Weekly national intelligencer. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1841-1869, 1847-08-28
THE GOVERNMENT WRITER'S.

late defeat before the People ny every sort OF vtu
perstion of the Wings, who can well afford to re
frain from retorting their abuse replying to the
exnayagancies, the writers for the government'pa
per have betaken themselves to an elaborate de
fence of the doctrine of Prerogatve powers, un
known to the Constitution, under color of which
the President has assumed to exercise Legislative
powers such as even the Congress of the United
States does not possess.
| The special pleading of the article on this sub,
jec IN the /" Union" of last Saturday nigh, betrays
the professional advocate. 1t is technical labori-
Gus, and strained.
Our present engagements do not allow US time
to sif his argument as thoroughly as possibly we
may hereafter take occasion to do. All we shall
say, at present, is that what is law in Monarchcal
Governments is not law in a Republic, except SO
far as il is embodied in the Constitution of that
Republic and that all attributions of substantive
power to the President by analogy from other Go
vernments has been denounced by the highest judi
cial tribunals of this country as false and heretca
doctrine.
The quotations by which the government writer
undertakes to maintain contrary doctrine are alb
solutely contradicted by parallel passages in the
very authorities from which he quotes, and special
ly in +" The Federalist" and the Letters o. I" Hell
vidius," (by Mr.. MADIsoN.) TO his argument of
many columns it is sufficient for us 10 reproduce,
by way of reply, what we had occasion to advance,
some months ago in a condensed form, against the
pretensions set up for the Presidentin his charac-
ter of Commander-in-C Chief of the Army and the
Navy which we defy the united ingenuity of all
the lawyers composing the Administration to
confue.
We take it from the National Intlligencer of the
22d of April last as follows:
The President is, it is true, BIZ virtue of his of
flee, COMMANDMENTS Chief of thu Army and Navy
of the United States But he S to command the
Army, &c. constitutionatly and not prerogatively;
and in that distinction lies the difference between
ourselves and our Baltimore Ieighbor. With
reasonable confidence in our own knowledge of the
Constitution under which we live, we are4yet CON-
forted wonderfully when we fId, in differing from
our friends, that we are sustained by the trainers
OF the Constitution themselves
The feature of the Constitution which encoun-
tered the strongest objection on the part of the Anti
-
power proposed TO be conferred on the President as
Commander Chief, &c. las it now stands in the
Constltution.) On this head, PATRICK HENRY said,
IN the Convention of Virginia, among other things
This Constitution has an awful squirting it scuints
towards monarchy and does not this raise Indignation in
the breast of every American " If we make King
may prescribe the rules by which he shall rule bis peo
pie, and nerpose such checks shall prevent him rom
INIT GaI1 II 90
his army prescribe the on which he shall reign
MASTER " &c.
1t was in answer to objections of this character,
industriousy disseminated among the People, to
that part OF the Constitution which proposed to
make the President Commander-in-C Chief, &c. that
the patriotic founders of the Constitution the au-
thors of the " Federaist," gave in No. 50 the fol-
lowing authentic and true Interpretation OF that pro-
vision:
The President is to be Commander-inCh Chief the Ar
my and Navy Of the United States In this respect his au
thony would be nominaIy the with that of the King
OF Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to II
would amount to nothing than the supreme command
and direction of the military and naval forces first Gene
raj and Admiral of the Confederacy whilst that of the Br
tsh King extends to the declaring of war; and to the raising
and regulating of fleets and armies all which, by the Con-
'uoh uiues Solsuerauon, would appertan 10 the Legs
lature.'"
"The power of regulation here referred to-the
power, In the terms of the Constitution, "To MAKE
RULES CONCERNING CAPTURES on land and water,"
thus conferred upon Congress, and refused to the
President, as the identical po,Der Which the Presi-
dent has undertaken TO exercise, and which TO
bring In questions, according to the Executive and
Its organ, nothing less than treason
:" 1T II be necessary further to fortify our con-
sructon by authority contemporary with the Con-
sutuon, Tor nearly so,) we are proud to be able 10
cite that of the ilustrous MADISON, from the Let
tiers of Helvidius, "a. d. 1881 in the following
conclusive passage:
"Wee il established that the powers of war and
not by strict construction transferred the Legislature they
actually belong to the Executive that of course all powers
not less executive in their than those powers if not
granted to the Legislature, may be claimed by the Execu
tive granted be taken strictly, with resduary
right in the Execuve-or will appear hereafter perhaps
claimed as concurrent right by the Execuive-no citizen
could any longer guess at the character Of the Government
under Which he HUeS MOST PENETRATING JrRIsr
would ne UNABLE TO SCAN THE EXTENT OF coysrRUc-
TIVE FRERoeATlvE."
"And again, in the next page, in the following
las 1t seems to u.s. unanswerable argument
"'If the right to declare be exception out Of the
general grant to the Executive power, ccy thing IScLu-
pEb in the right must be included in The exception and.
hair ,,cI. J.I =. H. -