I have not taken account of the case in which the vast power
centralised in the chief magistrate, and the insufficient attachment
of the mass of the people to free institutions, give him a chance of
success in an attempt to subvert the Constitution, and usurp sovereign
power. Where such peril exists, no first magistrate is admissible whom
the Parliament cannot, by a single vote, reduce to a private
station. In a state of things holding out any encouragement to that
most audacious and profligate of all breaches of trust, even this
entireness of constitutional dependence is but a weak protection.
Of all officers of government, those in whose appointment any
participation of popular suffrage is the most objectionable are
judicial officers. While there are no functionaries whose special
and professional qualifications the popular judgment is less fitted to
estimate, there are none in whose case absolute impartiality, and
freedom from connection with politicians or sections of politicians,
are of anything like equal importance. Some thinkers, among others Mr.
Bentham, have been of opinion that, although it is better that
judges should not be appointed by popular election, the people of
their district ought to have the power, after sufficient experience,
of removing them from their trust. It cannot be denied that the
irremovability of any public officer, to whom great interests are
entrusted, is in itself an evil.
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