have no control over his election; that the only mode to prevent this was to give the exclusive direction to the State Legislatures in the mode of choosing Electors, who should be obliged to vote secretly; and that the vote should be taken in such manner, and on the same day, as to make it impossible for the different States to know who the Electors are for, or for improper domestic, or, what is of much more consequence, foreign influence and gold to interfere; that by doing this the President would really hold his office independent of the Legislature; that instead of being the creature, he would be the man of the people; that he would have to look to them, and to the confidence which he felt his own meritorious actions would inspire, for applause or subsequent appointments. …
Knowing that it was the intention of the Constitution to make the President completely independent of the Federal Legislature, I well remember it was the object, as it is at present not only the spirit but the letter of that instrument, to give to Congress no interference in, or control over the election of a President. It is made their duty to count over the votes in a convention of both Houses, and for the President of the Senate to declare who has the majority of the votes of the Electors so transmitted. It never was intended, nor could it have been safe, in the Constitution, to have given to Congress thus assembled in convention, the right to object to any vote, or even to question whether they were constitutionally or properly given. This right of determining on the manner in which the Electors shall vote; the inquiry into the qualifications, and the guards necessary to prevent disqualified or improper men voting, and to insure the votes being legally given, rests and is exclusively vested in the State Legislatures. If it is necessary to have guards against improper elections of Electors, and to institute tribunals to inquire into their qualifications, with the State Legislatures, and with them alone, rests the power to institute them, and they must exercise it. To give to Congress, even when assembled in convention, a right to reject or admit the votes of States, would have been so gross and dangerous an absurdity, as the framers of the Constitution never could have been guilty of. How could they expect, that in deciding on the election of a President, particularly where such election was strongly contested, that party spirit would not prevail, and govern every decision? Did they not know how easy it was to raise objections against the votes of particular elections, and that in determining upon these, it was more than probable, the members would recollect their sides, their favorite candidate, and sometimes their own interests? Or must they not have supposed, that, in putting the ultimate and final decision of the Electors in
