Legislative and Executive Branch Service
Clifford was elected as a Democrat to the 26th and 27th Congresses, serving March 4, 1839 through March 3, 1843, and representing the Second and then the Third District. He was not a candidate for re-election in 1842.
In 1846, President James K. Polk appointed him 20th Attorney General of the United States after his predecessor, John Y. Mason, returned to being Naval Secretary. Clifford served in Polk's Cabinet from October 17, 1846, to March 17, 1848. Immediately after completing his service with the Justice Department he became the U.S. Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Mexico, serving from March 18, 1848 to September 6, 1849. It was through Clifford that the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was arranged with Mexico, by which California became a part of the United States.
Following his service in the diplomatic corps, Clifford resumed the practice of law in Portland, Maine.
Read more about this topic: Nathan Clifford
Famous quotes containing the words legislative and executive, legislative and, legislative, executive, branch and/or service:
“However much we may differ in the choice of the measures which should guide the administration of the government, there can be but little doubt in the minds of those who are really friendly to the republican features of our system that one of its most important securities consists in the separation of the legislative and executive powers at the same time that each is acknowledged to be supreme, in the will of the people constitutionally expressed.”
—Andrew Jackson (1767–1845)
“The dignity and stability of government in all its branches, the morals of the people, and every blessing of society, depend so much upon an upright and skilful administration of justice, that the judicial power ought to be distinct from both the legislative and executive, and independent upon both, that so it may be a check upon both, as both should be checks upon that.”
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“I find it profoundly symbolic that I am appearing before a committee of fifteen men who will report to a legislative body of one hundred men because of a decision handed down by a court comprised of nine men—on an issue that affects millions of women.... I have the feeling that if men could get pregnant, we wouldn’t be struggling for this legislation. If men could get pregnant, maternity benefits would be as sacrosanct as the G.I. Bill.”
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“Testimony of all ages forces us to admit that war is among the most dangerous enemies to liberty, and that the executive is the branch most favored by it of all the branches of Power.”
—James Madison (1751–1836)
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“The true courage of civilized nations is readiness for sacrifice in the service of the state, so that the individual counts as only one amongst many. The important thing here is not personal mettle but aligning oneself with the universal.”
—Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)