan Railroad Commission; Act of Aug. 8, 1917, c. 49, § 18, 40 Stat. 250, 269, Inland Waterways Commission; Act of May 13, 1924, c. 153, 43 Stat. 118, Rio Grande Commission.

(d) Miscellaneous: Joint Res. of July 5, 1866, No. 66, § 1, 14 Stat. 362, commissioners to Paris Universal Exhibition to be professional and scientific men; Act of June 10, 1896, c. 398, 29 Stat. 321, 342, commissioners to locate Indian boundaries to be surveyors; Act of Aug. 24, 1912, c. 387, § 18, 37 Stat. 512, 517, Alaskan Railroad Commission to include one geologist in charge of Alaskan survey.

44. Act of Aug. 26, 1852, c. 91, § 2, lo Stat. 30, superintendent of public printing to be a practical printer; Act of Aug. 31, 1852, c. 112, § 8, 10 Stat. 112, 119, Light House Board to include civilian of high scientific attainments; Act of July 27, 1866, c. 284, § 1, 14 Stat. 302, appraiser for New York to have had experience as an appraiser or to be practically acquainted with the quality and value of some one or more of the chief articles of importation subject to appraisement; Joint Res. of Feb. 9, 1871, No. 22, § 1, 16 Stat. 593, 594, commissioner for fish and fisheries to be a person of proved scientific and practical acquaintance with the fishes of the coast; Act of Feb. 28, 1871, c. 100, § 23, 63, 16 Stat. 440, 448, 458, supervising inspectors of steam vessels to be selected for their knowledge, skill, and practical experience in the uses of steam for navigation and to be competent judges of the character and qualities of steam vessels and of all parts of the machinery employed in steaming, inspector general to be selected with reference to his fitness and ability to systematize and carry into effect all the provisions of law relating to the steamboat inspection service, Act of June 23, 1874, c. 480, § 2, 18 Stat. 277, 278, inspector of gas in the District of Columbia to be a chemist, assistant inspector to be a gasfitter by trade; Joint Res. of Dec. 15, 1877, No. 1, § 2, 20 Stat. 245, commissioners to the International Industrial Exposition in Paris to include three practical artisan experts, four practical agriculturists, and nine scientific experts; Act of June 18, 1878, c. 265, § 6, 20 Stat. 163, 164, superintendent of Life Saving Service to be familiar with the various means employed in the Life Saving Service for the saving of life and property from shipwrecked vessels; Act of June 29, 1888, c. 503, § 8, 25 Stat. 217, 238, superintendent of Indian schools to be a person of knowledge and experience in the management, training and practical education of children; Act of July 9, 1888, c. 593, § 1, 25 Stat. 243, delegates to the International Marine Conference to include two masters of merchant marine (one sailing and one steam), and two civilians familiar with shipping and admiralty practice; Act of Mar. 3, 1891, c. 564, § 2, 26 Stat. 1104, mine inspectors in the territories to be practical miners; Act of July 13, 1892, c. 164, 27 Stat. 120, 139, Indian commissioners to be familiar with Indian affairs; Act of Jan. 12, 1895, c. 23, § 17, 28 Stat. 601, 603, public printer to be a practical printer; Act of Mar. 3, 1899, c. 419, § 2, 30 Stat. 1014, assistant director of the Census to be an experienced practical statistician; Act of May 16, 1910, c. 240, § 1, 36 Stat. 369, Director of Bureau of Mines to be equipped by technical education and experience; Act of Dec. 23, 1913, c. 6, § 10, 38 Stat. 251, 260, Federal Reserve Board to include two members experienced in banking or finance; Act of Mar. 3, 1919, c. 97, § 3, 40 Stat. 1291, 1292, assistant director of the Census to be an experienced practical statistician; Act of June 2, 1924, c. 234, § 900b, 43 Stat. 253, 336, Board of Tax Appeals to be selected solely on grounds of fitness to perform duties of the office.

45. Act of Mar. 3, 1853, c. 97, § 3, 10 Stat. 189, 211, examination required of clerks in the Departments of Treasury, War, Navy, Interior, and Post Office; Act of June 20, 1864, c. 136, § 2, 13 Stat. 137, 139, examination required of consular clerks; Act of Jan. 16, 1883, c. 27, § 2, 22 Stat. 403, examinations for civil service employees; Act of Jan. 4, 1889, c.19, § 1, 25 Stat. 639, medical officers of Marine Hospital Service; Act of May 22, 1917, c. 20, § 16, 40 Stat. 84, 88, officers of the Coast and Geodetic Survey; Act of Oct. 27, 1918, c.196, § 16, 40 Stat. 1017, examinations for Public Health Service Reserve; Act of May 24, 1924, c. 182, § 5, 43 Stat. 140, 141, examination for appointments as Foreign Service officers in Diplomatic Corps.

46. Act of June 20, 1864, c. 136, § 2, 13 Stat. 137, 139, consular clerks; Act of April 30, 1900, c. 339, § 66, 31 Stat. 141, 153, governor of Hawaii; Act of July 9, 1921, c. 42, § 303, 42 Stat. 108, 116, governor of Hawaii.

47. Joint Res. of Feb. 23, 1900, No. 9, 31 Stat. 711, one commissioner to represent the United States at the unveiling of the statue of Lafayette to be a woman; Act of June 5, 1920, c. 248, § 2, 41 Stat. 987, Director of Women's Bureau to be a woman.

48. Act of July 1, 1902, c. 1362, § 59, 32 Stat. 641, 654, commission to sell coal and asphalt deposits in Indian lands to include two Indians.

49. Act of Mar. 26, 1804, c. 38, § 4, 2 Stat. 283, 284, legislative council of Louisiana to be selected from those holding real estate.

50. Act of Jan. 16, 1883, c. 27, § 8, 22 Stat. 403, 406, civil service appointees.

51. Act of Mar. 22, 1882, c. 47, § 9, 22 Stat. 30, 32, board of elections in Utah Territory; Act of Jan. 16, 1883, c. 27, § 1, 22 Stat. 403, Civil Service Commission; Act of Feb. 4, 1887, c. 104, § 11, 24 Stat. 379, 383, amended by Act of June 29, 1906, c. 3591, § 8, 34 Stat. 584, 595, Act of Aug. 9, 1917, c. 50, § 1, 40 Stat. 270, and Act of Feb. 28, 1920, c. 91, § 440, 41 Stat. 456, 497, Interstate Commerce Commission; Act of June 10, 1890, c. 407, § 12, 26 Stat. 131, 136, Board of General Appraisers; Act of Mar. 2, 1889, c. 412, § 14, 25 Stat. 980, 1005, Act of Aug.19, 1890, c. 807, 26 Stat. 336, 354, Act of July 13, 1892, c. 164, 27 Stat. 120, 138, 139, Act of June 10, 1896, c. 398, 29 Stat. 321, 342, various commissions to negotiate Indian treaties; Act of Sept. 26, 1914, c. 311, § 1, 38 Stat. 717, Federal Trade Commission; Act of July 17, 1916, c. 245, § 3, 39 Stat. 360, Federal Farm Loan Board; Act of Sept. 7, 1916, c. 451, § 3, 39 Stat. 728, 729, amended by Act of June 5, 1920, c. 250, § 3a, 41 Stat. 988, 989, United States Shipping Board; Act of Sept. 7, 1916, c. 458, § 28, 39 Stat. 742, 748, United States Employees' Compensation Commission; Act of Sept. 8, 1916, c. 463, § 700, 39 Stat. 756, 795, United States Tariff Commission; Act of Sept. 21, 1922, c. 356, § 518, 42 Stat. 858, 972, Board of General Appraisers; Act of Feb. 28, 1923, c. 146, § 2, 42 Stat. 1325, 1326, World War Foreign Debt Commission.

52. Act of Mar. 3, 1901, c 864, § 2, 31 Stat. 1440, Louisiana Purchase Exposition commission; Act of Mar. 22, 1902, c. 272, 32 Stat. 76, 78, Act of Feb. 9, 1903, c. 530, 32 Stat. 807, 809, Act of Mar. 12, 1904, c. 543, 33 Stat. 67, 69, Act of Mar. 3, 1905, c. 1407, 33 Stat. 915, 917, Act of June 16, 1906, c. 3337, 34 Stat. 286, 288, Act of Feb. 22, 1907, c. 1184, 34 Stat. 916, 918, Act of May 21, 1908, c. 183, 35 Stat. 171, 172, Act of Mar. 2, 1909, c. 235, 35 Stat. 672, 674, Act of May 6, 1910, c. 199, 36 Stat. 337, 339, Act of Mar. 3, 1911, c. 208, 36 Stat. 1027, 1029, Act of April 30, 1912, c. 97, 37 Stat. 94, 96, Act of Feb. 28, 1913, c. 86, 37 Stat. 688, 689, Act of June 30, 1914, c. 132, 38 Stat. 442, 444, Act of Mar. 4, 1915, c. 145, 38 Stat. 1116, 1117, Act of July 1, 1916, c. 208, 39 Stat. 252, 253, Act of Mar. 3, 1917, c. 161, 39 Stat. 1047, 1049, Act of April 15, 1918, c. 52, 40 Stat. 519, 520, Act of Mar. 4, 1919, c. 123, 40 Stat. 1325, 1327, Act of June 4, 1920, c 223, 41 Stat. 739, 741, Act of Mar. 2, 1921, c. 113, 41 Stat. 1205, 1207, Act of June 1, 1922, c. 204, 42 Stat. 599, 601, Act of Jan. 3, 1923, c. 21, 42 Stat. 1068, 1070, student interpreters for China, Japan, and Turkey.

53. Joint Res. of Dec. 15, 1877, No. 1, § 2, 20 Stat. 245, commissioners to the International Industrial Exposition in Paris; Act of June 18, 1898, c. 466, § 1, 30 Stat. 476, Industrial Commission; Act of Aug. 23, 1912, c. 351, § 1, 37 Stat. 415, Commission on Industrial Relations; Act of Dec. 23, 1913, c. 6, § 10, 38 Stat. 251, 260, amended by Act of June 3, 1922, c. 205, 42 Stat. 620, Federal Reserve Board; Act of Feb. 23, 1917, c. 114, § 6, 39 Stat. 929, 932, Federal Board for Vocational Education; Act of Feb. 28, 1920, c. 91, § 304, 41 Stat. 456, 470.

54. Act of Aug. 6, 1861, c. 62, § 3, 12 Stat. 320, Board of Police Commissioners for the District of Columbia; Act of Feb. 16, 1863, c. 37, § 3, 12 Stat. 652, 653, commissioners to settle Sioux Indians' claims; Act of Mar. 3, 1863, c. 106, § 1, 12 Stat. 799, levy court of the District of Columbia; Act of Mar. 3, 1871, c. 105, § 2, 16 Stat. 470, 471, commissioners to the Philadelphia Exposition; Joint Res. of Dec. 15, 1877, No. 1, § 2, 20 Stat. 245, commissioners to the International Industrial Exposition in Paris; Act of Mar. 3, 1879, c. 202, § 1, 20 Stat. 484, National Board of Health; Act of Aug. 5, 1882, c. 389, § 4, 22 Stat. 219, 255, civil employees of certain departments; Act of Jan. 16, 1883, c. 27, § 2, 22 Stat. 403, civil service appointees; Act of Feb. 10, 1883, § 3, 22 Stat. 413, commissioners of World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition; Act of April 25, 1890, c. 156, § 3, 26 Stat. 62, World's Columbian Exposition Commission; Act of Aug.19, 1890, c. 807, 26 Stat. 336, 354-355, commissions to negotiate Indian treaties and investigate reservations; Act of Mar. 3, 1893, c. 209, § 1, 27 Stat. 612, 633, commission to select allotted Indian lands; Act of June 10, 1896, c. 398, 29 Stat. 321, 342, commission to adjust Indian boundaries; Act of Sept. 7, 1916, c. 451, § 3, 39 Stat. 728, 729, amended by Act of June 5, 1920, c. 250, § 3a, 41 Stat. 988, 989, United States Shipping Board; Act of Mar. 4, 1921, c. 171,-§ 3, 41 Stat. 1441, 1442, commission to appraise buildings of Washington Market Company; Act of June 3, 1922, c. 205, 42 Stat. 620, Federal Reserve Board; Joint Res. of Mar. 3, 1925, c. 482, § 1, 43 Stat. 1253, National Advisory Commission to the Sesquicentennial Exhibition Association.

55. (a) Selection to be from civil employees: Joint Res. of Feb. 9, 1871, No. 22, § 1, 16 Stat. 593, 594, commissioner of fish and fisheries; Act of May 27, 1908, c. 200, § 11, 35 Stat. 317, 388, board of managers of Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition; Act of June 23, 1913, c. 3, 38 Stat. 4, 76, Panama-Pacific Exposition Government Exhibit Board.

(b) Selection to be from particular civil employees: Act of April 5, 1906, c, 1366, § 4, 34 Stat. 99, 100, consulate inspectors from consulate force.

(c) Selection to be from army officers: Act of July 20, 1867, c. 32, § 1, 15 Stat. 17, commission to treat with hostile Indians; Act of Mar. 3, 1873, c. 316, § 1, 17 Stat. 622, commission to report on irrigation in the San Joaquin valley; Act of Mar. 1, 1893, c. 183, § 1, 27 Stat. 507, California Debris Commission; Act of June 4, 1897, c. 2, 30 Stat. 11, 51, board to examine Arkansas Pass; Joint Res. of Aug. 9, 1912, No. 40, § 2, 37 Stat. 641, commission to investigate Mexican insurrection claims; Act of Mar. 4, 1923, c. 283, § 1, 42 Stat. 1509, secretary of American Battle Monuments Commission.

(d) Selection to be from army and navy: Act of April 14, 1818, c 58, § 1, 3 Stat. 425, coast surveyors.

(e) Boards to include civilian representative of the Government: Act of Mar. 1, 1907, c. 2285, 34 Stat. 1015, 1036, Act of May 30, 1910, c. 260, § 4, 36 Stat. 448, 450, Act of June 1, 1910, c. 264, § 7, 36 Stat. 455, 457, Act of Aug. 3, 1914, c. 224, § 3, 38 Stat. 681, 682, various commissions to appraise unallotted Indian lands to include one representative of the Indian Bureau; Joint Res. of Mar. 4, 1911, No. 16, 36 Stat. 1458, commission to investigate cost of handling mail to include one Supreme Court Justice.

(f) Commissions to include army officers: Act of April 4, 1871, c. 9, § 1, 17 Stat. 3, commission to examine Sutro Tunnel; Act of June 13, 1902, c. 1079, § 4, 32 Stat. 331, 373, commission on Canadian boundary waters; Act of Aug. 8, 1917, c. 49, § 18, 40 Stat. 250, 269, Inland Waterways Commission.

(g) Commissions to include army and navy officers: Act of Aug. 31 1852, c. 1 2 § 8, 10 Stat. 112, 119, Light House Board; Act of June 4, 1897, c. 2, 30 Stat. 11, 59, Nicaragua Canal Commission; Act of June 28, 1902, c. 1302, § 7, 32 Stat. 481, 483, Isthmian Canal Commission; Joint Res. of June 28, 1906, No. 37, 34 Stat. 835, commission to appraise Chesapeake and Delaware Canal; Act of Aug. 24, 1912, c. 387, § 18, 37 Stat. 512, 517, Alaskan Railroad Commission.

(h) Commissions to include army and coast survey officers; Act of June 23, 1874, c. 457, § 3, 18 Stat. 237, 244, board of harbor engineers; Act of June 28, 1879, c. 43, § 2, 21 Stat. 37, Mississippi River Commission.

(i) Board to include navy officers and official of Life Saving Service: Act of July 9, 1888, c. 593, § 1, 25 Stat. 243, delegates to International Marine Conference.

56. Act of Feb. 25, 1863, c. 58, § 1, 12 Stat. 665, Comptroller of the Currency, on nomination of the Secretary of the Treasury, amended by Act of June 3, 1864, c. 106, § 1, 13 Stat. 99; Act of April 23, 1880, c. 60, § 4, 21 Stat. 77, 78, United States International Commission, on nominations of state governors; Act of Feb. 10, 1883, c. 42, §§ 2, 3, 22 Stat. 413, managers of World's Industrial and Cotton Centennial Exposition, on recommendation of executive committee of National Cotton Planters' Association and majority of subscribers to enterprise in the city where it shall be located, commissioners to the Exposition to be appointed on nomination of state governors; Act of July 1, 1902, c. 1362, § 59, 32 Stat. 641, 654, commission to sell coal and asphalt deposits in Indian lands, one appointment to be made on recommendation of principal chief of Choctaw Nation, one on recommendation of Governor of Chickasaw Nation; Act of Feb. 23, 1920, c. 91, § 304, 41 Stat. 456, 470, Railroad Labor Board, three to be appointed from six nominees made by employees, three to be appointed from six nominees made by carriers.

57. On July 25, 1868, the Senate, having confirmed the nomination of J. Marr as collector of internal revenue in Montana Territory, voted to reconsider the nomination, and ordered the nomination to be returned to the President "with the notification that the nominee is ineligible on account of nonresidence in the district for which he is nominated." 16 Ex.Journ. 372. President Johnson thereafter did not press Marr's nomination, but appointed A. J. Simmons to the office. 16 ibid. 429.

58. The Tenure of Office Act as originally introduced excepted from its operation the Secretaries of State, Treasury, War, Navy, Interior and the Postmaster General. Howe's attempts to strike out this exception, opposed by Senators Edmunds and Sherman, who were the principal sponsors of the Act, failed twice in the Senate. A similar attempt in the House succeeded after first being rejected. The Senate again refused to concur in the House amendment. The amendment was, however, insisted upon by the House conferees. Finally, the Senate, by a margin of three, votes agreed to accept the conference report. Cong.Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., 1518.

59. The occasion of the passage of the Tenure of Office Act was the threatened attempt of President Johnson to interfere with the reconstruction policies of Congress through his control over patronage. An attempt by Schenck to secure its recommitment to the Joint Select Committee on Retrenchment was placed upon the ground that "this whole subject was expressly referred to that committee" which had before it "the bill introduced by the select committee on the civil service, at the head of which is the gentleman from Rhode Island [Mr. Jenckes]." Cong.Globe, 39th Cong., 2d sess., 23. Senator Edmunds, in resisting an attempt to expand the Tenure of Office Act to require the concurrence of the Senate in the appointment of all civil officers receiving more than $1,000 per annum, referred to the Jenckes bill as "another branch of the subject which is under consideration elsewhere." Ibid., 489. The committee, in introducing the Tenure of Office Act, speaking through Senator Edmunds,

recommended the adoption of this rule respecting the tenure of officers as a permanent and systematic, and as they believe an appropriate regulation of the Government for all Administrations and for all time.

Ibid., 382.

60. The attempt on the part of the House to repeal the Act in 1869 brought forth the opposition of those members of the Senate who were most active in the general movement for civil service reform. Jenckes had voted against the repeal in the House. Carl Schurz, who, on Dec. 20, 1869, introduced a bill for the competitive principle in the civil service, opposed the repeal, and urged that it be recast at the next session more effectually to effect the desired civil service reform. Cong.Globe, 41st Cong., 1st sess., 155-156. Trumbull, speaking for the Committee on Judiciary, said that

they were unwilling after Congress had with such unanimity adopted this law within the last two years, and adopted it upon the principle that some law of this kind was proper to regulate the civil service, to recommend its absolute repeal . . . they thought it better to recommend the suspension of the act until the next session of Congress, and then Congress can either repeal it or adopt some civil service bill which in its judgment shall be thought to be for the best and permanent interests of the country.

Ibid,. 88. The National Quarterly Review, recognizing the essential unanimity of purpose between the Tenure of Office Act and other measures for civil service reform, said in 1867:

The recent legislation on this subject by Congress was the first step in the right direction; Mr. Jencke's bill is the second; but the one without the other is incomplete and unsafe.

House Rep. No. 47, 40th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 1352, p 93

61. The attempt to repeal the Act was resisted in the House by Holman on the ground that, since

the general impression exists in the country that executive patronage should be in some form reduced, rather than increased . . . this fragment of the original law should remain in force.

Cong.Globe, 42nd Cong., 2d sess., 3411.

62. Edmunds, one of the few Senators still acquainted with the circumstances of its passage, thus protested against the passage of the repealing Act:

It is, as it looks to me, as if we were to turn our backs now and here upon the principle of civil service reform . . . the passage of this bill would be the greatest practical step backward on the theory of the reformation of the civil service of the United States.

18 Cong.Rec. 137.

63. The Jenckes bill was introduced in the House on Dec. 20, 1865. Sumner had already, on April 30, 1864, presented in the Senate a bill for a classified civil service. On June 1, 1866, the House Committee on Civil Service Reform reported out the Jenckes bill. It contained, among other provisions, a section requiring the proposed commission to prescribe, subject to the approval of the President, the misconduct or inefficiency which would be sufficient ground for removal, and also the manner by which such charges were to be proved. This provision was retained in the succeeding bills sponsored by Jenckes in the House. The provision was expressly omitted from the Pendleton bill, which later became the Civil Service Act of 1883, in order not to endanger the passage of a measure for a classified civil service by impinging upon the controversial ground of removal. Senators Sherman and Brown attempted to secure legislation restricting removal by amendments to the Pendleton bill. 14 Cong.Rec. 210, 277, 364. In the First Session of the Thirty-ninth Congress, no action was taken upon the Jenckes bill, but the bill was reintroduced in the following session on Jan. 29, 1867. An attempt on the part of Jenckes, after the initial passage of the Tenure of Office Act, to secure the passage of his bill resulted in the tabling of his scheme on Feb. 6, 1867, by a vote of 72 to 66.

64. This measure appears to have been first suggested on May 4, 1826, in a bill which accompanied the report presented by Benton from the Select Committee of the Senate appointed to investigate executive patronage, when abuse of the power by President John Quincy Adams was apprehended. Sen.Doc. No. 88, 19th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 128. On Mar. 23, 1830, Barton's resolution asserting the right to such information was reported. Sen.Doc. 103, 21st Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No.193. On April 28, 1830, the proposal was renewed in a resolution introduced by Holmes. 6 Cong.Deb. 385. In 1835, it was embodied in the Executive Patronage Bill, which passed the Senate on two successive occasions, but failed of action in the House.

65. This measure appears to have been first suggested by President Monroe in his message of Dec. 2, 1823. 41 Ann.Cong. 20. Its proposal for enactment into law was first suggested on May 4, 1826, by the report of the Select Committee appointed by the Senate on possible abuses of Executive Patronage. In 1832, the proposal was again brought forward by Vance of Ohio in the nature of an amendment to the postal legislation, 8 Cong.Deb.1913. On Mar. 7, 1834, Clay's resolutions, that advocated the concurrence of the Senate in removals, also included a proposal for the appointment of postmasters by the President with the concurrence of the Senate. On Jan. 28, 1835, a report by the Senate Committee on Post Offices called attention to the extended removals of postmasters. Sen.Doc. No. 86, 23rd Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 268, p. 88. This report led to the introduction in 1835, and passage by the Senate of a bill reorganizing the Post Office which contained the proposal under consideration. The House having failed to act upon the 1835 bill, it was reintroduced at the next session and passed by both Houses. Act of July 2, 1836, c. 270, 5 Stat. 80. See also Sen.Doc. No. 362, 24th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 283.

66. This measure appears to have been first proposed in Congress by Clay on Mar. 7, 1834. 10 Cong. Deb. 834. In 1835, it was, in substance, embodied in an amendment proposed by him to the Executive Patronage Bill, which read:

That in all instances of appointment to office by the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, the power of removal shall be exercised only in concurrence with the Senate; and, when the Senate is not in session, the President may suspend any such officer, communicating his reasons for the suspension during the first month of its succeeding session, and if the Senate concur with him, the officer shall be removed; but if it do not concur with him, the officer shall be restored to office.

11 Cong.Deb. 523. In 1836 when a Senate Committee of Commerce investigated the removal of a gauger for political reasons, Levi Woodbury, then Secretary of the Treasury, suggested the assumption of Congressional control over removals, saying:

The Department deems it proper to add that . . . a great relief would be experienced if . . . the power of original appointment and removal in all these cases should be vested in Congress, if the exercise of it there is deemed more convenient and safe, and, at the same time, constitutional.

Sen.Doc. No. 430, 24th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 284, p. 30.

67. On July 1, 1841, Benton again reintroduced a proposal of this nature. Cong.Globe, 27th Cong., 1st sess., 63. On May 23, 1842, a Select Committee on Retrenchment reported to the House on the necessity of diminishing and regulating executive patronage, saying

they entertain no doubt of the power of Congress to prescribe, and of the propriety of prescribing, that, in all cases of removal by the President, he shall assign his reasons to the Senate at its next session.

House Rep. No 741, 27th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 410, p. 5. See also Report of July 27, 1842, House Rep. No. 945, 27th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 410; 5 Ex.Journ. 401. On Jan. 3, 1844, after an attempt to impeach President Tyler for misusing the appointing power had failed, Thomasson in the House again sought to secure the adoption of such a measure. On December 24, 1849, after the Post Office Department under Taylor's administration had recorded 3,406 removals, Bradbury proposed a resolution requiring the President to give the number and reasons for removals made from the beginning of his term of office. Senator Mangum, in order to cut short debate on the resolution, contended that it was an unconstitutional invasion of executive powers, and called for a test vote upon the resolution. The Senate divided 29 to 23 in upholding its right to demand reasons for removals. Cong.Globe, 31st Cong., 1st sess., 160. On Jan. 4, 1850, the Senate adopted a resolution calling for a report upon the number and reasons for removals of deputy postmasters. Ibid. 100.

68. The character that this movement to restrict the power of removal had assumed in consequence of the continuance of the spoils system is illustrated by the remarks of Bell in the Senate in 1850:

To restrain this power by law, I would urge as one of the greatest reforms of the age, so far as this Government is concerned. . . . Sir, I repeat, that to restrain by law this unlimited, arbitrary, despotic power of the Executive over the twenty or thirty thousand valuable public officers of the country -- the tendency of which is to make them slave of his will -- is the greatest reform demanded by the true interest of the country, no matter who may at any time be the tenant of the White House.

Cong.Globe, 31st Cong., 1st sess., App. 1043. Restrictions were twice advocated in the official utterances of President Tyler. 4 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 50, 89. See also Report of June 15, 1844, by Sen. Com. on Retrenchment; Sen.Doc. 399, 28th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 437, p. 55; Resolution of Dec. 17, 1844, by Grider in the House, Cong.Globe, 28th Cong., 2d sess., 40.

69. Act of Feb. 25, 1863, c. 58, § 1, 12 Stat. 665.

70. By the Act of Mar. 3, 1853, c. 97, § 3, 10 Stat. 189, 211, clerks in the departments of the Treasury, War, Navy, Interior and Post Office were to be classified, and appointments to the various classes were to be made only after examination by a select board. This scheme was later abandoned after it became evident that the examinations prescribed were conducted arbitrarily, and with no attempt to determine the fitness of candidates for positions. Fish, Civil Service and Patronage, 183. By the Act of Aug. 18, 1856, c. 127, § 7, 11 Stat. 52, 55, the appointment of twenty-five consular pupils was authorized, and examinations were to be conducted to determine the fitness of applicants for appointment. This provision was, however, stricken from the diplomatic and consular appropriation bill in the next session of Congress. The principle was not returned to again until the Act of June 20, 1864, c. 136, § 2, 13 Stat. 137, 139.

71. Chief Justice Marshall said of the proceedings of 1789:

In organizing the departments of the executive, the question in what manner the high officers who filled them should be removable came on to be discussed.

5 Marshall, Life of Washington, 196.

72. Of the ten Senators who had been members of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, four voted against the bill. A fifth, Bassett, changed sides during the debate. Maclay, Sketches of Debate, 110.

73. The six who held that the Constitution vested a sole power of removal in the President were Baldwin, 1 Ann.Cong. 557-560; Benson, 1 ibid. 505-507; Boudinot, 1 ibid. 526-532; Clymer, 1 ibid. 489; Madison, 1 ibid. 546; Vining. 1 ibid. 585. Madison, at first, considered it subject to Congressional control. 1 Ann.Cong. 374-375. Seven held that the power of removal was a subject for Congressional determination, and that it was either expedient or inexpedient to grant it to the President alone. Hartley, 1 Ann.Cong. 585; Lawrence, 1 ibid. 583; Lee, 1 ibid. 523-526; Sedgwick, 1 ibid. 582-583; Sherman, 1 ibid. 491-492; Sylvester, 1 ibid. 560-563; Tucker, 1 ibid. 584-585. Five held that the power of removal was constitutionally vested in the President and Senate. Gerry, 1 Ann.Cong. 502; Livermore, 1 ibid. 477-479; Page, 1 ibid. 519-520; Stone, 1 ibid. 567; White, 1 ibid. 517. Two held that impeachment was the exclusive method of removal. Jackson, 1 Ann.Cong. 374, 529-532; Smith, of South Carolina, 1 Ann.Cong. 457, 507-510. Three made desultory remarks, Goodhue, 1 Ann.Cong. 378, 533-534; Huntington, 1 Ann.Cong. 459, and Scott, 1 Ann.Cong. 532-533, which do not admit of definitive classification. Ames was only certain that the Senate should not participate in removals, and did not differentiate between a power vested in the President by the Constitution and a power granted him by the legislature. 1 Ann.Cong. 473-477, 538-543. He inclined, however, towards Madison's construction. 1 Works of Fisher Ames, 56. During the earlier debate upon the resolutions for the creation of Executive Departments, Bland had contended that the Senate shared in the power of removal. 1 Ann.Cong. 373-374. The conclusion that a majority of the members of the House did not hold the view that the Constitution vested the sole power of removal in the President was expressed by Senator Edmunds. 3 Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, 84. It had been expressed twenty years earlier by Lockwood, J., of the Supreme Court of Illinois, in a case involving a similar question and decided adversely to Madison's contention. Field v. People, 2 Scamm. 79, 162-173.

74. Madison's plea for support was addressed not only to those who conceived the power of removal to be vested in the President, but also to those who believed that Congress had power to grant the authority to the President and that, under the circumstances it was expedient to confer such authority. After expressing his own views on the subject, he continued:

If this is the true construction of this instrument, the clause in the bill is nothing more than explanatory of the meaning of the Constitution, and therefore not liable to any particular objection on that account. If the Constitution is silent, and it is a power the Legislature have a right to confer, it will appear to the world, if we strike out the clause, as if we doubted the propriety of vesting it in the President of the United States. I therefore think it best to retain it in the bill.

1 Ann.Cong. 464.

75. The initial vote of 34 to 20, defeating a motion to strike out the words "to be removable by the President," was indecisive save as a determination that the Senate had no constitutional right to share in removals. Madison, June 22, 1789, 1 Ann.Cong. 5757. "Indeed, the express grant of the power to the president rather implied a right in the legislature to give or withhold it at their discretion." 5 Marshall, Life of Washington, 200. Benson, therefore, proposed to remove this ambiguity by striking out the words "to be removable by the President," and inserting "whenever the said principal officer shall be removed from office by the President of the United States," thus implying the existence of the power in the President irrespective of legislative grant. The motions were successful, and their adoption has been generally interpreted as a legislative declaration of Benson's purpose. Such interpretation, although oft repeated, is not warranted by the facts of record. The individual votes on these two motions are given. An examination of the votes of those whose opinions are also on record shows that Benson's first motion succeeded only as a result of coalition between those who accepted Madison's views and those who considered removal subject to Congressional control but deemed it advisable to vest the power in the President. The vote on Benson's second motion to strike out the words "to be removable by the President" brought forth a different alignment. The minority now comprised those who, though they believed the grant of power to be expedient, did not desire to imply the existence of a power in the President beyond legislative control. Whereas the majority exhibits a combination of diverse views -- those who held to Madison's construction, those who initially had sought to strike out the clause on the ground that the Senate should share in removals, and those who deemed it unwise to make any legislative declaration of the Constitution. Thus, none of the three votes in the House revealed its sense upon the question whether the Constitution vested an uncontrollable power of removal in the President. On the contrary, the votes on Benson's amendments reveal that the success of this endeavor was due to the strategy of dividing the opposition, and not to unanimity of constitutional conceptions.

76. Presidents Jackson, 3 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 133; Johnson, 6 ibid. 492; Cleveland, 8 ibid. 379; Wilson, 59 Cong.Rec. 8609.

77. On Feb. 2, 1835, the Senate adopted a resolution requesting the President to communicate to the Senate copies of the charges against Gideon Fitz, surveyor-general, in that such information was necessary for its constitutional action upon the nomination of his successor. 4 Ex.Journ. 465. On Feb. 10, 1835, President Jackson refused to comply with these alleged " unconstitutional demands." 4 Ex.Journ. 468. On Jan. 25, 1886, the Senate adopted a resolution directing the Attorney General to transmit copies of documents on file in the Department of Justice relating to the management of the office of district attorney for the southern district of Alabama. J. D. Burnett had been nominated to the office in place of G. M. Duskin suspended. 25 Ex.Journ. 294. On Feb. 1, 1886, a letter from the Attorney General was laid before the Senate refusing to accede with the request by direction of the President. On Mar. 1, 1886, President Cleveland, in a message to the Senate, denied the constitutional right of the Senate to demand such information. 8 Messages and Papers of the Presidents, 375.

78. During March, 1830, prior to the Fitz episode, three resolutions to request the President to communicate grounds for the removal of inferior officials failed of adoption in the Senate. 4 Ex.Journ. 75, 76, 79. However, during April, 1830, in the case of nominations sent to the Senate for confirmation, resolutions requesting the President to communicate information relative to the character and qualifications of the appointees were adopted and complied with by President Jackson. 4 ibid. 86, 88, 92.

The instances of President Johnson's compliance with the second section of the Tenure of Office Act, requiring the communication of reasons for the suspension of inferior officials during the recess of the Senate, have been enumerated. See Notes 23 and 24, supra. President Johnson also complied with a resolution adopted by the Senate on Dec. 16, 1867, requesting him to furnish the petitions of Idaho citizens, filed with him, remonstrating against the removal of Governor Ballard. 16 Ex.Journ. 109, 121. Also, on April 5, 1867, his Attorney General complied with a Senate resolution calling for papers and other information relating to the charges against a judge of Idaho Territory whose removal the President was seeking through the appointment of a successor. 15 ibid. 630, 644. On Feb. 18, 1867, his Postmaster General, in compliance with a House resolution of Dec. 6, 1866, transmitted the number and reasons for the removals of postmasters, appointed by the President, between July 28, 1866, an Dec. 6, 1866. House Ex.Doc. No. 96, 39th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 1293. His Secretary of the Interior also complied with a House resolution requesting information as to removals and reasons therefor in the department. House Ex.Doc. No. 113 39th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 1293.

Prior to the date on which President Cleveland upheld his right to refuse the Senate information as to the conduct of a suspended official, his Secretary of the Treasury twice complied with requests of the Senate for such information. 25 Ex.Journ. 312, 317. These requests were couched in substantially the same form as that which was refused in the Duskin case. Subsequent to that date, compliances with similar resolutions are recorded in four further cases, two by the Secretary of the Treasury, one by the Postmaster General and one by the Attorney General. 25 Ex. Journ 362, 368, 480, 559.

79. On Mar. 2, 1847, President Polk complied with a Senate resolution requesting reasons and papers relating to the failure to send in Captain H. Holmes' name for promotion. 7 Ex.Journ. 227. On Sept. 2, 1850, President Fillmore complied with a Senate resolution requesting the President to communicate correspondence relating to "the alleged resignation" of Lieut. E. C. Anderson. 8 ibid. 226. Fillmore, in compliance with a Senate resolution of Aug. 14, 1850, laid before the Senate a report of the Postmaster General communicating the charges on file against the deputy postmaster at Milwaukee. 8 ibid. 220. Nominations having been made for the collectorships of New York and Chicago and the former incumbents suspended, Edmunds on Nov. 26, 1877, proposed a resolution directing the Secretary of the Treasury to transmit all papers bearing upon the expediency of removing the collectors. On Jan. 15, 1879, the Secretary of the Treasury communicated to the Senate an official report, and on Jan. 31, 1879, President Hayes forwarded his reasons for the suspensions. 21 ibid. 140, 455, 497.

Compliances with Senate resolutions directed to the Heads of Departments relative to the removal of Presidential appointees are also on record. In response to a House resolution of Feb. 13, 1843, requesting the charges against Roberts and Blythe, collectors, and the names of the persons who petitioned for their removal, the Secretary of the Treasury transmitted the material that he had in his control. House Doc. No. 158, 27th Cong., 3rd sess., Ser. No. 422. On Jan. 14, 1879, the Secretary of the Treasury complied with a Senate resolution requesting the charges on file against the Supervising Inspector-General of Steamboats. 21 Ex.Journ. 454. On Jan. 20, 1879, the Secretary of the Treasury complied with a Senate resolution calling for the papers showing why Lieutenant Devereux was discharged from the Revenue Marine Service. 21 ibid. 470. The Secretary of the Navy complied with a Senate resolution of Feb 25, 1880, asking why Edward Bellows was dropped from the roll of paymasters. Sen.Doc. No. 113, 46th Cong., 2d sess., Ser. No. 1885.

Presidents Van Buren and Tyler also complied with resolutions requesting the number of removals. Sen.Doc. No. 399, 28th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 437, p. 351; House Doc. No. 48, 27th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 392.

Senate resolutions, occasioned by the nomination of the successor in place of a former incumbent, requesting information as to the conduct or ability of the successor, have been complied with by Presidents Monroe on Feb. 1, 1822 (3 Ex.Journ. 273); Jackson on April 12, and 15, 1830 (4 ibid. 88, 92), and on April 24, 1834 (4 ibid. 390); by Tyler on June 29, 1842 (6 ibid. 97); by Polk on June 23, 1848 (7 ibid. 435); by Fillmore on Sept. 16, 1850 (8 ibid. 232); by Buchanan on Mar. 2, 1858 (10 ibid. 237); by Grant on Dec. 21, 1869 (17 ibid. 326), and by Heads of departments under Polk on June 23, 184 (7 ibid. 435); under Fillmore on Sept. 25, 1850, and Feb. 17, 1853 (8 ibid. 250, 9 ibid. 33); under Lincoln on Jan. 22, 1862, and on Feb. 23, 1865 (12 ibid. 95, 14 ibid. 135). The practice appears to have been suggested by President Washington. The Senate having rejected a nomination, President Washington, on Aug. 7, 1789, in nominating a successor, said:

Permit me to submit to your consideration whether, on occasions when the propriety of nominations appears questionable to you, it would not be expedient to communicate that circumstance to me, and thereby avail yourselves of the information which led me to make them, and which I would with pleasure lay before you.

1 Ex.Journ. 16.

80. The Executive Patronage Bill, containing such a requirement, passed the Senate on Feb. 21, 1835, and on Feb. 3, 1836. A test vote on the Senate's right in 1850 is also on record. See Note 67, supra. Following the protest of President Cleveland, resolutions condemnatory of the Attorney General's refusal "under whatever influence" to communicate the information requested were favorably reported to the Senate, debated at length, and passed. Among the members of the committee advocating the adoption of the resolutions were Hoar and Evarts, the two most energetic opponents of the Tenure of Office Act. Sen.Rep. No. 135, 49th Cong., 1st sess., Ser. No. 2358. The Acts of 1864 and 1873, approved by Presidents Lincoln and Grant, embody such a requirement. See Note 33, supra.

81. Attorneys General Legare, Clifford, and Crittenden seem to have been of the opinion that the President possessed an absolute power of removal. 4 Op.A.G. 1, 603; 5 ibid. 288. Legare, however, having occasion to consider Story's contention that the power of removal might be restricted by legislation with respect to inferior officers, said that he was "not prepared to dissent from any part of this sweeping proposition." 4 ibid. 165, 166. In 1818, Attorney General Wirt, in holding that, where an Act of Congress gave the President power to appoint an officer, whose tenure of office was not defined, that officer was subject to removal by the President, said:

Whenever Congress intend a more permanent tenure, (during good behaviour, for example), they take care to express that intention clearly and explicitly. . . .

1 ibid. 212, 213. Following the passage of the Tenure of Office Act, the subject was considered by Attorney General Evarts, who disposed of the problem "within the premises of the existing legislation." 12 ibid. 443, 449. In 1873, Attorney General Akerman refused to concede the President a power of removal in that, under that Act, he was limited to a power of suspension. 13 ibid. 300. In 1877, Attorney General Devens concurred in the provisions of the Tenure of Office Act restoring a suspended officer to his office upon the failure of the Senate to act upon the confirmation of his successor. 15 ibid. 375.

82. The Connecticut Charter of 1662, vested the appointment of practically all officers in the assembly, and provided that such officers were to be removable by the Governor, Assistants, and Company for any misdemeanor or default. The Rhode Island Charter of 1663 contained the same provisions. The Massachusetts Charter of 1691 provided for the appointment of officers by and with the advice and consent of the Council. Under Governors Phipps and Stroughton, the council asserted its rights over appointments and dismissals, and in 1741, Shirley was prevented from going back to the earlier arbitrary practice of Governor Belcher. Spencer, Constitutional Conflict in Massachusetts, 28. The Georgia Charter of 1732 provided that the common council should have power to nominate and appoint and

at their will and pleasure to displace, remove and put out such treasurer or treasurers, secretary or secretaries, and all such other officers, ministers and servants.

83. As early as 1724, Mrs. Hannah Penn, in her instructions to Sir William Keith, governor of Pennsylvania, protested against his dismissal of the Secretary without seeking the advice of his council. The practice of seeking such advice continued in later years. Shepherd, Proprietary Government in Pennsylvania, 321, 370.

84. In the Royal Colonies, there was a recognized tendency to guard against arbitrariness in removals by making the governor responsible to the home government, instead of the local representative assembly. In New Hampshire, the first and second Andros Commissions entrusted the power to the governor alone, but the Bellomont Commission of 1697, the Dudley Commission of 1702, the Shute Commission of 1716, the Burnet Commission of 1728, the Belcher Commission of 1729, the Wentworth Commission of 1741, and the John Wentworth Commission of 1766 were accompanied with instructions requiring either that removals be made only upon good and sufficient cause or upon cause signified to the home government in the "fullest & most distinct manner." In Virginia, similar instructions accompanied the issuance of commissions to Governor Howard in 1683 and to Governor Dunmore in 1771.

85. Smith of South Carolina, June 17, 1789, 1 Ann.Cong. 471; Gerry, June 17, 1789, 1 Ann.Cong. 504. See Note 9, supra.

86. Hamilton's opinion is significant in view of the fact that it was he who, on June 5, 1787, suggested the association of the Senate with the President in appointments as a compromise measure for dealing with the appointment of judges. 1 Farrand, Records of the Federal Convention, 128. The proposition that such appointments should be made by and with the advice and consent of the Senate was first brought forward by Nathaniel Corham of Massachusetts, "in the mode prescribed by the constitution of Masts." 2 ibid. 41. Later, this association of the President and the Senate was carried over generally to other appointments. The suggestion for the concurrence of the Senate in appointments of executive officials was advanced on May 29 by Pinckney in his "draught of a foederal government" and by Hamilton in resolutions submitted by him on June 18, 1787, 1 ibid. 292; 3 ibid. 599.

87. Rogers, Executive Power of Removal, 11, 39. On August 6, 1787, the Committee of Five reported the draft of the Constitution that, in Art. X, Sect. 2, provided for a single executive who "shall appoint officers in all cases not otherwise provided for by this Constitution." 2 Farrand, Records of the Federal Convention, 185. On August 20 propositions were submitted to the Committee of Five for the creation of a Council of State consisting of the Chief Justice, the Secretaries of domestic affairs, commerce and finance, foreign affairs, war, marine and state. All the Secretaries were to be appointed by the President and hold office during his pleasure. 2 ibid. 335-337. That proposition was rejected because "it was judged that the Presidt. by persuading his council to concur in his wrong measures, would acquire their protection. . . ." 2 ibid. 542. The criticism of Wilson, who had proposed the Council of State, and Mason of the Senate's participation in appointments was based upon this rejection. The lack of such a Council was the "fatal defect" from which "has arisen the improper power of the Senate in the appointment of public officers." 2 ibid. 537, 639.