Nobody,
therefore, being in office, there could be no removal. The judges, you
well know, have been considered as highly federal; and it was noted
that they confined their nominations exclusively to federalists. The
legislature, dissatisfied with this, transferred the nomination to the
President, and made the offices permanent. The very object in passing
the law was, that he should correct, not confirm, what was deemed the
partiality of the judges. I thought it therefore proper to inquire,
not whom they had employed, but whom I ought to appoint to fulfil
the intentions of the law. In making these appointments, I put in a
proportion of federalists, equal, I believe, to the proportion they bear
in numbers through the Union generally. Had I known that your son had
acted, it would have been a real pleasure to me to have preferred him
to some who were named in Boston, in what was deemed the same line
of politics. To this I should have been led by my knowledge of his
integrity, as well as my sincere dispositions towards yourself and Mr.
Adams.
You seem to think it devolved on the judges to decide on the validity of
the sedition law. But nothing in the constitution has given them a right
to decide for the executive, more than to the executive to decide for
them. Both magistracies are equally independent in the sphere of action
assigned to them. The judges, believing the law constitutional, had a
right to pass a sentence of fine and imprisonment, because the power was
placed in their hands by the constitution.
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