a
whole people, in critical circumstances or arduous times, is well known:
a law preventing the re-election of the chief magistrate would deprive
the citizens of the surest pledge of the prosperity and the security
of the commonwealth; and, by a singular inconsistency, a man would be
excluded from the government at the very time when he had shown his
ability in conducting its affairs.

But if these arguments are strong, perhaps still more powerful reasons
may be advanced against them. Intrigue and corruption are the natural
defects of elective government; but when the head of the State can be
re-elected these evils rise to a great height, and compromise the very
existence of the country. When a simple candidate seeks to rise by
intrigue, his manoeuvres must necessarily be limited to a narrow sphere;
but when the chief magistrate enters the lists, he borrows the strength
of the government for his own purposes. In the former case the feeble
resources of an individual are in action; in the latter, the State
itself, with all its immense influence, is busied in the work of
corruption and cabal. The private citizen, who employs the most
immoral practices to acquire power, can only act in a manner indirectly
prejudicial to the public prosperity. But if the representative of the
executive descends into the combat, the cares of government dwindle into
second-rate importance, and the success of his election is his first
concern. All laws and all the negotiations he undertakes are to him
nothing more than electioneering schemes; places become the reward
of services rendered, not to the nation, but to its chief; and the
influence of the government, if not injurious to the country, is at
least no longer beneficial to the community for which it was created.

It is impossible to consider the ordinary course of affairs in the
United States without perceiving that the desire of being re-elected is
the chief aim of the President; that his whole administration, and even
his most indifferent measures, tend to this object; and that, as the
crisis approaches, his personal interest takes the place of his interest
in the public good. The principle of re-eligibility renders the corrupt
influence of elective government still more extensive and pernicious.

In America it exercises a peculiarly fatal influence on the sources of
national existence. Every government seems to be afflicted by some evil
which is inherent in its nature, and the geniu