" All executive
departments--the State, War, Navy, Treasury, Post Office, Interior,
Justice, Agriculture, and Labor--have been created from time to time by
act of Congress. Regarding the structure and number of federal courts,
the constitution merely provides that "The judicial power of the United
States shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts
as Congress may from time to time ordain and establish." Our elaborate
system of district, circuit, and territorial courts, rests solely upon
congressional enactments. So, too, the constitution gives to Congress
the control of territories, but does not provide how that control shall
be exercised.
The framers of our constitution were wise in not attempting to specify
more particularly than they did, the manner in which the several powers
granted to the Federal Government should be exercised. They realized
that they were forming a scheme that was to endure for many years, and
that if it was to be capable of meeting the needs of a changing and
rapidly growing country, it would have to be elastic, and contain within
itself the power of adapting itself to new needs and conditions. To
secure the beneficial execution of the powers granted, Congress was
given the power of selecting appropriate means. To have refused the
grant of this power, would have been to attempt to provide by
unchangeable rule for emergencies that could by no possibilities be
foreseen.
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