James A. Garfield Quotes
If nobody is to be appointed because he is your friend or my friend, then nobody should be appointed because he is any other man's friend. The President himself should exercise the same self denial as other officials.
James A. Garfield, 1831-1881, 20th President of the United States (Republican, OH), Theodore Clark, Life and Letters of James A. Garfield, 1925
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2nd Baronet Peel. He was then the Chief Secretary of Ireland and only 26 years of age. Patronage jobs, cronyism, and corruption was then extreme in Irish politics.
We shall have a system where When Roosevelt became Police Commissioner, virtually every appointment, promotion, and disciplinary action was controlled politically. Nothing could be more shocking to the police and the politicians than Roosevelt’s statement. But he implemented that policy and the result developed into the finest urban police department in the country. The political influence however returned a few decades later.
He is remembered today as the "Hanging Judge" of the American Old West. The two statements of his motto are contradictory unless all trials were perfect and all police, prosecutors, defense lawyers, defendants and witness always told the truth, and never made mistakes. This judge never followed the basic principle laid down by Blackstone regarding criminal law. See {594956}.
1st Earl Baldwin of Bewdley
Shortly before his inauguration, Grant was arrested for driving his horses on Pennsylvania Avenue in excess of the speed limit. The presiding judge, Charles Walter, fined the President-elect ten dollars. Later, when Walter's commission came up for renewal, Grant was reminded that Walter had fined him; others, more respectful to the President, waited anxiously to be appointed Justice of the Police Court of the District of Columbia. Grant said:
James Abram Garfield was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March to September 1881. Garfield was shot by an assassin four months into his presidency and died two months later. He is the only sitting member of the United States House of Representatives to be elected to the presidency.
