Except some cavils about the power of convening either house of the
legislature, and that of receiving ambassadors, no objection has been
made to this class of authorities; nor could they possibly admit of any.
It required, indeed, an insatiable avidity for censure to invent
exceptions to the parts which have been excepted to. In regard to the
power of convening either house of the legislature, I shall barely
remark, that in respect to the Senate at least, we can readily discover
a good reason for it. AS this body has a concurrent power with the
Executive in the article of treaties, it might often be necessary to
call it together with a view to this object, when it would be
unnecessary and improper to convene the House of Representatives. As to
the reception of ambassadors, what I have said in a former paper will
furnish a sufficient answer.
We have now completed a survey of the structure and powers of the
executive department, which, I have endeavored to show, combines, as far
as republican principles will admit, all the requisites to energy. The
remaining inquiry is: Does it also combine the requisites to safety, in
a republican sense -- a due dependence on the people, a due
responsibility? The answer to this question has been anticipated in the
investigation of its other characteristics, and is satisfactorily
deducible from these circumstances; from the election of the President
once in four years by persons immediately chosen by the people for that
purpose; and from his being at all times liable to impeachment, trial,
dismission from office, incapacity to serve in any other, and to
forfeiture of life and estate by subsequent prosecution in the common
course of law.
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