Page:Speeches, correspondence and political papers of Carl Schurz, Volume 4.djvu/49

Rh It is believed by many that it is an easy task to perform the duties of the President of the United States—that the only thing he has to do is to form a program of policy which he desires to carry out, and to call good and experienced men into his Cabinet to attend to the detail of the business, without meddling himself with its intricate complications. The experience I have gathered from personal observation, not only as a member of the legislative body but also of the Cabinet, has convinced me that this is a great mistake.

If all the President had to do were to select seven men who agree with him as to the principal objects to be accomplished, and then consult and agree with them about the means to be used, undisturbed by the pressure of outside forces, it would, indeed, be a comparatively easy and a comfortable thing. But the fact is that the President of the United States, by the very nature of his position, is obliged to spend far more time in listening to the advice and the wishes and the urgency of men outside of his Cabinet, than to his consultations with Cabinet ministers themselves. The opposition he may encounter from the opposing party in Congress and in the press is, in most cases, the least of the difficulties he has to contend with. The greatest puzzles that are apt to perplex and sometimes to overwhelm his mind come from his own party, who have a claim upon his attention and insist to have that claim respected. Not only upon the great measures of his Administration, but upon every detail, the advice of the members of his party, especially those in Congress, is urged upon him with all imaginable sorts of argument and from all imaginable sorts of motive. There is scarcely an appointment he has to make, there is certainly not a reform he wants to execute, that he will not have to carry through a siege and storm of opposing wishes and interests. Every object he pursues will run counter to the wishes