Democratic Sentinel, Volume 10, Number 5, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 5 March 1886 — PRESIDENT CLEVELAND [ARTICLE]

PRESIDENT CLEVELAND

He Wiil Not Famish Certain Papers Regarding Suspensions from Office. In a Message to the Senate He Maintains His Eight to Withhold Them. The President sent to the Senate, on the Ist of 'March, a message stating his position in relation to the suspensions of officials, and defending his action in refusing to send to the Senate papers on file in departments upon -which it is assumed by the Senate that the suspensions of certain officials are based. The message was read in the open session of the Senate. It is as follows : To the Senate of the United States : Ever since the beginning of the present session of the Senate the different heads of the departments attached to the Executive branch of the Government have been plied with various requests and demands from committees of the Senate, from members of such committees, and at last from the Senate itself, requiring the transmission of reasons for the suspension of certain officials during the recess of that body, or for the papers touching the conduct of such officials, or for all papers and documents relating to such suspensions, or for all documents and papers filed in such departments in relation to the management and conduct of the offices held by such suspended officials. The different terms from time to time adopted in making these requests and demands, the order in which they succeeded each other, and the fact that when made by the Senate the resolution for that purpose was passed in executive session, have led to a piesumption, the correctness of which will, I suppose, be candidly admitted, that from first to last the information thus sought and the papers thus demanded were for use by the Senate and its ccmmitiees, in considering the propriety of the suspensions referred to. Though those suspensions are mv executive acts, bused upon considerations addressed to me alone, and for w hich I aui wholly responsible, I have 1 al no invitation frem the'Senate to state the position which I have felt constrained to assume iu relation to the same, or to interpret for myself my acts and motives in the premises. In this c jndition of affairs I have forborne addressing the Senate upon the subject lest I might be accused of thrusting myself unbidden upon the attention of that body. But the report of the Committee on the Judiciary of the Senate, lately presented und published, which censures the Attorney General of the United States for his refusal to transmit certain papers relating to a suspension from office, and which also, if I correctly interpret it, evinces a misapprehension of the position of the Executive upon such suspensions, will, I hope, justify this communication. The President refers to the resolution of the Senate culling for the Dustin papers and the reply of the Attorney General thereto, and says: * Upon this resolution and the answer thereto the issue is thus stated by the Committee ou the Judiciary at the outset of the report: “The important question, then, is whether it is within the constitutional competence of either house of Congress to have access to the official papers and documents in the various public offices of the United States created by laws enacted by themselves.” I do not suppose that “the public offices of the United States” are regulated or controlled in their relations to either house of Congress by the fact that they were “created by laws enacted by themselves.” It must be that these instrumentations were created for the benefit of the people and to answer the general purposes of ' governmentlunder the Constitution and the laws, and that they are unincumbered by any ) I Satin favor of either branch of Congress growing out of their Constitution, and unembarrassed by any obligation to the Senate as the price of their creation. The complaint of the committee that access to official papers in the public offices is denied the Senate is met by the statement that at to t me has it been the disposition or the intention of the President or any department of the executive branch of the Government to withhold from the Senate official documents or papers filed in any of the public offices. While it is by no means conceded that the Senate has the' right in any case to review the act of the Executive in removing or suspending a public officer upon official documents or otherwise, it is considered that documents and papers of that nature should# • because thoy are official, be freely transmitted to the Senate upon its demand, trusting the use of the same for proper and legitimate purposes to the goou faith of that body. And though no such paper or document has been specifically demanded in any of the numerous requests and demands made upon the departments, yet, as often as they were found in the phblie offices, they have been furnished in answer to such applications. The letter of the Attorney General in response to the resolutions of the Senate in the particular case mentioned in the committee’s report was written at my suggestion and by my direction. There had been no official papers or documents filed in his department relating to the case within the period specified in the resolution. The letter was intended, by its description of the papers and documents remaining in the custody of the department, to convey the idea that they were r.ot official; and it was assumed that the resolution called for information, pap.'rs, and documents of the same character as were required by the requests and demands which preceded it. Everything that had been written or done on behalf of the Senate from the beginning pointed to all letters and papers-of a private and unofficial natur 3 as the objects of search, if they were to be found in the departments, and provided they had been presented to the Executive with a view to their consideration upon the question of suspension from office. Against the transmission of such papers and documents I have interposed my advice and direction. This has not been done, as is suggested in the committee’s report, upon the assumption on my part that the Attorney General cr any other head ©f a department “is the servant of the President, and is to give or withhold copies of documents in his office according to the will of the Ex< cutive and not otherwise,” but because I regarded the papers and documents withheld and addressed to me or intended for my use and action purely unofficial and private, not infrequently confidential, and having reference to the performance of a duty exclusively mine. I consider them in no proper sense as" upon the files -of the department, but as deposited there for my convenience, remaining still completely under my control. I suppose, if I desired to take them into my custody, I might do so with entire propriety, and if I saw fit to destroy them no ■one c ould complain. The paiiers and documents that are now the ■objects of the Senate’s quest eonsist of letters and representations addressed to the Executive or intended for his inspection; they are voluntarily wrltt m and presented by private citizens who are not in the L ast insticated thereto by any official invitation or at all subject to official control. While sc me of them are entitled to ex--ecutive consideration, many of them are so irrelevant, or, in the light of other facts, so worthless, that they have not been given the least weight in determining the question to which they are supposed to relate. Are all these, simply because they arc preserved, to be considered official documents, and subject to the inspection of the Senate ? If not, who is to detc rmino which belong to this class? Are the motives and purposes of tho Senate, as they are day by day developed, such as would be satisfied with my selecuon? Am I to submit to theirs at the risk f being charged with making a suspension fr«m office i pen evidence which was not even considered? Are these papers to be regarded official because they have not only b; en presented but preserved la the public offices? Their nature onl character remain the same whether thoy are kept in tho Executive M’ noon or deposited in the departments. There is no mysterious power of transmutation in departmental custody, r:or is there mat i; in the undehned and sacred solemnity of department files. If the presenocf these papers in the public offices is a stumbling block in tho way of the performance of senatorial duty, It can be easily ri movt d. The papers and documents which have been described derive no official character from any constitutional, statutory, or othor requirement making them necessary" to the performance of the official duty of tho Executive. It will not be' suppose, that the President may suspend amiublic officer in the entire absence ■of any papers or documents lo aid bis official judgment and discretion. And lam quite pre-

pared to avow that the eases are not few in which suspensions from office have depended more upon oral representations made to me by citizens of known good repute, and by members of the House of Representatives and Sena.ors of the United States, than upon any letters and documents presented for my examination. I have not felt justified in suspecting the veracity, integrity, and patriotism of Senators, or ignoring their representations, because they were not in party affiliation with the majority of their associates; and I recall a few suspensions which bear the approval of individual members identified politically with the majority in the Senate. While, therefore, I am constrained to deny the right of the Senate to the papers and documents described, so far as the right to the same is based upon the claim that they are in any view of the subject official. I am aiso led unequivocally to dispute the right of the Senate, by the aid of any documents whatever, or in any way save through the judicial process of trial on Impeachment, to review or reverse the act of the Executive in the suspension during the recess of the Senate of Federal officials. I believe the power to remove or suspend such officials is vesttd in the President alone by the Constitution, which in express terms provides that “the executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America,” and that “he shall take care that the laws 1m faithfully executed. ” The Senate belongs to the legislative branch of the Government. When the Constitution by express provision supsradded to its legislative duties the right to advise and consent to appointments to office, and to sit as a court of impeachment it conferred upon that body all the control and regulation of executive action supposed to be necessary for the safety of the people; and this express and special grant of such extraordinary powers, not in any way related to or growing out of general Senatorial duty, and in itself a departure from the general plan of our Government, should be held, under a familiar maxim of construction, to exclude every other right of interference with executive functions. In the first Congress which assembled after the adoption of the Constitution, comprising many who aided in its preparation, a legislative construction was given to that instrument in which the independence of the Exeoutive in the matter of removals from office was fully Busstained. I tnink it will be found that, in the subsequent discussions of this question, there was generally, if not at all times, a proposition pending to in some way curtail this power of the President by legislation, which furnishes evidence that to limit such power it was supposed to be necessary to supplement the Constitution by such legislation. The first enactment of this description was passed under a stress of partisanship and political bitterness, which culminated in the President’s impeachment. Tho law provided that the Federal officers to whom it applied could only be suspended during the recess of the Senate wht n shown by evidence satisfactory to the President to be guilty of misconduct in office, or crime, or when incapable or disqualified to perform their duties, and that, within twenty days after the next meeting of the Senate, it should be the duty of the President “to report to the Senate such suspension, with the evidence and reasons for his action in the case.” This statute passed in 1867, when Congress was overwhelmingly and bitterlyopposcd, politically, to the President, may be regarded as an indication that even then it was thought necessary by a Congress determined upon the subjugation of the executive to the legislative will to furnish a law for that purpose, instead of attempting to reach the object intended by an invocation of any pretended constitutional right. Tfie law which thus found its way to our sta-tute-book was plain in its terms, and its intent needed no avowal. If valid and now in operation it would justify the present course of the Senate and command the obedience of the Executive to its demands. It may, however, be remarked in passing that under this law the President had the privilege of presenting to the body which assumed to review his executive acts his reasons therefor, instead of being excluded from explanation or judged by papers found in the department. Two years after the law of 1867 was passed, and within less than five weeks after the inauguration of the President in political accord with both branches of Congress, the sections of the act regulating suspensions from office during the recess of the Senate were entirely repealed, and in their place were substituted provisions which, instead of limiting the causes of suspension to misconduct, crime, disability, or disqualification, expressly permitted such suspension by the President “in his discretion,” and completely abandoned the requirement obliging him to report to the Senate “the evidence and reasons” for his action. With these modifications, and ■with all branches of the Government in political harmony, und in the absence of partisan incentive to captious discussion, the law, us it was left by the amendment of 186!), was much less destructive of exeoutive discretion; and yet the great General and patriotic citizen who, on the 4th day of March, 1869, assumed the duties of chief executive, and for whose freer administration of his high office the most hateful restraints of the law of 1867 were, on the sth day of April, 1869, removed, mindful of his obligation to defend and protect every prerogative of his great trust, and apprehensivo of the injury threatened the public service in the continued operation of these statutes, even in their modification, in his first message to Congress advised their repeal and set forth their unconstitutional character and hurtful tendency. lam unable to state whether or not this recommendation for a repeal of these laws has been since repeated. If it has not, the reason can probably be found in the experience which demonstrated the fact that the necessities of th.e i olitical situation but rarely developed their vicious character. And so it happens that after an extension of nearly twenty years of almost innocueus desuetude, theso laws are brought forth, apparently the repealed as well as the unrepealed, and put In the way of au executive who is willing, if permitted, to attempt an improvement in the methods of administration. The constitutionality of these laws is by no means admitted. But why should the provisions of the repealed law, which required specific cause for suspension and a report to the Senate of “evidence and reasons,” ne now, in effect, applied to the present executive instead of the law, afterward passed and unrepealed, which distinctly permits “susjiensions by the President” in his discretion, and carefully omits the requirement that “evidence and reasons for his action in the case” shall bo reported to the Senate? The requests and demands which by the score have for nearly three months been presented to tho different departments of the Government, whatever may he their form, have but one complexion. They assume the right of the Senate to sit in judgment upon the exercise of my executive function, for which I am solely responsible to the people from whom I have so lately received the sacred trust of office. My oath to support and defend the Constitution; my duty to the people who have chosen me to execute the powers of their great office, and not to relinquish them, and my duty to the Chief Magistracy, which I must preserve unimpaired in all its dignity and vigor, compel me to refuse to comply with these demands. To the end that the service may be improved, the Senate is invited to the fullest scrutinv of the persons submitted to them for public office, in recognition of the constitutional power of that body to advise and consent to their appointment. I shall continue, as I have thus far done, to furnish, at the request of the confirming body, all the information I possess touching the fitness of the nominees placed before them for their action, both whon they are proposed to fill vacancies and to take the places of suspended officials. Upon a refusal to confirm I shall not assume the right to ask the reasons for the action of the Senate, nor question its determination. I cannot think that anything more is required to secure worthy incumbents in public office than a careful and independent discharge of our rospectivo duties within their well-defined limits. Though the propriety of suspensions might he better assured if tho action of the President was subject to review by the Senate, •yet if the Constitution and tho laws have placed this responsibility upon tho executive branch of the Government it should not be divided nor the discretion which it involved relinquished. It has been claimed that, tlie present Executive having pledged himself not to remove officials except for cause, t.ie fact of their suspension implies such misconduct on the j art of a suspended official as injures his character and reputation, and therefore tee Senate should review the case for his vindication. I have said that certain officials should not, in iny cpinion, be removed during the continuance of the term for which they were appointed solely for the per] o e of putting in their place thosoi in p litical affiliation with tho aDpolnting power; ana this declara’i >n was immediately followed by a description of official partisanship which ov ght nut to entitle those in whom it was exhibited to consideration. It is not apparent how an adherenos to the course thuß announced carries with it the eonssquenoes de-

scribed. If in any degree the suggestion is worthy of consideration it is to be hoped that there may be a defen sa against unjust suspension in the justice of the Executive. Every pledge which I have made by which I have placed a limitation upon luy exercise of Executive power has been faithfully redeemed. Of course the pretense is not put forth that no mistakes have been committed; but not a suspension has been made except it appeared to my satisfaction that the public welfare would be improved thereby. Manv applications for suspension have been denied, and the adherence to the rule laid down to govern my action as to such suspensions has caused much irritation and impatience on the part of those who have insisted upon more c hanges in the offices. The pledges I have made were made to the people, and to them I am responsible for the manner in which they have been redeemed. I am not responsible to the Senate, and 1 am unwilling to submit mv actions and official conduct to them for judgment. There are no grounds for an ailogation that the fear of being found false to my prole-sions influences mo in declining to submit to the demands of the Senata. I have not constantly refused to suspend officials, and thus incurred the displeasure of political friends, and yet willfully broken faith with the people for the sake of being false to them. ' Neither the discontent of party friends nor the allurement constantly offered of confirmations of appointees 'conditioned upon tho avowal that suspensions have been mode on jiarty grounds alone, nor the threat Droposed in the resolutions now before the Senato that no confirmations will be made unless the demands of that body be complied with, is sufficient to discourage or deter me from following in the way which I mu convinced leads to better government for the people. Grover Cleveland. Executive Mansion, Washington, D. C., March 1, 1886.