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rests of the state will certainly be prostrated, must ap pear to be such a dereliction of all sense of propriety, as will stamp his future character for ever; and then, he could only have pretended to be a republican, in order to aggrandize himself and get into power, or his present conduct would not be so decidedly hostile to every principle of genuine patriotism and love of his country!

It is the duty of every man to give his fellow-citizens such information as he may possess, with respect to the conduct of public men, this consideration has occasioned the foregoing reflections being offered to their view, and it will remain for them to decide between the governor and council on the present question. That the party who shall be found to have deserted their interests, either for the gratification of personal ambition, or from any other private or sinister motive whatever, may be consigned to merited neglect and contempt, which will teach others, that no one, who, Janus like, wears a double countenance, and under that mask attempts to deceive them, will meet with their countenance or support. REPUBLICANUS.

The governor has published the resolution of the senate, but the resolution passed by both houses, which made directly against him, he has suppressed-the rea son must be obvious, and needs no comment.

FROM THE AMERICAN.

A CIVIL OFFICER OF MARYLAND-No. III.

To pursue the ignes fatui of anonymous publi

eations, may possibly lead into the filth and mire, where those noxious vapours emit a glow-worm light, only to mislead and disappear: still where explanations have once commenced, the malevolence of the times might construe unfavourably, silence on subsequent chargeshowever contemptible their source or exceptionable their form. This observation can alone justify a reply to a pub. lication in your paper of the 14th instant, under the sig

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nature of Republicanus, which is a motley assemblage of wilful misquotation from our constitution, conclusions from real passages made in contempt of the rules of reason, and malignant fabrications, calculated to impeach the motives of the governor of the state.

As much of this matter has already been anticipated and fully replied to, in the different publications of the Civil Officer, unnecessary repetitions will be here avoided. In fact the constitutional argument of this writer, is little more than a copious dissertation against the exclusive right of the governor to nominate to office. In reply to this unmeaning farrago it might be simply asked, whether one word has ever been said by the governor or the Civil Officer, respecting such exclusive right of nomination? In the letter addressed by the council to the legislature, it was thought proper to raise this phantom in order to combat it: Republicanus improving the hint, has carried it through all the evolutions of modern polemical tactics: But the artifice of exciting a clamour, in order to withdraw the public attention from the real question, has become too trite to be longer successful. The constitution of Maryland, it must be repeated, expressly vests the appointment of officers in the governor, to be made by and with the advice and consent of the council; but it says not one word about nomination-it neither creates nor recognizes any such power-it is a term not only unknown to our constitution and laws, but, it is believed, that no such authority as a distinct power, will be found in the constitutions of any of those states, that first formed the confederation, nor in any of their laws during their colonial government. As Mr. Jay has justly observed in his address on a similar subject, to the legislature of New-York" A governor cannot appoint without nominating-the vesting him therefore with the right to appoint, must necessarily convey the subordinate or incidental power of nominating, without which, the. right of appointing could not possibly be exercised." It appears from the same document, that under a similar formulary of appointing by and with the advice and consent of the council, the governor of that state had solely nominated to office, without a doubt of its propriety, for

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about twenty years, and until a majority of the legislature became of a different political complexion from their chief magistrate, who is there elected by the peoplethen the right was questioned-The governor addressed the legislature on the subject; and the legislature called a convention-who now vested, as they had an undoubted right to do, what is called a concurrent right of nomination, in each member of the council of appointment. But there was still these evident distinctions, (independent of party motives,) between the two cases and the constitutions of the two states. The governor of NewYork, is by his election, independent of the legislature; he has no permanent council the council alluded to, is expressly a council for the appointment of officers onlycomposed of the governor and a certain number of senators, annually elected by the legislature. The governor has no other authority over appointments but what he derives from that article which constitutes him president. of the council-but which seems to be evidently calculated in all its other provisions but one, to share the power of appointment jointly, and not concurrently, between the executive and legislative departments. By the constitution of Maryland, the power of the governor to appoint, and all his other powers, are derived from other parts of the constitution; and not from that article which directs that he should preside in council; with whose concurrence expressly he is to act, and not jointly; and his powers would equally exist if he did not preside in council, or if there was no such article at all.

The right of nomination, as has been shewn, and as will be still farther elucidated, is no distinct and independent power; it is from its nature only one of the incidental means of carrying into execution the power of appointment; and it has really nothing to do with the construction of the constitution of Maryland, to which it is unknown. The merits of the question between the governor and council here, will be found solely to rest on the true import and meaning of that advice and consent to the appointments of the governor, which the council are authorised to give: The question on the particular case which has occurred between them, naturally

divides itself into two points-first, is that advice and consent imperative and obligatory, so that he must appoint whomever they advise, whether he approves or not? If so, he is a mere machine and instrument in their hands -and the consent of the council to such an appointment of the governor is not only absurd, but a mockery. Second, does the right to advise and consent to the appointment of the governor, vest an authority in the Council to appoint of themselves, without the governor being present or having any agency in the appointment? If so the governor is perfectly useless and unnecessary, even as an instrument; and both the words advice and consent become absolutely ludicrous: In fact the council then advise themselves, and consent to their own acts. And this was precisely the case of the appointment by the council of the Susquehanna commissioners. Such folly, absurdity and abuse, may render the interposition of a nomination necessary hereafter; but as they had never happened during the provincial government, under the same words, so they could not have been foreseen by the convention who formed the constitution of Maryland,

It is admitted that doubts early occurred, after our independence, as to the true import and meaning of the terms advice and consent of council-these did not originate in New-York. More than twenty years ago, twą young gentlemen of great talents and enterprize, then members of the council in Virginia, suggested their right to give advice to the governor, when he did not ask it; but it was never understood by the Civil Officer, that they contended that he was obliged to take their advice. whether he approved of it or not. He then and always since has considered their construction to extend no farther, than to claim a right to offer any advice they thought proper, instead of being confined to confirming or negativing the governor's propositions; and to have their advice so given, entered on the journals, to justify themselves, or criminate him, to their constituents, whenever they differed in opinion.

In order to avoid such doubts and their consequences, in those constitutions which have been lately formed in

these states, and where the chief executive magistrate is still to act by and with the consent of others in making appointments, express words have been introduced authorising him to nominate as well as to appoint. If he alone nominates, still those with whom he must concur to effectuate an appointment, retain the same control over him, that he has over them; they may refuse their assent until he makes a nomination that pleases them, and nothing prevents their explaining to him, who would please them: Where then is this Satrap power, this Persian despotism contended for by the governor? He only asks that equal independent authority, which he has ever been willing to concede to the council. But permit the council to complete an appointment without his assent, as they have done, and the governor is instantly reduced to a cypher. Were his oath and the constitution out of the question, no man of independent mind could submit to so degraded and humiliating a situation; but under those sacred obligations, voluntary acquiescence is forbid by the imperative voice of duty.

To divert the public mind from a dispassionate view of such glaring absurdity and flagrant violation of the constitution, this writer has heated his own imagination and attempts to excite the sympathy of his readers, by a rhapsodical display of the subversion of society, and conversion of government into the most hideous of curses, if the governor should be permitted to exercise the sole right of nominating, and the council to retain only the mere duty of putting a negative on his nomination. How unfortunate that the United States and the state of Massachusetts could not have availed themselves of the political sagacity of Republicanus, when they so imprudently and expressly confined the right of nominating to their chief magistrates, and only permitted the senate and council, (whose advice and consent they still rendered necessary in appointments,) to exercise the mere duty of confirming or negativing their nominations! Although these governments still continue blessings to the people, must we yet dread that the curses predicted by Republicanus, are accumulating with interest in the chancery of Heaven? With these examples staring him in the face, how

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