I do, therefore, for the reasons stated, and in the name of the people of the several States, solemnly protest against these proceedings of the House of Representatives, because they are in violation of the rights of the coördinate executive branch of the Government, and subversive of its constitutional independence; because they are calculated to foster a band of interested parasites and informers, ever ready, for their own advantage, to swear before ex parte committees to pretended private conversations between the President and themselves, incapable, from their nature, of being disproved, thus furnishing material for harassing him, degrading him in the eyes of the country, and eventually, should he be a weak or a timid man, rendering him subservient to improper influences, in order to avoid such persecutions and annoyances; because they tend to destroy that harmonious action for the common good which ought to be maintained, and which I sincerely desire to cherish between coördinate branches of the Government; and, finally, because, if unresisted, they would establish a precedent dangerous and embarrassing to all my successors, to whatever political party they might be attached.
James Buchanan.
Washington, March 28, 1860.
This message was referred to the Committee on the Judiciary, a majority of whom, through their chairman, on the 9th of April, reported resolutions against its constitutional doctrines, which the House adopted on the 8th of June, by a party vote, and the proceedings[proceedings] of the Covode Committee went on until the 16th of that month. Mr. Train, of Massachusetts, one of the committee, then reported to the House a great mass of testimony which had been taken from all sorts of willing witnesses against the President, but without a single resolution accusing or censuring either him or any member of his cabinet. This was, in one sense, as he has himself said, “a triumphant result for the President.”[[57]] But the movers in this business had attained their object, in procuring and spreading before the country the means of traducing the President; means which rested for the most part on perjury, and for the residue were colored by personal or political hostility. It was impossible for Mr. Buchanan to allow this to pass without further notice. It is more than probable that the further notice which he took of it prevented a repetition of this kind of proceeding, when, on a future occasion, another President of the United States incurred the hostility of a dominant majority in the House of Representatives. On the 22d of June he sent to the House the following additional message:—
“To the House of Representatives:—
“In my message to the House of Representatives of the 28th March last, I solemnly protested against the creation of a committee, at the head of which was placed my accuser, for the purpose of investigating whether the President had, ‘by money, patronage or other improper means, sought to influence the action of Congress, or any committee thereof, for or against the passage of any law appertaining to the rights of any State or Territory.’ I protested against this because it was destitute of any specification; because it referred to no particular act to enable the President to prepare for his defence; because it deprived him of the constitutional guards, which, in common with every citizen of the United States, he possesses for his protection; and because it assailed his constitutional independence as a coördinate branch of the Government. There is an enlightened justice, as well as a beautiful symmetry, in every part of the Constitution. This is conspicuously manifested in regard to impeachments. The House of Representatives possesses ‘the sole power of impeachment;’ the Senate ‘the sole power to try all impeachments;’ and the impeachable offences are ‘treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors.’ The practice of the House, from the earliest times, had been in accordance with its own dignity, the rights of the accused, and the demands of justice. At the commencement of each judicial investigation which might lead to an impeachment, specific charges were always preferred; the accused had an opportunity of cross-examining the witnesses, and he was placed in full possession of the precise nature of the offence which he had to meet. An impartial and elevated standing committee was charged with this investigation, upon which no member inspired with the ancient sense of honor and justice would have served, had he ever expressed an opinion against the accused. Until the present occasion, it was never deemed proper to transform the accuser into the judge, and to confer upon him the selection of his own committee.
“The charges made against me, in vague and general terms, were of such a false and atrocious character, that I did not entertain a moment’s apprehension for the result. They were abhorrent to every principle instilled into me from my youth, and every practice of my life, and I did not believe it possible that the man existed who would so basely perjure himself as to swear to the truth of any such accusations. In this conviction I am informed I have not been mistaken. In my former protest, therefore, I truly and emphatically declared that it was made for no reason personal to myself, but because the proceedings of the House were in violation of the rights of the coördinate executive branch of the Government, subversive of its constitutional independence, and, if unresisted, would establish a precedent dangerous and embarrassing to all my successors. Notwithstanding all this, if the committee had not transcended the authority conferred upon it by the resolution of the House of Representatives, broad and general as this was, I should have remained silent upon the subject. What I now charge is, that they have acted as though they possessed unlimited power, and, without any warrant whatever in the resolution under which they were appointed, have pursued a course not merely at war with the constitutional rights of the Executive, but tending to degrade the presidential office itself to such a degree as to render it unworthy of the acceptance of any man of honor or principle.
“The resolution of the House, so far as it is accusatory of the President, is confined to an inquiry whether he had used corrupt or improper means to influence the action of Congress or any of its committees on legislative measures pending before them. Nothing more, nothing less. I have not learned through the newspapers, or in any other mode, that the committee have touched the other accusatory branch of the resolution, charging the President with a violation of duty in failing to execute some law or laws. This branch of the resolution is therefore out of the question. By what authority, then, have the committee undertaken to investigate the course of the President in regard to the convention which framed the Lecompton constitution? By what authority have they undertaken to pry into our foreign relations, for the purpose of assailing him on account of the instructions given by the Secretary of State to our minister in Mexico, relative to the Tehuantepec route? By what authority have they inquired into the causes of removal from office, and this from the parties themselves removed, with a view to prejudice his character, notwithstanding this power of removal belongs exclusively to the President under the Constitution, was so decided by the first Congress in the year 1789, and has accordingly ever since been exercised? There is in the resolution no pretext of authority for the committee to investigate the question of the printing of the post-office blanks, nor is it to be supposed that the House, if asked, would have granted such an authority, because this question had been previously committed to two other committees—one in the Senate and the other in the House. Notwithstanding this absolute want of power, the committee rushed into this investigation in advance of all other subjects.
“The[“The] committee proceeded for months, from March 22d, 1860, to examine ex parte, and without any notice to myself, into every subject which could possibly affect my character. Interested and vindictive witnesses were summoned and examined before them; and the first and only information of their testimony which, in almost every instance, I received, was obtained from the publication of such portions of it as could injuriously affect myself, in the New York journals. It mattered not that these statements were, so far as I have learned, disproved by the most respectable witnesses who happened to be on the spot. The telegraph was silent respecting these contradictions. It was a secret committee in regard to all the testimony which could by possibility reflect on my character. The poison was left to produce its effect upon the public mind, whilst the antidote was carefully withheld.
“In their examinations the committee violated the most sacred and honorable confidences existing among men. Private correspondence, which a truly honorable man would never even entertain a distant thought of divulging, was dragged to light. Different persons in official and confidential relations with myself, and with whom it was supposed I might have held conversations, the revelation of which would do me injury, were examined. Even members of the Senate and members of my own cabinet, both my constitutional advisers, were called upon to testify, for the purpose of discovering something, if possible, to my discredit.