and reenacted; the
departments of State, War, and Treasury were established; and a call was
made on the Secretary of the Treasury to report a plan for payment of
the old Continental debt.

%210. The United States Courts.%--The Constitution declares that the
judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court
and such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain
and establish. Acting under this power, Congress made provision for a
Supreme Court, consisting of a Chief Justice and five Associate
Justices, and marked out the United States into circuits and districts.
The circuits were three in number. In the first were the Eastern States;
in the second, the Middle States; and in the third, the Southern States.
To each were assigned two Justices of the Supreme Court, whose business
it was to go to some city in each state in the circuit, and there, with
the district judge of that state, hold a circuit court. The district
courts were thirteen in number, one being established in each state.[1]
Washington appointed John Jay the first Chief Justice of the
Supreme Court.

[Footnote 1: For later changes, see Andrews's _Manual of the
Constitution,_ p. 183.]

%211. The Secretaries.%--During the management of affairs by the
Continental Congress three great executive departments had gradually
grown up and been placed in charge of three men, called the
"Superintendent of Finance," the "Secretary of the United States for the
Department of Foreign Affairs," and the "Secretary of War." These the
Constitution recognized in the expression "principal officer in each of
the executive departments." Congress by law now continued the
departments and placed them in charge of a Secretary of the Treasury, a
Secretary of State, and a Secretary of War. Washington filled the
offices promptly, making Alexander Hamilton Secretary of the Treasury,
Thomas Jefferson Secretary of State, and General Henry Knox Secretary
of War.

%212. The "Cabinet."%--It has long been the custom for the President
to gather his secretaries about him on certain days in each week for the
purpose of discussing public measures. To these gatherings has been
given the name "Cabinet meetings," while the secretaries have come to be
called "Cabinet officers." The Constitution, however, never intended to
give the President a body of advisers. Indeed, a proposition to provide
him with a council was voted down in the constitutional convention. Bu