The Constitution invests the President with authority to decide whether a removal should be made in any given case; the act of Congress declares in substance that he shall only accuse such as he supposes to be unworthy of their trust.  The Constitution makes him sole judge in the premises, but the statute takes away his jurisdiction, transfers it to the Senate, and leaves him nothing but the odious and sometimes impracticable duty of becoming a prosecutor.  The prosecution is to be conducted before a tribunal whose members are not, like him, responsible to the whole people, but to separate constituent bodies, and who may hear his accusation with great disfavor.  The Senate is absolutely without any known standard of decision applicable to such a case.  Its judgment can not be anticipated, for it is not governed by any rule.  The law does not define what shall be deemed good cause for removal.  It is impossible even to conjecture what may or may not be so considered by the Senate.  The nature of the subject forbids clear proof.  If the charge be incapacity, what evidence will support it?  Fidelity to the Constitution may be understood or misunderstood in a thousand different ways, and by violent party men, in violent party times, unfaithfulness to the Constitution may even come to be considered meritorious.  If the officer be accused of dishonesty, how shall it be made out?  Will it be inferred from acts unconnected with public duty, from private history, or from general reputation, or must the President await the commission of an actual misdemeanor in office?  Shall he in the meantime risk the character and interest of the nation in the hands of men to whom he can not give his confidence?  Must he forbear his complaint until the mischief is done and can not be prevented?  If his zeal in the public service should impel him to anticipate the overt act, must he move at the peril of being tried himself for the offense of slandering his subordinate?  In the present circumstances of the country someone must be held responsible for official delinquency of every kind.  It is extremely difficult to say where that responsibility should be thrown if it be not left where it has been placed by the Constitution.  But all just men will admit that the President ought to be entirely relieved from such responsibility if he can not meet it by reason of restrictions placed by law upon his action.

The unrestricted power of removal from office is a very great one to be trusted even to a magistrate chosen by the general suffrage of the whole people and accountable directly to them for his acts.  It is undoubtedly liable to abuse, and at some periods of our history perhaps has been abused.  If it be thought desirable and constitutional that it should be so limited as to make the President merely a common informer against other public agents, he should at least be permitted to act in that capacity before some open tribunal, independent of party politics,