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In America it exercises a still more fatal influence on the sources of national existence. Every government seems to be afflicted by some evil inherent in its nature, and the genius of the legislator is shown in eluding its attacks. A state may survive the influence of a host of bad laws, and the mischief they cause is frequently exaggerated; but a law which encourages the growth of the canker within must prove fatal in the end, although its bad consequences may not be immediately perceived.
The principle of destruction in absolute monarchies lies in the excessive and unreasonable extension of the prerogative of the crown; and a measure tending to remove the constitutional provisions which counterbalance this influence would be radically bad, even if its consequences should long appear to be imperceptible. By a parity of reasoning, in countries governed by a democracy, where the people is perpetually drawing all authority to itself, the laws which increase or accelerate its action are the direct assailants of the very principle of the government.
The greatest proof of the ability of the American legislators is, that they clearly discerned this truth, and that they had the courage to act up to it. They conceived that a certain authority above the body of the people was necessary, which should enjoy a degree of independence, without however being entirely beyond the popular control; an authority which would be forced to comply with the permanent determinations of the majority, but which would be able to resist its caprices, and to refuse its most dangerous demands.
To this end they centred the whole executive power of the nation in a single arm; they granted extensive prerogatives to the president, and they armed him with the veto to resist the encroachments of the legislature.
But by introducing the principle of re-election they partly destroyed their work; and they rendered the president but little inclined to exert the great power they had vested in his hands. If ineligible a second time, the president would be far from independent of the people, for his responsibility would not be lessened; but the favour of the people would not be so necessary to him as to induce him to court it by humouring its desires. If re-eligible (and this is more especially true at the present day, when political morality is relaxed, and when great men are rare), the president of the United States becomes an easy tool in the hands of the
