Litchfield enquirer., 1868-06-04

y so', ana as such IS treated throughout fl le statute. The body of the section compr n ne1ds eoe';y person holding cion office re and is restricted by single exception o'yi vi le the persons described. in the proviso f holding their offices during the term of tl 70 TT President by whom they were appointed l. The counsel for the President. (naoa no,
 Impeachment Trial quotes the proviso. 't !" Provided That the Secretaries of Stat d of the Treasury, of War, of the Navy. an l. or the Interior, the Postmaster Genera @ and the Attorney General, shall hold thei e offices respectively" &c
 And adds:
 n IT. That does not mean the mon; it mean the offices shall have that tenure.''
 TIT This certainly sounds like absurdit7 l The Secretary of State, or of War, is nc an n oD1ce put an o01cer: person holding a l once: An office has no tenure; tho posses
 sor Of an office has that s'manner of nos f session." that 'act or right of holdinu ; that manner of holding' which is a P, f m'e The absurdity becomes apparent
 we read the proyiso according to the con
 structlon of the counsel for the President
 The offices of Secretary of War, &c.
 snail hold their respective offices,'' &c. It follows, therefore, as suggested by on. of the managers, that it is immaferia whether we consider Mr. Stanton as hold. ing his office during the term of the Presi
 dent by whom he was appointed or not; all agree that he was holding the office: if
 within the term of the President by whom
 he was appointed, he is embraced in the
 proviso; if not within such term, he is 2 '"person holding civil office" and protected
 by the body of the section.
 II, now, turn to contemporaneous con.
 structlon to ascertain the meaning of the
 law, ind such construction given both by the executive and legislative department
 of the government. Whatever the Presi
 dent or his cabinet may have thought be- fore the final passage of the act of it's effect upon MT. Stanton, a period arrived within a few months after it's passage when it be- came necessary for Mr. Johnson to eive if a practical construction. He informs ns that he proceeded with great and anxious deliberation, and the evidence before rs demonstrates that he arrived at the con cluslon that MT. Stanton was within the act. -a..- ~.
 On the 18th of August, 1S67 the Presi dent suspended the Secretary of War from office, in conformity with the provisions of the act By the same authority he appoint ed General Grant Secretary a2 interim. He notlhed the Secretary of the Treasury of hls action, citing the act by name as the authority for such notification. He sent in ms reasons to the Senate pursuant to the law, and, as he informs us, hoped for con currence of the Senate and the removal ot the Secretary, in accordance with the law.
 It IS too late now to do away with the eff feet of this executive construction bv the assertion that power of suspension has been discovered in the Constitution which tehass thss ppeyeEE ,ppE-lbaan been exercised and never
 Upon the presentation of the Presidents reasons for the removal of the Secretary, the Senate gave legislative construction to the statute. It proceeded in exact con- formity with the terms of the law; it con- sidered the reasons; it debated them; it refused to concur in them, and sent notice thereof to the President. am not aware that single senator in that debate suggest ted that MT. Stanton was suspended by vir- tue of the Constitution, or that he was not embraced in the protection of the tenure-of office act.
 Upon, then, fair consideration of the debates accompanying the passage of the act, upon the proper construction of the language of the act itself, and upon the contemporaneous construction given to 1t by the executive and legislative branches of the government, I find MT. Stanton to be embraced within the provisions of the first section.
 I find, therefore, the act to be valid, and that it includes MT. Stanton in it's protec- tion against the presidential power without the consent of the Senate
 I find that the President has delib- erately broken this law, and, by it's express terms, has, in so doing, committed high misdemeanor.
 It is urged, however, that the offence is IS not complete because the criminal intent was absent. It is said that the law was broken to test it's constituhonality. To this the obvious Onswer is, be who breaks law for this purpose must take the risk of its being held to be constitutional by the proper tribunals. In this case, the Senate | is the proper tribunal for the trial of the i question, and it affirms the constitutionali- | ty of the law.
 But do not find, in fact, that it was the intention of the President to try the con stitutional question. The means adopted were not adapted to that end. Upon the removal of Mir. Stanton the latter could have no remedy in the courts, and the President, though time and opportunity been ample since the passage of the law, | never attempted to 1n1tlate leSsu Pfooooo-
 ings himself.
 The evidence in this case exhibits the
 real intent with perfect clearness. The
 declarations of the President at different
 periods during the last two years, as proved before us; his intermeddling with the
 southern legislature in opposition to Con
 gress, as shown by the Alabama telegram T his conversation with Wood, unfolding his purpose of distributing patronage, whose emoluments exceed twenty-one millions ot dollars year, for the purpose of creating ) party hostile to the measures of Congress : all these demonstrate fixed and unconstl- tutional design to defeat and prevent ; the execution of the laws. Grant that ht was honest in all this, and that he believed l that the laws ought to have been defeated ;, So were Charles I and James II honest II their ideas of the royal prerogative; bu : those ideas brought the one to the blocl : and cost the other his crown. In thi
 country the legislature is the organ of tn 3 people, and the laws are the peoples will : For tho Executive to set his own will Il l opposition to the will of the people, ez f pressed through Congress, and employ tn : powers vested in him for other purposes t | 1 IL. ..sI