I am not
conscious that my participations in executive authority have produced
any bias in favor of the single executive; because the parts I have
acted have been in the subordinate, as well as superior stations, and
because, if I know myself, what I have felt, and what I have wished, I
know that I have never been so well pleased, as when I could shift power
from my own, on the shoulders of others; nor have I ever been able to
conceive how any rational being could propose happiness to himself from
the exercise of power over others.
I am still, however, sensible of the solidity of your principle, that,
to insure the safety of the public liberty, its depository should be
subject to be changed with the greatest ease possible, and without
suspending or disturbing for a moment the movements of the machine of
government. You apprehend that a single executive, with, eminence of
talent, and destitution of principle, equal to the object, might, by
usurpation, render his powers hereditary. Yet I think history furnishes
as many examples of a single usurper arising out of a government by a
plurality, as of temporary trusts of power in a single hand rendered
permanent by usurpation. I do not believe, therefore, that this danger
is lessened in the hands of a plural executive. Perhaps it is greatly
increased, by the state of inefficiency to which they are liable from
feuds and divisions among themselves.
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