Presidential Monopoly

The Presidential Monopoly

Wrote Jefferson in 1790: “The transaction of business with foreign nations is executive altogether. It belongs, then, to the head of that department, except as to such portions of it as are specially submitted to the Senate. Exceptions are to be construed strictly.” 1 So when Citizen Genet, envoy to the United States from the first French Republic, sought an exequatur for a consul whose commission was addressed to the Congress of the United States, Jefferson informed him that “as the President was the only channel of communication between the United States and foreign nations, it was from him alone 'that foreign nations or their agents are to learn what is or has been the will of the nation'; that whatever he communicated as such, they had a right and were bound to consider 'as the expression of the nation'; and that no foreign agent could be 'allowed to question it,' or 'to interpose between him and any other branch of government, under the pretext of either's transgressing their functions.' Mr. Jefferson therefore declined to enter into any discussion of the question as to whether it belonged to the President under the Constitution to admit or exclude foreign agents. 'I inform you of the fact,' he said, 'by authority from the President.' Mr. Jefferson returned the consul's commission and declared that the President would issue no exequatur to a consul except upon a commission correctly addressed.” 2

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References

This text about Presidential Monopoly is based on “The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation”, published by the U.S. Government Printing Office.

Notes

[Footnote 1] Opinion on the Question Whether the Senate Has the Right to Negative the Grade of Persons Appointed by the Executive to Fill Foreign Missions, April 24, 1790, 5 WRITINGS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON 161, 162 (P. Ford ed., 1895).

[Footnote 2] 4 J. Moore, supra at 680-81.