or union of states, was formed. The two plans, as originally introduced, are in I. Elliott's Debates, pp. 143, 175. They bear but little resemblance to the plan finally adopted. Each of them contemplated for its basis the "all-power" of the states.

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The "National" Idea repudiated. And, consistently with the above, on the very first occasion of considering this matter, the following record was made: "Wednesday, June 20th - The first resolution of the report of the committee of the whole being before the house, Mr. Ellsworth, seconded by Mr. Gorham, moves to alter it so as to 'that the government of the united states ought to consist of a supreme legislative, executive, and judiciary.' This alteration, he said, would drop the word 'national,' and retain the proper title, 'the united states.' . . . He wished also the plan to go forth as an amendment of the articles of confederation. . . . The motion of Mr. Ellsworth was acquiesced in, nem. con. The second resolution 'that the national legislature ought to consist of two branches,' being taken up the word 'national' struck out, as of course." [V. Ell. Deb. 214.] Nay, more, while the word "national" was used twenty-six times in the aforesaid resolutions, it was, in obedience to the aboveindicated will of the convention, invariably exchanged for "united states," and "union of states;" so that finally neither the word "national" nor the idea of it was left in the federal plan.

More Anti-National Facts. The expunction of "national" is merely the first of a series of great facts, that decisively contradict and refute Story and Webster, as well as their feebler followers. The 2d is, that on the 18th of August, 1787, the nationalists proposed to invest the general government with powers, to grant charters of incorporation, to establish a university and seminaries, to promote literature, science, and arts, to encourage useful knowledge, and discoveries, by premiums, etc., to establish public institutions, rewards, and immunities, for the promotion of agriculture, commerce and manufactures, etc. These, and others proposed, were suited to a national or state legislature, but not a federal one; and the convention declined to recommend transferring them from the state governments, where they already were.1 [V. Ell. Deb. 440, 445, 446.]

The 3d great anti-national fact is, that a power to revise or negative state laws was repeatedly proposed, and as often overwhelmingly defeated. [Ibid. 174, 180, 321-2, 468-9.] On the occasion of the last

1 If all powers, except those expressly delegated, were reserved by the states, the power to create the United States Bank, or Jay Cooke's National Insurance Company, to say nothing of other corporations, must have been reserved by the states, for no such power is expressed in the constitution. And as this power was proposed, discussed, and actually excluded from the constitution, there can be no doubt of the above corporate bodies being the offspring of usurpation by men who had sworn to refrain from it!

proposal, John Rutledge indignantly exclaimed: "If nothing else, this alone would damn, and ought to damn, the constitution ;" and the convention, by vote, refused even to let it go to a committee, and the proposition was withdrawn. [Ibid. 468-9. [Ibid. 468-9. See also Appendix C, No. 3.]

The 4th great anti-national fact is the all-important one, that the convention absolutely declined to give the general government even the least coercive power over states, and all the fathers spurned the idea, both in the federal and state conventions, as inconsistent with the plan, and tantamount to giving the power to wage war against the states. Mr. Madison said the idea was "visionary and fallacious;" Mr. Hamilton that it was "the maddest project ever devised;" and Ellsworth, Randolph, and others, spoke of it as preposterous, in the nature of war, and out of the question. This subject will be dealt with hereafter. Now what sort of a national government is that, which has no coercive power over the constituents of the nation no power to hold them together, and no power to negative, or even revise, state laws? How could Mr. Webster permit himself to say that the constitution "effectually controlled" "state sovereignty"? And we must note here, that the states made three amendments to forefend this very danger, the ninth and tenth to prevent the implying of powers for state control, and the eleventh to guard against even judicial coercion of states.

The Real Preamble.

The 5th great anti-national fact is one that Dane, Story, Webster, and Curtis must have deemed too important for allusion to, let alone comment on; and well they might, for it crushes them, and their little imaginary foothold in the constitution. The preamble and first article, unanimously adopted by the convention, for the proposed compact, were as follows: "We, the people of the states of New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, do ordain, declare, and establish the following constitution for the government of ourselves and our posterity. [Article I.] The style of the government shall be 'the united states of America,' etc. [V. Ell. Deb. 376, 382.]

But the whole instrument, after being agreed upon and adopted, article by article, was placed in the hands of a committee of revision, who reported it back considerably improved in mere form. As to the preamble, the generalization, "We, the people of the united states," was substituted, as equivalent to the specification of the states. This was proper, because the constitution was to take effect when ratified by nine states, and it might, if the states were named, result that some would be designated, though not in the union. It should

further be explained, that the phrase "We, the people " was used in this constitution, because the previous pact had been ratified, or acceded to, by the state governments the mere creatures of the people; whereas, in this case, it was intended to connect the federal government with, and base it directly upon, the very source of power the sovereignty itself; making thirteen sovereignties, as Madison and all the fathers understood, the constitutors of the new pact — the constituents or principals of the new agency. The people of the states, being obliged to act as organizations, and according to the law of their political nature, gave separate assents, and hence the new constitution was not less a compact than the old one, though the powers vested by it in the government created, were more extensive. And the convention accepted the revised constitution as their work, and never reconsidered their solemn and unanimous approval of the phrase "We, the people of the states." Dane and Story should have known this, as well as the independent ratifications of the states, when the former penned, and the latter quoted approvingly, the following, in reference to the preamble: "They properly said, 'We, the people of the united states' do ordain and establish; and not 'We, the people of each state.'"

"The style of the government shall be the united states of America.” Here we see that the real government is the states themselves, the "general government" being "the government of [i. e. belonging to] the united states," and a mere agency. These states were republics, and they intended to keep, and not cede, political sovereignty. Their citizens only, and not themselves, were to be the subjects of governing power. This is what Madison meant, in the Virginia ratifying convention, by the phrase "a government of a federal nature, consisting of many coequal sovereignties;" and what Parsons meant, in the Massachusetts ratifying convention, by saying, "the people divest themselves of nothing," when they delegate powers of government!

The 6th great anti-national fact is, that the entire convention thought they had formed a federal plan, because in their unanimous letter, reporting the constitution to congress, they spoke of it as "the federal government of these states;" and in the compact itself, they repeatedly wrote the phrase "the united states," and "union of states." And it is a most potent fact, that Gouverneur Morris, one of the chief consolidationists, and the chairman of the committee on revision, whose pen made the change referred to above, declared, years afterwards, that "the constitution is a compact between political societies, ... each enjoying sovereign power." [III. Life of G. Morris, 193.] Anti-national Contemporaneous Exposition. But, perhaps, the most important fact in the history of this great subject, is the follow

ing, that, after the work was finished, all the leading fathers, in the state conventions, through the press, and before the people, characterized the constitution as a compact, and the system as a federation of sovereign states, as is already shown in Part I., Chapter VII.

It is quite certain, then, that the original states, and the fathers, intended to avoid the very thing these expounders predicated of the constitution, viz. a consolidated nation, or a sovereign national government; and to make the very thing these men deny, viz. federal union of states.

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Hamilton, all of whose views and wishes were in favor of consolidation, was forced to admit that his plan and idea had been rejected [V. Ell. Deb. 556], and that the system was "A CONFEDERACY OF STATES." [II. Ell. Deb. 353.] He also said: "While the constitution continues to be read, and its principles known, the states must, by every rational man, be considered as essential component parts of the 'union.'" [Ibid. 304.]

IN

CHAPTER VIII.

DANIEL WEBSTER'S MASTER-PIECE OF CRITICISM.

INTERPRETATION No. 12. “CONSTITUTIONAL COMPACT."

N 1833, John C. Calhoun submitted a series of resolutions to the United States Senate, the first of which declared, "that the people of the several states . . are united as parties to a constitutional compact, to which the people of each state acceded as a separate sovereign community."

In his celebrated reply, Daniel Webster severely inveighed against Mr. C.'s use of the words "compact" and "accede," and charged him with "abandoning the use of constitutional language for a new vocabulary." "If," said Mr. W., "nothing was done but acceding to a compact, nothing would seem necessary, in order to break it up, but to secede from the same compact. . . This is the reason why it is necessary to give new names to things; to speak of the constitution, not as a constitution, but as a compact; and of the ratifications by the people, not as ratifications, but as acts of accession." And he repeatedly made the assertion that "there is no language in the whole constitution, applicable to a confederation of states."

These utterances involve the absurd assumption that all language used, in devising, discussing, and establishing the constitution, by the fathers and the states, which they did not also use in the instrument, is unconstitutional, as well as improper for resolutions and arguments concerning it.

"Compact" and "accede" are correct. -I shall now proceed to show that Mr. C's language was precisely that which the fathers and the states habitually used, throughout the great series of discussions and acts attending the establishment of the federal system. Nay, more, I shall show before concluding, that Mr. Calhoun's resolution expressed the most studied and elaborate views of Mr. Webster himself !

In the establishment of the constitution, the acts by which the conventions expressed the wills of their respective states were described by a variety of words and phrases, all of which embodied the idea of a ratification of the instrument by political bodies. Little Delaware, in