Chapter: The Duration in Office of the Executive

From the New York Packet. Tuesday, March 18, 1788.

HAMILTON

To the People of the State of New York:

DURATION in office has been mentioned as the second requisite to the
energy of the Executive authority. This has relation to two objects: to
the personal firmness of the executive magistrate, in the employment
of his constitutional powers; and to the stability of the system of
administration which may have been adopted under his auspices. With
regard to the first, it must be evident, that the longer the duration in
office, the greater will be the probability of obtaining so important an
advantage. It is a general principle of human nature, that a man will
be interested in whatever he possesses, in proportion to the firmness or
precariousness of the tenure by which he holds it; will be less attached
to what he holds by a momentary or uncertain title, than to what he
enjoys by a durable or certain title; and, of course, will be willing to
risk more for the sake of the one, than for the sake of the other. This
remark is not less applicable to a political privilege, or honor, or
trust, than to any article of ordinary property. The inference from
it is, that a man acting in the capacity of chief magistrate, under a
consciousness that in a very short time he MUST lay down his office,
will be apt to feel himself too little interested in it to hazard any
material censure or perplexity, from the independent exertion of his
powers, or from encountering the ill-humors, however transient, which
may happen to prevail, either in a considerable part of the society
itself, or even in a predominant faction in the legislative body. If the
case should only be, that he MIGHT lay it down, unless continued by a
new choice, and if he should be desirous of being continued, his wishes,
conspiring with his fears, would tend still more powerfully to corrupt
his integrity, or debase his fortitude. In either case, feebleness and
irresolution must be the characteristics of the station.

There are some who would be inclined to regard the servile pliancy of
the Executive to a prevailing current, either in the community or in
the legislature, as its best recommendation. But such men entertain
very crude notions, as well of the purposes for which government was
instituted, as of the true means by which the public happiness may be
promoted. The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of
the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they intrust
the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified
complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion, or to every transient
impulse which the people may receive from the arts of men, who flatter
their prejudices to betray their interests. It is a just observation,
that the people commonly INTEND the PUBLIC GOOD. This often applies to
their very errors. But their good sense would despise the adulator
who should pretend that they always REASON RIGHT about the MEANS of
promoting it. They know from experience that they sometimes err; and the
wonder is that they so seldom err as they do, beset, as they continually
are, by the wiles of parasites and sycophants, by the snares of the
ambitious, the avaricious, the desperate, by the artifices of men who
possess their confidence more than they deserve it, and of those who
seek to possess rather than to deserve it. When occasions present
themselves, in which the interests of the people are at variance
with their inclinations, it is the duty of the persons whom they have
appointed to be the guardians of those interests, to withstand the
temporary delusion, in order to give them time and opportunity for more
cool and sedate reflection. Instances might be cited in which a conduct
of this kind has saved the people from very fatal consequences of their
own mistakes, and has procured lasting monuments of their gratitude
to the men who had courage and magnanimity enough to serve them at the
peril of their displeasure.

But however inclined we might be to insist upon an unbounded
complaisance in the Executive to the inclinations of the people, we can
with no propriety contend for a like complaisance to the humors of the
legislature. The latter may sometimes stand in opposition to the
former, and at other times the people may be entirely neutral. In either
supposition, it is certainly desirable that the Executive should be in a
situation to dare to act his own opinion with vigor and decision.

The same rule which teaches the propriety of a partition between the
various branches of power, teaches us likewise that this partition ought
to be so contrived as to render the one independent of the other.
To what purpose separate the executive or the judiciary from the
legislative, if both the executive and the judiciary are so constituted
as to be at the absolute devotion of the legislative? Such a separation
must be merely nominal, and incapable of producing the ends for which
it was established. It is one thing to be subordinate to the laws, and
another to be dependent on the legislative body. The first comports
with, the last violates, the fundamental principles of good government;
and, whatever may be the forms of the Constitution, unites all power
in the same hands. The tendency of the legislative authority to absorb
every other, has been fully displayed and illustrated by examples in
some preceding numbers. In governments purely republican, this tendency
is almost irresistible. The representatives of the people, in a popular
assembly, seem sometimes to fancy that they are the people themselves,
and betray strong symptoms of impatience and disgust at the least sign
of opposition from any other quarter; as if the exercise of its rights,
by either the executive or judiciary, were a breach of their privilege
and an outrage to their dignity. They often appear disposed to exert an
imperious control over the other departments; and as they commonly have
the people on their side, they always act with such momentum as to make
it very difficult for the other members of the government to maintain
the balance of the Constitution.

It may perhaps be asked, how the shortness of the duration in office can
affect the independence of the Executive on the legislature, unless the
one were possessed of the power of appointing or displacing the other.
One answer to this inquiry may be drawn from the principle already
remarked that is, from the slender interest a man is apt to take in
a short-lived advantage, and the little inducement it affords him to
expose himself, on account of it, to any considerable inconvenience
or hazard. Another answer, perhaps more obvious, though not more
conclusive, will result from the consideration of the influence of the
legislative body over the people; which might be employed to prevent
the re-election of a man who, by an upright resistance to any sinister
project of that body, should have made himself obnoxious to its
resentment.

It may be asked also, whether a duration of four years would answer the
end proposed; and if it would not, whether a less period, which would
at least be recommended by greater security against ambitious designs,
would not, for that reason, be preferable to a longer period, which was,
at the same time, too short for the purpose of inspiring the desired
firmness and independence of the magistrate.

It cannot be affirmed, that a duration of four years, or any other
limited duration, would completely answer the end proposed; but it would
contribute towards it in a degree which would have a material
influence upon the spirit and character of the government. Between the
commencement and termination of such a period, there would always be a
considerable interval, in which the prospect of annihilation would be
sufficiently remote, not to have an improper effect upon the conduct
of a man indued with a tolerable portion of fortitude; and in which he
might reasonably promise himself, that there would be time enough before
it arrived, to make the community sensible of the propriety of the
measures he might incline to pursue. Though it be probable that, as
he approached the moment when the public were, by a new election, to
signify their sense of his conduct, his confidence, and with it his
firmness, would decline; yet both the one and the other would derive
support from the opportunities which his previous continuance in the
station had afforded him, of establishing himself in the esteem and
good-will of his constituents. He might, then, hazard with safety, in
proportion to the proofs he had given of his wisdom and integrity,
and to the title he had acquired to the respect and attachment of his
fellow-citizens. As, on the one hand, a duration of four years will
contribute to the firmness of the Executive in a sufficient degree to
render it a very valuable ingredient in the composition; so, on the
other, it is not enough to justify any alarm for the public liberty. If
a British House of Commons, from the most feeble beginnings, FROM THE
MERE POWER OF ASSENTING OR DISAGREEING TO THE IMPOSITION OF A NEW TAX,
have, by rapid strides, reduced the prerogatives of the crown and
the privileges of the nobility within the limits they conceived to be
compatible with the principles of a free government, while they raised
themselves to the rank and consequence of a coequal branch of the
legislature; if they have been able, in one instance, to abolish
both the royalty and the aristocracy, and to overturn all the ancient
establishments, as well in the Church as State; if they have been able,
on a recent occasion, to make the monarch tremble at the prospect of
an innovation(1) attempted by them, what would be to be feared from
an elective magistrate of four years' duration, with the confined
authorities of a President of the United States? What, but that he might
be unequal to the task which the Constitution assigns him? I shall only
add, that if his duration be such as to leave a doubt of his firmness,
that doubt is inconsistent with a jealousy of his encroachments.

PUBLIUS

1. This was the case with respect to Mr. Fox's India bill, which was
carried in the House of Commons, and rejected in the House of Lords, to
the entire satisfaction, as it is said, of the people.

 Hamilton defends the provision of the constitution for a presidential term of four-years. Some alleged that this was too long a term and would increase the risk of the president amassing too much power. However, Hamilton defends the four-year term from the perspective of energy. He argues that a term of four years will give the president the ability to counteract temporary passions or influences of faction that may from time to time convulse the American people and their representatives in Congress. It is the duty of the executive, according to Hamilton, to protect the interests of the people and the greater good of the nation, even when the people may, as a result of being deceived or manipulated, demand the adoption of flawed policy. Hamilton furthermore argues that a term of four years will enable the president to pursue policies he feels best. If the term were too short, the president might not be willing to make bold, perhaps controversial decisions since to do so would risk incurring the ire of the people and perhaps cost him reelection.

