y contrast to the complicated language of the English
laws." Yet on account of the elementary character of the article of the
Constitution on the powers of the President, there is room for
inference, a chance for development, and an opportunity for a strong man
to imprint his character upon the office. The Convention, writes Mr.
Bryce, made its executive a George III "shorn of a part of his
prerogative," his influence and dignity diminished by a reduction of the
term of office to four years. The English writer was thoroughly familiar
with the _Federalist_, and appreciated Hamilton's politic efforts to
demonstrate that the executive of the Constitution was modeled after the
governors of the states, and not after the British monarch; but "an
enlarged copy of the state governor," Mr. Bryce asserts, is one and the
same thing as "a reduced and improved copy of the English king." But, on
the other hand, Bagehot did not believe that the Americans comprehended
the English Constitution. "Living across the Atlantic," he wrote, "and
misled by accepted doctrines, the acute framers of the Federal
Constitution, even after the keenest attention, did not perceive the
Prime Minister to be the principal executive of the British
Constitution, and the sovereign a cog in the mechanism;" and he seems to
think that if this had been understood the executive power would have
been differently constituted.

It is a pertinent suggestion of Mr. Bryce's that the members of the
Convention must have been thinking of their presiding officer, George
Washington, as the first man who would exercise the powers of the
executive office they were creating. So it turned out. Never did a
country begin a new enterprise with so wise a ruler. An admirable polity
had been adopted, but much depended upon getting it to work, and the man
who was selected to start the government was the man of all men for the
task. Histories many and from different points of view have been written
of Washington's administration; all are interesting, and the subject
seems to ennoble the writers. Statesmen meeting with students to discuss
the character and political acts of Washington marvel at his wisdom in
great things and his patience in small things, at the dignity and good
sense with which he established the etiquette of his office, at the tact
which retained in his service two such irreconcilable men as Jefferson
and Hamilton. The importance of a good start for an infant government