[Xthe17th]

There were something like 85 Federalist letters. Is the one Wise referred to #78? If anyone knows the exact letter, LMK. In the meanwhile, thanks for the link to the Constitution website - will try to look it up.

[ez]

This is from #78... And as there would be a necessity for submitting each nomination to the judgment of an entire branch of the legislature, the circumstances attending an appointment, from the mode of conducting it, would naturally become matters of notoriety; and the public would be at no loss to determine what part had been performed by the different actors. The blame of a bad nomination would fall upon the President singly and absolutely. The censure of rejecting a good one would lie entirely at the door of the Senate; aggravated by the consideration of their having counteracted the good intentions of the Executive. If an ill appointment should be made, the Executive for nominating, and the Senate for approving, would participate, though in different degrees, in the opprobrium and disgrace. There are no penalties for acting inappropriately except for the notoriety among the populace. If the free press does not publcize the conflict, however, such pressure is abrogated.

Our course should be then to publicize this conflict as widely as possible.

[Stay the course]

George Will quoted #76 in his column this week. That's probably where Wise got it from.

[not_apathetic_anymore]

This from #76 But might not his nomination be overruled? I grant it might, yet this could only be to make place for another nomination by himself. The person ultimately appointed must be the object of his preference, though perhaps not in the first degree. It is also not very probable that his nomination would often be overruled. The Senate could not be tempted, by the preference they might feel to another, to reject the one proposed; because they could not assure themselves, that the person they might wish would be brought forward by a second or by any subsequent nomination. They could not even be certain, that a future nomination would present a candidate in any degree more acceptable to them; and as their dissent might cast a kind of stigma upon the individual rejected, and might have the appearance of a reflection upon the judgment of the chief magistrate, it is not likely that their sanction would often be refused, where there were not special and strong reasons for the refusal.