U.S. Senate unreflectively goes hardcore on confirmations from the very beginning

Their attitude is, of course we need someone we can work with. And their attitude toward George Washington is, of course the country needs an elder statesman (meaning a largely ceremonial chief executive).

Both of these are large steps toward a parliamentary form of democracy.

For example, with the third president (maybe Thomas Jefferson) having nowhere near the authority to make a large land purchase from France, how do you see the expansion or not of the United States going, including relations with American Indian peoples?

And any outside chance a parliamentary system might bring about phase-out of slavery?
 
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The Senate is extremely picky over who they confirm for Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury, Attorney General, and Secretary of War. (original first 4 cabinet positions)

* and they think this is just naturally the way things should be, to the point where most members of Congress don’t even understand the occasion criticism of them for being picky
 
Because people like the Sec. of State primarily keep their job or don’t keep their job depending on whether most Senators approve of the job they’re doing.

And the president is reduced to a largely ceremonial role, which admittedly has some importance to a nation and a people.
 
On the contrary, imo, if Congress starts getting pissy about cabinet officers, the President will likely just appoint them in spite of Congress. Nothing in the Constitution gives Congress any say over the Cabinet. This could easily lead to a STRONGER presidency, not a weaker one.

Besides, even under current rules, Congress can't un-ratify an officer. The whole point of a parliamentary system is that the executive is in power only so long as it has the confidence of the legislative body, and nothing you're proposing comes anywhere remotely near that.
 
You can not apply the rules of modern parliaments to US... All countries who have this kind of system came from a constitutional monarchy or have still today a King as head of state and in neither case the head of state is elected by the people. Excluding the fact who I can not see any valid reason for doing that in the just established US is most likely who doing something like that in that timeframe would be ASB... You can not apply the political system of late 1800-1900 to late 1700...
 
On the contrary, imo, if Congress starts getting pissy about cabinet officers, the President will likely just appoint them in spite of Congress. . .
You can not apply the rules of modern parliaments to US... All countries who have this kind of system came from a constitutional monarchy or have still today a King as head of state . . .
Yes, there could develop a test of wills between Congress and the presidency, and yes, at the very least it would be a non-traditional way of developing a parliamentary system.

But I think I was told at both the high school and college level that American patriots were very fearful of sliding back and getting a king again and that they seriously considered having a 3-person executive. And it was only because they trusted George Washington that they went ahead with a single person president.

So, I think with a little more skepticism in this direction, early America could have evolved in a different way.

———-

Later edit: It looks like George Mason may have been the only person who advocated for a 3-person executive.
https://books.google.com/books?id=n...hosen from each region of the nation”&f=false
But it was something mentioned in my own education perhaps as early as junior high (ages 11-14), for it is a interesting, colorful idea.
 
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Speaking as an American citizen, we think of our Constitution as setting up three co-equal branches of government, largely because that’s what we’re taught in school.

People back then . . . well, Article I is first and it’s the longest, and people then may have largely inclined to think in terms of the Legislative being in charge, with this as much preferable to a king either inherited or created having too much power.

So, I’m asking, What if the early situation had played out a little more in this direction?
 
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Speaking as an American citizen, we think of our Constitution as setting up three co-equal branches of government, largely because that’s what we’re taught in school.

People back then . . . well, Article I is first and it’s the longest, and people then may have largely inclined to think in terms of the Legislative being in charge, with this as much preferable to a king either inherited or created having too much power.

So, I’m asking, What if the early situation had played out a little more in this direction?
I really agree with you that many things still had to be established because of the lack of precedents.
It would be argued in this case that the legislative can't appoint directly the executive. It would break the separation of powers, the basic idea behind the first three articles.
 
. . . It would break the separation of powers, the basic idea behind the first three articles.
I’m pretty sure the phrase separation of power doesn’t appear anywhere in the Constitution. Of course, it can be very reasonably argued that the idea is heavily implied, and it may well have been directly argued in the Federalist Papers.

Now, with the Constitution having 7 Articles and the third Article setting up a Judiciary in a straightforward and relatively brief manner (the most substantial part may be the limited definition of treason), this third Article may have largely been viewed in the nature of housekeeping. That is, I don’t think the framers anticipated the Supreme Court becoming as powerful as it did.
 
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