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It is possible to distinguish in the federal administrative agencies, collectively known as "the bureaucracy," a separate branch of government distinct alike from the executive and from the legislature. It is equally possible to argue that the administrative agencies, because they are the organs through which the law becomes effective and because they are at least nominally under presidential control, are parts of the executive establishment; or that through congressional control over appropriations they are extensions of the legislature. To the extent that the bureaucracy does in fact share all of these characteristics, it becomes the instrument through which the close fusion of executive and legislative functions required by the complex nature of modern government may be brought about under a constitution committed to the eighteenth-century doctrine of separation of powers.

Jefferson's importance as a political theorist tends to be overshadowed by his success as diplomat and statesman. The practical accomplishments of his forty years in public office often obscure the breadth and consistency of the philosophy behind all of his official conduct, and his tremendous influence in formulating and disseminating the principles on which the modern democratic state rests is too often forgotten. His genius consisted, not so much in the originality of his political ideas, as in his ability to select from the conflicting theories of his day all that could be practically applied, and to transmute a diverse intellectual heritage into a working philosophy of the state. Against the sovereign whose command is law, Jefferson sets up a legal theory seeking justice as well as order, and by which ruler and subject are alike bound. It is a theory which transcends national lines, recognizing that isolation, in any rigorous sense, means stagnation and death, both to the individual and to the state. So when Jefferson asks for "peace, commerce, and honest friendship, with all nations–entangling alliances with none," only the second phrase is negative, and it means no more than it says. Peace and commerce are both relations external to the individual state; and both presuppose for their maintenance some form of international organization–some system of international law. Both Jefferson's writings and his official acts testify to his belief that the intercourse of nations must be governed by some body of legal rules.

From the great mass of Jefferson's writings, letters, and public utterances, it is possible to select isolated fragments in justification of almost any course one chooses to pursue; and the history of his forty years in the service of his country offers almost as various a pattern. Taking his career and his writings as a whole, however, and piecing together from both the broad outlines of a political philosophy, one is struck by what appears to be a dual emphasis: two diverging streams of thought, which seem at first glance to be incompatible, and which have rendered the great democrat vulnerable to the charge of inconsistency so often repeated in his own day as in ours. One of these emphases, and that most apt to be quoted by campaign orators, is on individualism; but the direction and purpose of the other is socialistic.Both in the abstract system of the philosopher and in the concrete events of the world of action, time has a way of reconciling apparent contradictions. Historical perspective will do much to reveal unsuspected unities, and the point of view from which the inquiry is approached will do the rest.