Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol II).djvu/357

 CH. XIII.] independent, and under an entirely different responsibility to the nation, from what belongs to them. He is the representative of the whole nation in the aggregate; they are the representatives only of distinct parts; and sometimes of little more than sectional or local interests.

§ 883. Nor is there any solid objection to this qualified power. If it should be objected, that it may sometimes prevent the passage of good laws, as well as of bad laws, the objection is entitled to but little weight. In the first place, it can never be effectually exercised, if two thirds of both houses are in favour of the law; and if they are not, it is not so easily demonstrable, that the law is either wise or salutary. The presumption would rather be the other way; or, at least, that the utility of it was not unquestionable, or it would receive the requisite support. In the next place, the great evil of all free governments is a tendency to over-legislation, and the mischief of inconstancy and mutability in the laws forms a great blemish in the character and genius of all free governments. The injury, which may possibly arise from the postponement of a salutary law, is far less, than from the passage of a mischievous one, or from a redundant and vacillating legislation. In the next place, there is no practical danger, that this power would be much, if any, abused by the president. The superior weight and influence of the legislative body in a free government, and the hazard to the weight and influence of the executive in a trial of strength, afford a satisfactory security, that the power generally be employed with great caution; and that there will be more often room for a charge of