Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/386

 378 from party motives, from a spirit of opposition, and even from motives of a more private nature, may reject a nomination absolutely unexceptionable. But such occurrences will be rare. The more common error, (if there shall be any) will be too great a facility to yield to the executive wishes, as a means of personal, or popular favour. A president will rarely want means, if he shall choose to use them, to induce some members of such a body to aid his nominations; since a correspondent influence may be fairly presumed to exist, to gratify such persons in other recommendations for office, and thus to make them indirectly the dispensers of local patronage. It will be, principally, with regard to high officers, such as ambassadors, judges, heads of departments, and other appointments of great public importance, that the senate will interpose to prevent an unsuitable choice. Their own dignity, and sense of character, their duty to their country, and their very tide to office will be materially dependent upon a firm discharge of their duty on such occasions.

§ 1527. Perhaps the duties of the president, in the discharge of this most delicate and important duty of his office, were never better summed up, than in the following language of a distinguished commentator. A proper selection and appointment of subordinate officers is one of the strongest marks of a powerful mind. It is a duty of the president to acquire, as far