of the authors, and the extent of the injury inflicted, the determination manifested to persist in it, and the danger of delay. But in cases of deliberate, dangerous and palpable infractions of the Constitution affecting the sovereignty of a state and liberties of the people, it is not only the right, but the duty of such a state to interpose its authority for their protection in the manner best calculated to secure that end. When emergencies occur which are either beyond the reach of the judicial tribunals, or too pressing to admit of delay incident to their forms, states which have no common umpire, must be their own judges, and execute their own decisions." This effort of Massachusetts to justify her interposition against the General Government and the war of 1812, was a libel on the Democratic doctrine of State Rights. She appealed neither to the judiciary nor to a Constitutional amendment as a remedy, but abjured both. It was unlawful state resistance to lawful Federal authority. It was not reserved state rights exercised against undelegated Federal power, but state wrongs against Federal rights; not state power in defence of its own sovereignty, but in rebellion against a sovereignty, delegated by itself to another. Such was the the position of Massachusetts in her four years of rebellion against the government during the war of 1812. To know how severely she was condemned by the Democracy of that day, it is only needful to refer to the reports of the joint committees, respectively of the great states of New York and Pennsylvania, made in 1815, on the convention, and its reports above alluded to. The joint committee of the New York Legislature says: "At the time this convention was called, the United States was engaged in a war with one of the most formidable nations on earth. Having terminated hostilities with every other nation, she was bending the whole of her mighty power against our devoted country. Flushed with victory, her minions vauntingly boasted that they would drive our chief magistrate from his station, and bring America a miserable suppliant at the foot of the British throne." * * Referring to the report of that convention, signed by the names which have been given, this committee further say: "it was approved by Massachusetts and Connecticut." "It contains, among other things, a recommendation to the states represented in the convention, to adopt such measures as might effectually protect their citizens from the operation of certain laws, which were then under the consideration of Congress; to unite in an ear

nest application to the government of the United States to make a surrender to them of a portion of the National revenue, to organize the military force of those states and hold in readiness to act in in their own defense, or that of each other; manifestly for the purpose of resisting the power of the General Government, and finally, if they should be successful in their application, and peace should not be concluded and their defense neglected, as they allege it had been, to appoint delegates to another convention with such power and instructions as, (to use their own language) a crisis so momentous might require;' meaning thereby, in the opinion of your committee to make peace with the enemy, and forcibly to separate themselves from the Union."

Another ground of rebellion by Massachusetts against the Federal Government, was the admission of Louisiana into the Union, which she alleged to be a violation of State Rights.

The growth of our country beyond the limits of the old thirteen states to its present grand proportions, owes its origin and progress to the National Democracy. No grander or more patriotic achievement was ever accomplished by them for this high purpose, than the acquisition of Louisiana through their great leader, Thomas Jefferson. Out of this, have come into the Union the important States of Louisiana, Arkansas, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska, and we may say, Oregon. Previously, this vast territory had been owned, for fifteen years of our national existence, by a powerful foreign nation, which thereby held command of the mouth of the great rivers which rise in our Western States, and flow through them to the Ocean. These outlets to the sea, she had disputed our rights to use, and thus our commeree was endangered and our trade restricted. On this splendid achievement of Mr. Jefferson-this grant of the freedom of the seas to our commerce-this peaceful purchase, not by blood, but for a paltry sum, of this vast domain and of these highways to the Ocean-this one great occasion of our national expansion and of our national glory-Massachusetts charged the government with having committed a great wrong, and made the admission of Louisiana into the Union one of the counts in her indictment against the Federal Government during the war of 1812. She charged that admission to be a violation of state rights, and flagrantly so, as it had been done without obtaining the assent of each and all the states as members of the national compact. She therefore instructed her

Senators and Representatives in Congress, more than a year after its passage, to repeal this act of admission and thus to dissolve the union formed with the new state, because she charged it was in violation of state rights and state sovereignty. Although the acquisition of Louisiana, and its admission as a State in the Union, had been declared constitutional by the Supreme Court, and by all the departments of the government, and sustained by the nation at large, as an act of the highest statemanship; yet on the occasion of the annexation of Texas, in 1844, Massachusetts, actuated by the same rebellious spirit against the Federal Government, which characterized her opposition to the admission of Louisiana into the Union, assumed a rebellious position, and threatened the exercise of state sovereignty against the Federal Government by declaring, "that the project of the annexation of Texas, unless arrested on the threshold, may drive these states into a dissolution of the Union." "And as the powers of legislation, granted in the Constitution of the United States to Congress, do not embrace the case of the admission of a foreign state by the legislature-such an act of admission would have no binding force whatever on the people of Massachusetts.'

Ohio, by a resolution of her Legislature, passed in the winter of 1820-21, declared: "This General Assembly do recognize and approve the doctrine asserted by the Legislatures of Kentucky and Virginia, in their resolutions of November and December, 1798, and January, 1800, and do consider that their principles have been recognized and adopted by a majority of the American people. At the same time, in violation of those Virginia principles, she adopted the report of the Committee who presented the resolution, in which, referring to the Bank of the United States, they "recommend that provision be made by law forbidding our Courts, Justices of the Peace, Judges and Grand Juries from taking any cognizance of any wrong alleged to have been committed upon any species of property owned by the Bank, or upon any of its corporate rights or privileges; and prohibiting our Notaries Public from protesting any notes or bills by the Bank or their agents or made payable to them." This Bank was a constitutional fiscal agent of the General Government, decided to be such by the Supreme Court. The law commended in the report rendered the Bank wholly inoperative and therefore an act of nullification, placing Ohio in direct

hostility to the Federal Government, and classing her with Pennsylvania and Massachusetts as the only States in the union which up to 1821 had taught the doctrine that the Constitution was only a league, and had nullified an act of Congress and ignored the authority of the Federal Judiciary.

Equally condemned by the Democracy, is the extreme doctrine of state rights advocated by the Hon. William Rawle, a most distinguished jurist of Pennsylvania, the author of one of the earliest and most celebrated commentaries on the Constitution. He was born in Philadelphia in 1759. Having studied law in New York, in London, and in Paris; having been offered by Washington the Attorney-Generalship of the United States, and served as District Attorney and as Chancellor of the Bar Association of Philadelphia; he published, in 1825, a commentary on the constitution which has been circulated, ever since its publication, far and wide througout the Union. This work is quoted by Judge Story as one of the earliest and highest authorities on many questions of constitutional law. Considering its early date and its high standing and extensive circulation, perhaps no commentary has exerted a greater influence in construing the Constitution than that of the renowned jurist of the Philadelphia Bar. In his celebrated commentary, he virtually justifies the heresy of his own State which has been cited, by assuming the position that "the secession of a State from the Union depends on the will of the people of such state." In other words, that without an actual violation by the General Government of the Federal compact, a state has not only the right to interpose, but even to secede. Such a doctrine as that maintained by Rawle, and by the different states on the occasions which have been named is wholly inconsistent with, and condemned by, the State Rights creed of 1798, and by that advocated by the National Democracy of the present day.

South Carolina in 1833 followed these precedents, and made herself prominent in the support of such heresies, which were promptly disclaimed by Virginia, in her resolutions of that year denouncing them, and were bravely resisted by the National Democracy headed by General Jackson, then their distinguished leader and President.

The next example which we shall notice in this connection is the case of Rhode Island v. Massachusetts, in which Rhode Island

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filed a bill in the Federal Court against Massachusetts, asking for the establishment of the Northern boundary between the two States, and the right of the complainant to a tract of land in dispute, containing about eighty square miles. Notwithstanding the plain, express provision of our Constitution that the judicial power shall extend "to controversies between two or more States," and that the General Government, even under the old Articles of Confederation, had the express authority to settle such disputes "as may arise between two or more States concerning boundary," Massachusetts moved to dismiss the bill on the ground that the Court had no jurisdiction of the cause, because of her State Rights and State Sovereignty. She dared boldly to declare before that high National tribunal in all the pride of her Stately power, that " this suit being for sovereignty and sovereign rights, is beyond the jurisdiction of a judicial court." The common law of England takes no jurisdiction over the actions of Sovereign States, nor is there any power in Chancery to hold jurisdiction over a Sovereign, without his consent. Such is the character of the States, respectively, of this Union The States never intended to include in their controversies questions of sovereign right, for the regulation of which no law is made, and no law ever can be made by any other power than themselves, and each one for itself." Fortunately, the little but plucky State of Rhode Island was the party present to rebuke such sovereign audacity. When Massachusetts expressed the hope that if the Court should decide against her, "it will, for the honor of the Court, for the honor of the country, be sure to find some way to execute its decree;" Rhode Island promptly responded: "What! does Massachusetts threaten? Is Massachusetts ready to become a nullifying State, and to set up her will in defiance of this Court and of the Constitution?" After such stormy words from Rhode Island, with perchance a slight suggestion that General Jackson was still alive, the record becomes suddenly silent as to the final result of the controversy.

In the course of events, the great American conflict of 1860, occurred. Its issues and results necessarily demand our attention in the discussion of the subject under consideration.

The Southerners claimed the exercise of two rights, which they alleged were of vital interest to them, and were secured by the Federal Constitution.

The first was, the equal right of the people of the United