139.  The  President  is  advised  and  assisted  by  a  council,  Tha
generally  known  as  the  Gtibinet,  which  is  not  provided  for  in
the  constitution  but  has  been  created  by  statute.  Since  the
powers  of  the  President  are  conferred  upon  him  directly  by  the
constitution  and  can  not  be  taken  away  or  limited  by  act  of
Congress,  it  follows  that  the  President  in  executing  his  con-
stitutional functions  is  not  bound  to  take  the  advice  of  his
Cabinet.  He  is  the  actual  not  merely  the  nominal  executive,
and  the  acts  of  the  Cabinet  are  for  the  most  part  legally  his
acts,  though  in  a  few  cases  Congress  has  by  law  imposed  duties
or  conferred  powers  directly  upon  members  of  the  Cabinet.  The
Cabinet  consists  of  the  following  officers,  each  of  whom  is  the
head  of  a  department  of  the  government  for  whose  conduct  he
is  responsible  to  the  President,  namely,  the  Secretary  of  State,  who
acts  as  a  minister  of  foreign  affairs,  the  Secretary  of  the  Treasury,
the  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  who  has  special  charge  of  home
affairs,  the  Secretary  of  War,  the  Secretary  of  the  Navy,  the
Secretary  of  Agriculture,  the  Attorney  General,  who  is  the
chief  law  officer  of  the  government  and  the  head  of  the  depart-
ment of  justice,  and  the  Postmaster  General.  All  these  officers
are  appointed  by  the  President,  and  each  incoming  President
makes  his  own  Cabinet.  There  is  no  Prime  Minister.  The
members  of  the  Cabinet  are  not,  as  in  England,  members  of  j^^jjj^jpj
either  house  of  Congress,  nor  do  they  or  the  President  resign  «»«"**'^
their  offices  on  the  happening  of  an  adverse  majority  in  Con-
gress.    The  executive  is  not  a  mere  committee  of  the  legislature,

but  is  an  equal  and  independent  branch  of  the  government.
