sarily implied, are expressly reserved to the
States respectively and to the people.
" That the State Governments should be
held secure in their reserved rights, and the
General Government sustained in its Con-
stitutional powers, &c.
" That the Federal and State govern-
ments are parts of one system, alike neces-
sary fur the common prosperity, peace and
security, and ought to be retarded alike
with a cordial, habitual and immovable
attachment. Respect for the authority of
each, and the acquiescence in just constitu-
tional measures of each. are duties required
by the plainest considerations of national,
of state, and of individual welfare."
I refer also to the celebrated resolutions
introduced into the Senate of the United
States in 1837, simply for the purpose of
showing that the great leader oof the Whig
party, Henry Clay, took a decided interest
in those resolutions, amended them in
many particulars, and voted for them, and
voted for one of them which declares,
" That in the adoption of the Federal
Constitution the States adopting the same
acted severally as free, independent and
sovereign States, and that each for itself by
its own voluntary assent, entered this Union
with a view to its increased security against
all dangers, domestic as well as foreign,
and the more perfect and secure enjoyment
of its advantages, national, political and
social."
The great name of Henry Clay can no
more be invoked in favor of this theory of
consolidation than it can in favor of that
other equally objectionable doctrine of
abolition.
Let me recur again to what Mr. Seward
has said in this celebrated letter written in
1861, when he was expounding to foreign
governments what was the nature and
character of our system: and to show that
he sets up no claim of paramount allegiance
to the Federal Government. He says:
" We are not only a nation, but we are
States also. All public officers as well as
all citizens, owe not only allegiance to the
Union but. allegiance also to the States in
which they reside."
He lays clown his principles just as the
Whig party did in 1850, and just as I shall
show they were held by statesmen of that
school, from the earliest times to the pres-
ent. No such doctrine as that of para-
mount allegiance to the General Govern-
ment was taught by Hamilton, and the
great men of his day. They recognized |
the fact that the State and Federal Govern-
ments were each supreme within its own
sphere of action, and it was the duty of the
citizen to obey both equally, not one more
than the other, but each within its consti-
tutional limits.
I now turn to the decisions of the courts
upon this subject. The gentleman from
Baltimore city, (Mr. Thomas,) was exceed-
ingly unfortunate in his allusion to the case
of McCullough vs. State of Maryland, in 4
Wheaton, as well as to the case in I Whea-
ton, if he thought he could derive from
them any support of his theory of consoli-
dation. What does Chief Justice Marshall
say in the first case. I will read a passage
or two from his opinion, upon the mode in
which this Constitution was adopted :
" They acted upon it in the only manner
in which they can act safely, effectually and
wisely on such a subject, by assembling in
convention. It is true they assembled in
their several States, and where else should
they have assembled? No political dreamer
was ever wild enough to think of breaking
down the lines which separata the States,
and of compounding the American people
into one common mass. Of consequence,
when they act. they act in their States"
Again, on the other point, " This Government
is acknowledged by all to be one
of enumerated powers. The principle that
it can exercise only the powers granted to
it would seem too apparent to have required
to be enforced by all those arguments which
its enlightened friends, while it was pending
before the people, found it necessary to
urge."
That principle is now universally adopted.
The same thing was said by Judge Story,
in the other case to which the gentleman
referred, Martin vs. Hunter's lessee, I
Wheaton, 657. Hear him.
" On the other hand, it is perfectly clear,
that the sovereign powers vested in the State
governments by their respective constitu-
tions, remains unaltered and unimpaired;
except so far as they were granted tie the
Government of the United States. These
deductions do not rest. upon general reason-
ing, plain and obvious as they seem to be.
They have been positively recognized by
one of the articles in Amendments of the
Constitution, which declares that ' the pow-
ers not delegated to the United States by
the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to
the States, are reserved to the States re-
spectively, or to the people.' The Govern-
ment, then, of the United States can claim |
