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Current Topics [excerpt]
I that the new President
of the United States is not, and never has been, a lawyer. The late
President was admitted to the bar and practised for some time, but
with no great success. His predecessor, Mr. C, was a prosperous
lawyer, and we have an impression that, after laying down his office,
he returned to practice at the bar. There seems to be a difference
between the relations of law and politics in this country and in
the United States. Here a lawyer usually enters political life with
a view to advancement in his profession; there the profession seems
to be very commonly regarded as the road to political promotion
and office. Mr. C, for instance, the leader of the New York
bar, did not hesitate to give up his great position and practice
at the bar to accept the post of Ambassador to this country.
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P R
has succeeded to the supreme magistracy of the United States in
virtue of the clause of the constitution which provides that “in
case of the removal of the President from office, or of his death,
resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of
the said office, the same shall devolve on the Vice-President.”
The remarkable thing is that, unless the Vice-President is brought
before the public in this exceptional manner, he has no public function
except to preside in the Senate. There he has a casting vote, but
no ordinary vote. The original clause in the constitution provided
that the candidate for the Presidency who was second in number of
votes to the successful candidate should be Vice-President. Apparently
this mode of selection, while securing that the Vice-President should
be a politician of note, also secured that he should be of the opposite
party to the President, and therefore the devolution of power from
one to another meant a sudden change of policy as the result of
a mere accident. At any rate the mode was found unsatisfactory,
and it was changed in 1804, by the twelfth amendment to the constitution,
for the present system, by which the presidential electors vote
for the President and the Vice-President separately. The result
is that they are selected from the same “ticket” and belong to the
same political party. Mr. B tells us (The
American Commonwealth, vol. 1. p. 65) that “very little pains are
bestowed on the election of a Vice-President. The convention which
selects the party candidates usually gives the nomination to this
post to a man in the second rank . . . sometimes as a compliment
to an elderly leader who is personally popular.” President R
cannot be described as “elderly,” but otherwise he seems to answer
to the description, and notwithstanding this criticism on the mode
of selection, he seems qualified to play a distinguished part in
the position to which he has succeeded under such melancholy circumstances.
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T President
MK is, as is well
known, the third President of the United States who has perished
at the hand [775][776] of the assassin.
In the case of President L the assassin
B did not live to suffer punishment in the
regular course of law. After shooting the president in his box at
the Washington Theatre, he leaped down upon the stage and escaped
for the time by the rear of the building. Twelve days later he was
shot in a barn where he had concealed himself. The assassination
was part of a plot for the murder of the heads of the Government.
The assassination of President G by G
in 1881 was due to the disappointment of the assassin. He had sought
unsuccessfully to obtain a consulship, and he attributed his failure
to G’ abandonment
of the policy of giving public appointments as rewards for electioneering
services. The defence of insanity was set up, and the direction
of C, J., on this point to the jury, reported
in 10 Federal Rep. 161, is included in the Select Cases on Criminal
Law, recently compiled by Dr. C K.
The learned judge referred to the rules in M’Naughten’s case
(10 Cl. & Fin. 200), as having been approved, with some qualifications,
in the United States, and directed the jury that where partial insanity
is set up as a defence, it must appear that the crime charged was
the product of the morbid condition and connected with it as effect
with cause. G was found guilty and was
executed. With regard to the assassin of President MK
it is to be presumed that the law will take its course, and there
does not at present seem to be any suggestion of a defence such
as that of G. The misfortune is that the
last penalty seems to have practically no deterrent effect on other
similar criminals. The punishment is simply retributive, and that
is the least satisfactory aspect of the penal law.
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