The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster With an Essay on Daniel Webster as a Master of English Style (part 4 of 8)

The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster With an Essay on Daniel Webster as a Master of English Style (part 4 of 8)

"If we fail, it can be no worse for us. But we shall not fail. The cause will raise up armies; the cause will create navies. The people, the people, if we are true to them, will carry us, and will carry themselves, gloriously, through this struggle. I care not how fickle other people have been found. I know the people of these Colonies, and I know that resistance to British aggression is deep and settled in their hearts and cannot be eradicated. Every Colony, indeed, has expressed its willingness to follow, if we but take the lead. Sir, the Declaration will inspire the people with increased courage. Instead of a long and bloody war for the restoration of privileges, for redress of grievances, for chartered immunities, held under a British king, set before them the glorious object of entire independeuce, and it will breathe into them anew the breath of life. Read this Declaration at the head of the army; every sword will be drawn from its scabbard, and the solemn vow uttered, to maintain it, or to perish on the bed of honor. Publish it from the pulpit; religion will approve it, and the love of religious liberty will cling round it, resolved to stand with it, or fall with it. Send it to the public halls; proclaim it there; let them hear it who heard the first roar of the enemy's cannon; let them see it who saw their brothers and their sons fall on the field of Bunker Hill, and in the streets of Lexington and Concord, and the very walls will cry out in its support.

"Sir, I know the uncertainty of human affairs, but I see, I see clearly, through this day's business. You and I, indeed, may rue it. We may not live to the time when this Declaration shall be made good. We may die; die colonists; die slaves; die, it may be, ignominiously and on the scaffold. Be it so. Be it so. If it be the pleasure of Heaven that my country shall require the poor offering of my life, the victim shall be ready, at the appointed hour of sacrifice, come when that hour may. But while I do live, let me have a country, or at least the hope of a country, and that a free country.

"But whatever may be our fate, be assured, be assured that this Declaration will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost blood; but it will stand, and it will richly compensate for both. Through the thick gloom of the present, I see the brightness of the future, as the sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious, an immortal day. When we are in our graves, our children will honor it. They will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires, and illuminations. On its annual return they will shed tears, copious, gushing tears, not of subjection and slavery, not of agony and distress, but of exultation, of gratitude, and of joy. Sir, before God, I believe the hour is come. My judgment approves this measure, and my whole heart is in it. All that I have, and all that I am, and all that I hope, in this life, I am now ready here to stake upon it; and I leave off as I begun, that live or die, survive or perish, I am for the Declaration. It is my living sentiment, and by the blessing of God it shall be my dying sentiment, Independence now, and INDEPENDENCE FOR EVER."[9]

And so that day shall be honored, illustrious prophet and patriot! so that day shall be honored, and as often as it returns, thy renown shall come along with it, and the glory of thy life, like the day of thy death, shall not fail from the remembrance of men.

It would be unjust, fellow-citizens, on this occasion, while we express our veneration for him who is the immediate subject of these remarks, were we to omit a most respectful, affectionate, and grateful mention of those other great men, his colleagues, who stood with him, and with the same spirit, the same devotion, took part in the interesting transaction. HANCOCK, the proscribed HANCOCK, exiled from his home by a military governor, cut off by proclamation from the mercy of the crown,--Heaven reserved for him the distinguished honor of putting this great question to the vote, and of writing his own name first, and most conspicuously, on that parchment which spoke defiance to the power of the crown of England. There, too, is the name of that other proscribed patriot, SAMUEL ADAMS, a man who hungered and thirsted for the independence of his country, who thought the Declaration halted and lingered, being himself not only ready, but eager, for it, long before it was proposed; a man of the deepest sagacity, the clearest foresight, and the profoundest judgment in men. And there is GERRY, himself among the earliest and the foremost of the patriots, found, when the battle of Lexington summoned them to common counsels, by the side of WARREN; a man who lived to serve his country at home and abroad, and to die in the second place in the government. There, too, is the inflexible, the upright, the Spartan character, ROBERT TREAT PAINE. He also lived to serve his country through the struggle, and then withdrew from her councils, only that he might give his labors and his life to his native State, in another relation. These names, fellow-citizens, are the treasures of the Commonwealth; and they are treasures which grow brighter by time.

It is now necessary to resume the narrative, and to finish with great brevity the notice of the lives of those whose virtues and services we have met to commemorate.

Mr. Adams remained in Congress from its first meeting till November, 1777, when he was appointed Minister to France. He proceeded on that service in the February following, embarking in the frigate Boston, from the shore of his native town, at the foot of Mount Wollaston. The year following, he was appointed commissioner to treat of peace with England. Returning to the United States, he was a delegate from Braintree in the Convention for framing the Constitution of this Commonwealth, in 1780.[10] At the latter end of the same year, he again went abroad in the diplomatic service of the country, and was employed at various courts, and occupied with various negotiations, until 1788. The particulars of these interesting and important services this occasion does not allow time to relate. In 1782 he concluded our first treaty with Holland. His negotiations with that republic, his efforts to persuade the States-General to recognize our independence, his incessant and indefatigable exertions to represent the American cause favorably on the Continent, and to counteract the designs of its enemies, open and secret, and his successful undertaking to obtain loans on the credit of a nation yet new and unknown, are among his most arduous, most useful, most honorable services. It was his fortune to bear a part in the negotiation for peace with England, and in something more than six years from the Declaration which he had so strenuously supported, he had the satisfaction of seeing the minister plenipotentiary of the crown subscribe his name to the instrument which declared that his "Britannic Majesty acknowledged the United States to be free, sovereign, and independent." In these important transactions, Mr. Adams's conduct received the marked approbation of Congress and of the country.

While abroad, in 1787, he published his "Defence of the American Constitutions"; a work of merit and ability, though composed with haste, on the spur of a particular occasion, in the midst of other occupations, and under circumstances not admitting of careful revision. The immediate object of the work was to counteract the weight of opinions advanced by several popular European writers of that day, M. Turgot, the Abbé de Mably, and Dr. Price, at a time when the people of the United States were employed in forming and revising their systems of government.

Returning to the United States in 1788, he found the new government about going into operation, and was himself elected the first Vice-President, a situation which he filled with reputation for eight years, at the expiration of which he was raised to the Presidential chair, as immediate successor to the immortal Washington. In this high station he was succeeded by Mr. Jefferson, after a memorable controversy between their respective friends, in 1801; and from that period his manner of life has been known to all who hear me. He has lived, for five-and-twenty years, with every enjoyment that could render old age happy. Not inattentive to the occurrences of the times, political cares have yet not materially, or for any long time, disturbed his repose. In 1820 he acted as Elector of President and Vice-President, and in the same year we saw him, then at the age of eighty-five, a member of the Convention of this Commonwealth called to revise the Constitution. Forty years before, he had been one of those who formed that Constitution; and he had now the pleasure of witnessing that there was little which the people desired to change.[11] Possessing all his faculties to the end of his long life, with an unabated love of reading and contemplation, in the centre of interesting circles of friendship and affection, he was blessed in his retirement with whatever of repose and felicity the condition of man allows. He had, also, other enjoyments. He saw around him that prosperity and general happiness which had been the object of his public cares and labors. No man ever beheld more clearly, and for a longer time, the great and beneficial effects of the services rendered by himself to his country. That liberty which he so early defended, that independence of which he was so able an advocate and supporter, he saw, we trust, firmly and securely established. The population of the country thickened around him faster, and extended wider, than his own sanguine predictions had anticipated; and the wealth, respectability, and power of the nation sprang up to a magnitude which it is quite impossible he could have expected to witness in his day. He lived also to behold those principles of civil freedom which had been developed, established, and practically applied in America, attract attention, command respect, and awaken imitation, in other regions of the globe; and well might, and well did, he exclaim, "Where will the consequences of the American Revolution end?"

If any thing yet remain to fill this cup of happiness, let it be added, that he lived to see a great and intelligent people bestow the highest honor in their gift where he had bestowed his own kindest parental affections and lodged his fondest hopes. Thus honored in life, thus happy at death, he saw the JUBILEE, and he died; and with the last prayers which trembled on his lips was the fervent supplication for his country, "Independence for ever!"[12]

Mr. Jefferson, having been occupied in the years 1778 and 1779 in the important service of revising the laws of Virginia, was elected Governor of that State, as successor to Patrick Henry, and held the situation when the State was invaded by the British arms. In 1781 he published his Notes on Virginia, a work which attracted attention in Europe as well as America, dispelled many misconceptions respecting this continent, and gave its author a place among men distinguished for science. In November, 1783, he again took his seat in the Continental Congress, but in the May following was appointed Minister Plenipotentiary, to act abroad, in the negotiation of commercial treaties, with Dr. Franklin and Mr. Adams. He proceeded to France, in execution of this mission, embarking at Boston; and that was the only occasion on which he ever visited this place. In 1785 he was appointed Minister to France, the duties of which situation he continued to perform until October, 1789, when he obtained leave to retire, just on the eve of that tremendous revolution which has so much agitated the world in our times. Mr. Jefferson's discharge of his diplomatic duties was marked by great ability, diligence, and patriotism; and while he resided at Paris, in one of the most interesting periods, his character for intelligence, his love of knowledge and of the society of learned men, distinguished him in the highest circles of the French capital. No court in Europe had at that time in Paris a representative commanding or enjoying higher regard, for political knowledge or for general attainments, than the minister of this then infant republic. Immediately on his return to his native country, at the organization of the government under the present Constitution, his talents and experience recommended him to President Washington for the first office in his gift. He was placed at the head of the Department of State. In this situation, also, he manifested conspicuous ability. His correspondence with the ministers of other powers residing here, and his instructions to our own diplomatic agents abroad, are among our ablest state papers. A thorough knowledge of the laws and usages of nations, perfect acquaintance with the immediate subject before him, great felicity, and still greater facility, in writing, show themselves in whatever effort his official situation called on him to make. It is believed by competent judges, that the diplomatic intercourse of the government of the United States, from the first meeting of the Continental Congress in 1774 to the present time, taken together, would not suffer, in respect to the talent with which it has been conducted, by comparison with any thing which other and older governments can produce; and to the attainment of this respectability and distinction Mr. Jefferson has contributed his full part.

On the retirement of General Washington from the Presidency, and the election of Mr. Adams to that office in 1797, he was chosen Vice-President. While presiding in this capacity over the deliberations of the Senate, he compiled and published a Manual of Parliamentary Practice, a work of more labor and more merit than is indicated by its size. It is now received as the general standard by which proceedings are regulated, not only in both Houses of Congress, but in most of the other legislative bodies in the country. In 1801 he was elected President, in opposition to Mr. Adams, and re-elected in 1805, by a vote approaching towards unanimity.

From the time of his final retirement from public life, in 1809, Mr. Jefferson lived as became a wise man. Surrounded by affectionate friends, his ardor in the pursuit of knowledge undiminished, with uncommon health and unbroken spirits, he was able to enjoy largely the rational pleasures of life, and to partake in that public prosperity which he had so much contributed to produce. His kindness and hospitality, the charm of his conversation, the ease of his manners, the extent of his acquirements, and, especially, the full store of Revolutionary incidents which he had treasured in his memory, and which he knew when and how to dispense, rendered his abode in a high degree attractive to his admiring countrymen, while his high public and scientific character drew towards him every intelligent and educated traveller from abroad. Both Mr. Adams and Mr. Jefferson had the pleasure of knowing that the respect which they so largely received was not paid to their official stations. They were not men made great by office; but great men, on whom the country for its own benefit had conferred office. There was that in them which office did not give, and which the relinquishment of office did not, and could not, take away. In their retirement, in the midst of their fellow-citizens, themselves private citizens, they enjoyed as high regard and esteem as when filling the most important places of public trust.

There remained to Mr. Jefferson yet one other work of patriotism and beneficence, the establishment of a university in his native State. To this object he devoted years of incessant and anxious attention, and by the enlightened liberality of the Legislature of Virginia, and the co-operation of other able and zealous friends, he lived to see it accomplished. May all success attend this infant seminary; and may those who enjoy its advantages, as often as their eyes shall rest on the neighboring height, recollect what they owe to their disinterested and indefatigable benefactor; and may letters honor him who thus labored in the cause of letters![13]

Thus useful, and thus respected, passed the old age of Thomas Jefferson. But time was on its ever-ceaseless wing, and was now bringing the last hour of this illustrious man. He saw its approach with undisturbed serenity. He counted the moments as they passed, and beheld that his last sands were falling. That day, too, was at hand which he had helped to make immortal. One wish, one hope, if it were not presumptuous, beat in his fainting breast. Could it be so, might it please God, he would desire once more to see the sun, once more to look abroad on the scene around him, on the great day of liberty. Heaven, in its mercy, fulfilled that prayer. He saw that sun, he enjoyed its sacred light, he thanked God for this mercy, and bowed his aged head to the grave. "Felix, non vitae tantum claritate, sed etiam opportunitate mortis."

The last public labor of Mr. Jefferson naturally suggests the expression of the high praise which is due, both to him and to Mr. Adams, for their uniform and zealous attachment to learning, and to the cause of general knowledge. Of the advantages of learning, indeed, and of literary accomplishments, their own characters were striking recommendations and illustrations. They were scholars, ripe and good scholars; widely acquainted with ancient, as well as modern literature, and not altogether uninstructed in the deeper sciences. Their acquirements, doubtless, were different, and so were the particular objects of their literary pursuits; as their tastes and characters, in these respects, differed like those of other men. Being, also, men of busy lives, with great objects requiring action constantly before them, their attainments in letters did not become showy or obtrusive. Yet I would hazard the opinion, that, if we could now ascertain all the causes which gave them eminence and distinction in the midst of the great men with whom they acted, we should find not among the least their early acquisitions in literature, the resources which it furnished, the promptitude and facility which it communicated, and the wide field it opened for analogy and illustration; giving them thus, on every subject, a larger view and a broader range, as well for discussion as for the government of their own conduct.

Literature sometimes disgusts, and pretension to it much oftener disgusts, by appearing to hang loosely on the character, like something foreign or extraneous, not a part, but an ill-adjusted appendage; or by seeming to overload and weigh it down by its unsightly bulk, like the productions of bad taste in architecture, where there is massy and cumbrous ornament without strength or solidity of column. This has exposed learning, and especially classical learning, to reproach. Men have seen that it might exist without mental superiority, without vigor, without good taste, and without utility. But in such cases classical learning has only not inspired natural talent; or, at most, it has but made original feebleness of intellect, and natural bluntness of perception, something more conspicuous. The question, after all, if it be a question, is, whether literature, ancient as well as modern, does not assist a good understanding, improve natural good taste, add polished armor to native strength, and render its possessor, not only more capable of deriving private happiness from contemplation and reflection, but more accomplished also for action in the affairs of life, and especially for public action. Those whose memories we now honor were learned men; but their learning was kept in its proper place, and made subservient to the uses and objects of life. They were scholars, not common nor superficial; but their scholarship was so in keeping with their character, so blended and inwrought, that careless observers, or bad judges, not seeing an ostentatious display of it, might infer that it did not exist; forgetting, or not knowing, that classical learning in men who act in conspicuous public stations, perform duties which exercise the faculty of writing, or address popular, deliberative, or judicial bodies, is often felt where it is little seen, and sometimes felt more effectually because it is not seen at all.

But the cause of knowledge, in a more enlarged sense, the cause of general knowledge and of popular education, had no warmer friends, nor more powerful advocates, than Mr. Adams and Mr. Jefferson. On this foundation they knew the whole republican system rested; and this great and all-important truth they strove to impress, by all the means in their power. In the early publication already referred to, Mr. Adams expresses the strong and just sentiment, that the education of the poor is more important, even to the rich themselves, than all their own riches. On this great truth, indeed, is founded that unrivalled, that invaluable political and moral institution, our own blessing and the glory of our fathers, the New England system of free schools.

As the promotion of knowledge had been the object of their regard through life, so these great men made it the subject of their testamentary bounty. Mr. Jefferson is understood to have bequeathed his library to the University of Virginia, and that of Mr. Adams is bestowed on the inhabitants of Quincy.

Mr. Adams and Mr. Jefferson, fellow-citizens, were successively Presidents of the United States. The comparative merits of their respective administrations for a long time agitated and divided public opinion. They were rivals, each supported by numerous and powerful portions of the people, for the highest office. This contest, partly the cause and partly the consequence of the long existence of two great political parties in the country, is now part of the history of our government. We may naturally regret that any thing should have occurred to create difference and discord between those who had acted harmoniously and efficiently in the great concerns of the Revolution. But this is not the time, nor this the occasion, for entering into the grounds of that difference, or for attempting to discuss the merits of the questions which it involves. As practical questions, they were canvassed when the measures which they regarded were acted on and adopted; and as belonging to history, the time has not come for their consideration.

It is, perhaps, not wonderful, that, when the Constitution of the United States first went into operation, different opinions should be entertained as to the extent of the powers conferred by it. Here was a natural source of diversity of sentiment. It is still less wonderful, that that event, nearly contemporary with our government under the present Constitution, which so entirely shocked all Europe, and disturbed our relations with her leading powers, should be thought, by different men, to have different bearings on our own prosperity; and that the early measures adopted by the government of the United States, in consequence of this new state of things, should be seen in opposite lights. It is for the future historian, when what now remains of prejudice and misconception shall have passed away, to state these different opinions, and pronounce impartial judgment. In the mean time, all good men rejoice, and well may rejoice, that the sharpest differences sprung out of measures which, whether right or wrong, have ceased with the exigencies that gave them birth, and have left no permanent effect, either on the Constitution or on the general prosperity of the country. This remark, I am aware, may be supposed to have its exception in one measure, the alteration of the Constitution as to the mode of choosing President; but it is true in its general application. Thus the course of policy pursued towards France in 1798, on the one hand, and the measures of commercial restriction commenced in 1807, on the other, both subjects of warm and severe opposition, have passed away and left nothing behind them. They were temporary, and, whether wise or unwise, their consequences were limited to their respective occasions. It is equally clear, at the same time, and it is equally gratifying, that those measures of both administrations which were of durable importance, and which drew after them momentous and long remaining consequences, have received general approbation. Such was the organization, or rather the creation, of the navy, in the administration of Mr. Adams; such the acquisition of Louisiana in that of Mr. Jefferson. The country, it may safely be added, is not likely to be willing either to approve, or to reprobate, indiscriminately, and in the aggregate, all the measures of either, or of any, administration. The dictate of reason and of justice is, that, holding each one his own sentiments on the points of difference, we imitate the great men themselves in the forbearance and moderation which they have cherished, and in the mutual respect and kindness which they have been so much inclined to feel and to reciprocate.

No men, fellow-citizens, ever served their country with more entire exemption from every imputation of selfish and mercenary motives, than those to whose memory we are paying these proofs of respect. A suspicion of any disposition to enrich themselves or to profit by their public employments, never rested on either. No sordid motive approached them. The inheritance which they have left to their children is of their character and their fame.

Fellow-citizens, I will detain you no longer by this faint and feeble tribute to the memory of the illustrious dead. Even in other hands, adequate justice could not be done to them, within the limits of this occasion. Their highest, their best praise, is your deep conviction of their merits, your affectionate gratitude for their labors and their services. It is not my voice, it is this cessation of ordinary pursuits, this arresting of all attention, these solemn ceremonies, and this crowded house, which speak their eulogy. Their fame, indeed, is safe. That is now treasured up beyond the reach of accident. Although no sculptured marble should rise to their memory, nor engraved stone bear record of their deeds, yet will their remembrance be as lasting as the land they honored. Marble columns may, indeed, moulder into dust, time may erase all impress from the crumbling stone, but their fame remains; for with AMERICAN LIBERTY it rose, and with AMERICAN LIBERTY ONLY can it perish. It was the last swelling peal of yonder choir, "THEIR BODIES ARE BURIED IN PEACE, BUT THEIR NAME LIVETH EVERMORE." I catch that solemn song, I echo that lofty strain of funeral triumph, "THEIR NAME LIVETH EVERMORE."

Of the illustrious signers of the Declaration of Independence there now remains only CHARLES CARROLL. He seems an aged oak, standing alone on the plain, which time has spared a little longer after all its contemporaries have been levelled with the dust. Venerable object! we delight to gather round its trunk, while yet it stands, and to dwell beneath its shadow. Sole survivor of an assembly of as great men as the world has witnessed, in a transaction one of the most important that history records, what thoughts, what interesting reflections, must fill his elevated and devout soul! If he dwell on the past, how touching its recollections; if he survey the present, how happy, how joyous, how full of the fruition of that hope which his ardent patriotism indulged; if he glance at the future, how does the prospect of his country's advancement almost bewilder his weakened conception! Fortunate, distinguished patriot! Interesting relic of the past! Let him know that, while we honor the dead, we do not forget the living; and that there is not a heart here which does not fervently pray that Heaven may keep him yet back from the society of his companions.

And now, fellow-citizens, let us not retire from this occasion without a deep and solemn conviction of the duties which have devolved upon us. This lovely land, this glorious liberty, these benign institutions, the dear purchase of our fathers, are ours; ours to enjoy, ours to preserve, ours to transmit. Generations past and generations to come hold us responsible for this sacred trust. Our fathers, from behind, admonish us, with their anxious paternal voices; posterity calls out to us, from the bosom of the future; the world turns hither its solicitous eyes; all, all conjure us to act wisely, and faithfully, in the relation which we sustain. We can never, indeed, pay the debt which is upon us; but by virtue, by morality, by religion, by the cultivation of every good principle and every good habit, we may hope to enjoy the blessing, through our day, and to leave it unimpaired to our children. Let us feel deeply how much of what we are and of what we possess we owe to this liberty, and to these institutions of government. Nature has, indeed, given us a soil which yields bounteously to the hand of industry, the mighty and fruitful ocean is before us, and the skies over our heads shed health and vigor. But what are lands, and seas, and skies, to civilized man, without society, without knowledge, without morals, without religious culture; and how can these be enjoyed, in all their extent and all their excellence, but under the protection of wise institutions and a free government? Fellow-citizens, there is not one of us, there is not one of us here present, who does not, at this moment, and at every moment, experience, in his own condition, and in the condition of those most near and dear to him, the influence and the benefits of this liberty and these institutions. Let us then acknowledge the blessing, let us feel it deeply and powerfully, let us cherish a strong affection for it, and resolve to maintain and perpetuate it. The blood of our fathers, let it not have been shed in vain; the great hope of posterity, let it not be blasted.

The striking attitude, too, in which we stand to the world around us, a topic to which, I fear, I advert too often, and dwell on too long, cannot be altogether omitted here. Neither individuals nor nations can perform their part well, until they understand and feel its importance, and comprehend and justly appreciate all the duties belonging to it. It is not to inflate national vanity, nor to swell a light and empty feeling of self-importance, but it is that we may judge justly of our situation, and of our own duties, that I earnestly urge upon you this consideration of our position and our character among the nations of the earth. It cannot be denied, but by those who would dispute against the sun, that with America, and in America, a new era commences in human affairs. This era is distinguished by free representative governments, by entire religious liberty, by improved systems of national intercourse, by a newly awakened and an unconquerable spirit of free inquiry, and by a diffusion of knowledge through the community, such as has been before altogether unknown and unheard of. America, America, our country, fellow-citizens, our own dear and native land, is inseparably connected, fast bound up, in fortune and by fate, with these great interests. If they fall, we fall with them; if they stand, it will be because we have maintained them. Let us contemplate, then, this connection, which binds the prosperity of others to our own; and let us manfully discharge all the duties which it imposes. If we cherish the virtues and the principles of our fathers, Heaven will assist us to carry on the work of human liberty and human happiness. Auspicious omens cheer us. Great examples are before us. Our own firmament now shines brightly upon our path. WASHINGTON is in the clear, upper sky. These other stars have now joined the American constellation; they circle round their centre, and the heavens beam with new light. Beneath this illumination let us walk the course of life, and at its close devoutly commend our beloved country, the common parent of us all, to the Divine Benignity.

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NOTE.

Page 170.

The question has often been asked, whether the anonymous speech against the Declaration of Independence, and the speech in support of it ascribed to John Adams in the preceding Discourse, are a portion of the debates which actually took place in 1776 in the Continental Congress. Not only has this inquiry been propounded in the public papers, but several letters on the subject have been addressed to Mr. Webster and his friends. For this reason, it may be proper to state, that those speeches were composed by Mr. Webster, after the manner of the ancient historians, as embodying in an impressive form the arguments relied upon by the friends and opponents of the measure, respectively. They of course represent the speeches that were actually made on both sides, but no report of the debates of this period has been preserved, and the orator on the present occasion had no aid in framing these addresses, but what was furnished by general tradition and the known line of argument pursued by the speakers and writers of that day for and against the measure of Independence. The first sentence of the speech ascribed to Mr. Adams was of course suggested by the parting scene with Jonathan Sewall, as described by Mr. Adams himself, in the Preface to the Letters of Novanglus and Massachusettensis.

So much interest has been taken in this subject, that it has been thought proper, by way of settling the question in the most authentic manner, to give publicity to the following answer, written by Mr. Webster to one of the letters of inquiry above alluded to.

"Washington, 22 January, 1846.

"Dear Sir:--

"I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the 18th instant. Its contents hardly surprise me, as I have received very many similar communications.

"Your inquiry is easily answered. The Congress of the Revolution sat with closed doors. Its proceedings were made known to the public from time to time, by printing its journal; but the debates were not published. So far as I know, there is not existing, in print or manuscript, the speech, or any part or fragment of the speech, delivered by Mr. Adams on the question of the Declaration of Independence. We only know, from the testimony of his auditors, that he spoke with remarkable ability and characteristic earnestness.

"The day after the Declaration was made, Mr. Adams, in writing to a friend,[14] declared the event to be one that 'ought to be commemorated, as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward, for evermore.'

"And on the day of his death, hearing the noise of bells and cannon, he asked the occasion. On being reminded that it was 'Independent day,' he replied, 'Independence for ever!' These expressions were introduced into the speech supposed to have been made by him. For the rest I must be answerable. The speech was written by me, in my house in Boston, the day before the delivery of the Discourse in Faneuil Hall; a poor substitute, I am sure it would appear to be, if we could now see the speech actually made by Mr. Adams on that transcendently important occasion.

"I am, respectfully,

"Your obedient servant,

"DANIEL WEBSTER."

[Footnote 1: Hon. Josiah Quincy.]

[Footnote 2: Nearly all that was known of this celebrated argument, at the time the present Discourse was delivered, was derived from the recollections of John Adams, as preserved in Minot's History of Massachusetts, Vol. II. p. 91. See Life and Works of John Adams, Vol. II. p. 124, published in the course of the past year (1850), in the Appendix to which, p. 521, will be found a paper hitherto unpublished, containing notes of the argument of Otis, "which seem to be the foundation of the sketch published by Minot." Tudor's Life of James Otis, p. 61.]

[Footnote 3: See Life and Works of John Adams, Vol. II. p. 150, Vol. III. p. 447, and North American Review, Vol. LXXI. p. 430.]

[Footnote 4: Cicero de Officiis, Lib. I. § 43.]

[Footnote 5: A fac-simile of this ever-memorable state paper, as drafted by Mr. Jefferson, with the interlineations alluded to in the text, is contained in Mr. Jefferson's Writings, Vol. I. p. 146. See, also, in reference to the history of the Declaration, the Life and Works of John Adams, Vol. II. p. 512 et seq.]

[Footnote 6: This question, of the power of Parliament over the Colonies, was discussed, with singular ability, by Governor Hutchinson on the one side, and the House of Representatives of Massachusetts on the other, in 1773. The argument of the House is in the form of an answer to the Governor's Message, and was reported by Mr. Samuel Adams, Mr. Hancock, Mr. Hawley, Mr. Bowers, Mr. Hobson, Mr. Foster, Mr. Phillips, and Mr. Thayer. As the power of the Parliament had been acknowledged, so far at least as to affect us by laws of trade, it was not easy to settle the line of distinction. It was thought, however, to be very clear, that the charters of the Colonies had exempted them from the general legislation of the British Parliament. See Massachusetts State Papers, p. 351. The important assistance rendered by John Adams in the preparation of the answer of the House to the Message of the Governor may be learned from the Life and Works of John Adams, Vol. II. p. 311 et seq.]

[Footnote 7: The official copy of the Declaration, as engrossed and signed by the members of Congress, is framed and preserved in the Hall over the Patent-Office at Washington.]

[Footnote 8: See Life and Works of John Adams, Vol. II. p. 417 et seq.]

[Footnote 9: On the authorship of this speech, see Note at the end of the Discourse.]

[Footnote 10: In this Convention he served as chairman of the committee for preparing the draft of a Constitution.]

[Footnote 11: Upon the organization of this body, 15th November, 1820, John Adams was elected its President; an office which the infirmities of age compelled him to decline. For the interesting proceedings of the Convention on this occasion, the address of Chief Justice Parker, and the reply of Mr. Adams, see Journal of Debates and Proceedings in the Convention of Delegates chosen to revise the Constitution of Massachusetts, p. 8 et seq.]

[Footnote 12: For an account of Mr. Webster's last interview with Mr. Adams, see March's Reminiscences of Congress, p. 62.]

[Footnote 13: Mr. Jefferson himself considered his services in establishing the University of Virginia as among the most important rendered by him to the country. In Mr. Wirt's Eulogy, it is stated that a private memorandum was found among his papers, containing the following inscription to be placed on his monument.--"Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, Author of the Declaration of Independence, of the Statutes of Virginia for Religious Freedom, and Father of the University of Virginia." Eulogies on Adams and Jefferson, p. 426.]

[Footnote 14: See Letters of John Adams to his Wife, Vol. I. p. 128, note.]

THE CASE OF OGDEN AND SAUNDERS.

AN ARGUMENT MADE IN THE CASE OF OGDEN AND SAUNDERS, IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES, JANUARY TERM, 1827.

[This was an action of assumpsit, brought originally in the Circuit Court of Louisiana, by Saunders, a citizen of Kentucky, against Ogden, a citizen of Louisiana. The plaintiff below declared upon certain bills of exchange, drawn on the 30th of September, 1806, by one Jordan, at Lexington, in the State of Kentucky, upon the defendant below, Ogden, in the city of New York, (the defendant then being a citizen and resident of the State of New York,) accepted by him at the city of New York, and protested for non-payment.

The defendant below pleaded several pleas, among which was a certificate of discharge under the act of the legislature of the State of New York, of April 3d, 1801, for the relief of insolvent debtors, commonly called the Three-Fourths Act.

The jury found the facts in the form of a special verdict, on which the court rendered a judgment for the plaintiff below, and the cause was brought by writ of error before this court. The question which arose under this plea, as to the validity of the law of New York as being repugnant to the Constitution of the United States, was argued at February term, 1824, by Mr. Clay, Mr. D.B. Ogden, and Mr. Haines, for the plaintiff in error, and by Mr. Webster and Mr. Wheaton, for the defendant in error, and the cause was continued for advisement until the present term. It was again argued at the present term, by Mr. Webster and Mr. Wheaton, against the validity, and by the Attorney-General, Mr. E. Livingston, Mr. D.B. Ogden, Mr. Jones, and Mr. Sampson, for the validity.

Mr. Wheaton opened the argument for the defendant in error; he was followed by the counsel for the plaintiff in error; and Mr. Webster replied as follows.]

The question arising in this case is not more important, nor so important even, in its bearing on individual cases of private right, as in its character of a public political question. The Constitution was intended to accomplish a great political object. Its design was not so much to prevent injustice or injury in one case, or in successive single cases, as it was to make general salutary provisions, which, in their operation, should give security to all contracts, stability to credit, uniformity among all the States in those things which materially concern the foreign commerce of the country, and their own credit, trade, and intercourse with each other. The real question, is, therefore, a much broader one than has been argued. It is this: Whether the Constitution has not, for general political purposes, ordained that bankrupt laws should be established only by national authority? We contend that such was the intention of the Constitution; an intention, as we think, plainly manifested in several of its provisions.

The act of New York, under which this question arises, provides that a debtor may be discharged from all his debts, upon assigning his property to trustees for the use of his creditors. When applied to the discharge of debts contracted before the date of the law, this court has decided that the act is invalid.[1] The act itself makes no distinction between past and future debts, but provides for the discharge of both in the same manner. In the case, then, of a debt already existing, it is admitted that the act does impair the obligation of contracts. We wish the full extent of this decision to be well considered. It is not merely that the legislature of the State cannot interfere by law, in the particular case of A or B, to injure or impair rights which have become vested under contracts; but it is, that they have no power by general law to regulate the manner in which all debtors may be discharged from subsisting contracts; in other wrords, they cannot pass general bankrupt laws to be applied in presenti. Now, it is not contended that such laws are unjust, and ought not to be passed by any legislature. It is not said that they are unwise or impolitic. On the contrary, we know the general practice to be, that, when bankrupt laws are established, they make no distinction between present and future debts. While all agree that special acts, made for individual cases, are unjust, all admit that a general law, made for all cases, may be both just and politic. The question, then, which meets us on the threshold is this: If the Constitution meant to leave the States the power of establishing systems of bankruptcy to act upon future debts, what great or important object of a political nature is answered by denying the power of making such systems applicable to existing debts?

The argument used in Sturges v. Crowninshield was, at least, a plausible and consistent argument. It maintained that the prohibition of the Constitution was levelled only against interferences in individual cases, and did not apply to general laws, whether those laws were retrospective or prospective in their operation. But the court rejected that conclusion. It decided that the Constitution was intended to apply to general laws or systems of bankruptcy; that an act providing that all debtors might be discharged from all creditors, upon certain conditions, was of no more validity than an act providing that a particular debtor, A, should be discharged on the same conditions from his particular creditor, B.

It being thus decided that general laws are within the prohibition of the Constitution, it is for the plaintiff in error now to show on what ground, consistent with the general objects of the Constitution, he can establish a distinction which can give effect to those general laws in their application to future debts, while it denies them effect in their application to subsisting debts. The words are, that "no State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts." The general operation of all such laws is to impair that obligation; that is, to discharge the obligation without fulfilling it. This is admitted; and the only ground taken for the distinction to stand on is, that, when the law was in existence at the time of the making of the contract, the parties must be supposed to have reference to it, or, as it is usually expressed, the law is made a part of the contract. Before considering what foundation there is for this argument, it may be well to inquire what is that obligation of contracts of which the Constitution speaks, and whence is it derived.

The definition given by the court in Sturges v. Crowninshield is sufficient for our present purpose. "A contract," say the court, "is an agreement to do some particular thing; the law binds the party to perform this agreement, and this is the obligation of the contract."

It is indeed probable that the Constitution used the words in a somewhat more popular sense. We speak, for example, familiarly of a usurious contract, and yet we say, speaking technically, that a usurious agreement is no contract.

By the obligation of a contract, we should understand the Constitution to mean, the duty of performing a legal agreement. If the contract be lawful, the party is bound to perform it. But bound by what? What is it that binds him? And this leads us to what we regard as a principal fallacy in the argument on the other side. That argument supposes, and insists, that the whole obligation of a contract has its origin in the municipal law. This position we controvert. We do not say that it is that obligation which springs from conscience merely; but we deny that it is only such as springs from the particular law of the place where the contract is made. It must be a lawful contract, doubtless; that is, permitted and allowed; because society has a right to prohibit all such contracts, as well as all such actions, as it deems to be mischievous or injurious. But if the contract be such as the law of society tolerates, in other words, if it be lawful, then we say, the duty of performing it springs from universal law. And this is the concurrent sense of all the writers of authority.

The duty of performing promises is thus shown to rest on universal law; and if, departing from this well-established principle, we now follow the teachers who instruct us that the obligation of a contract has its origin in the law of a particular State, and is in all cases what that law makes it, and no more, and no less, we shall probably find ourselves involved in inextricable difficulties. A man promises, for a valuable consideration, to pay money in New York. Is the obligation of that contract created by the laws of that State, or does it subsist independent of those laws? We contend that the obligation of a contract, that is, the duty of performing it, is not created by the law of the particular place where it is made, and dependent on that law for its existence; but that it may subsist, and does subsist, without that law, and independent of it. The obligation is in the contract itself, in the assent of the parties, and in the sanction of universal law. This is the doctrine of Grotius, Vattel, Burlamaqui, Pothier, and Rutherforth. The contract, doubtless, is necessarily to be enforced by the municipal law of the place where performance is demanded. The municipal law acts on the contract after it is made, to compel its execution, or give damages for its violation. But this is a very different thing from the same law being the origin or fountain of the contract.

Let us illustrate this matter by an example. Two persons contract together in New York for the delivery, by one to the other, of a domestic animal, a utensil of husbandry, or a weapon of war. This is a lawful contract, and, while the parties remain in New York, it is to be enforced by the laws of that State. But if they remove with the article to Pennsylvania or Maryland, there a new law comes to act upon the contract, and to apply other remedies if it be broken. Thus far the remedies are furnished by the laws of society. But suppose the same parties to go together to a savage wilderness, or a desert island, beyond the reach of the laws of any society. The obligation of the contract still subsists, and is as perfect as ever, and is now to be enforced by another law, that is, the law of nature; and the party to whom the promise was made has a right to take by force the animal, the utensil, or the weapon that was promised him. The right is as perfect here as it was in Pennsylvania, or even in New York; but this could not be so if the obligation were created by the law of New York, or were dependent on that law for its existence, because the laws of that State can have no operation beyond its territory. Let us reverse this example. Suppose a contract to be made between two persons cast ashore on an uninhabited territory, or in a place over which no law of society extends. There are such places, and contracts have been made by individuals casually there, and these contracts have been enforced in courts of law in civilized communities. Whence do such contracts derive their obligation, if not from universal law?

If these considerations show us that the obligation of a lawful contract does not derive its force from the particular law of the place where made, but may exist where that law does not exist, and be enforced where that law has no validity, then it follows, we contend, that any statute which diminishes or lessens its obligation does impair it, whether it precedes or succeeds the contract in date. The contract having an independent origin, whenever the law comes to exist together with it, and interferes with it, it lessens, we say, and impairs, its own original and independent obligation. In the case before the court, the contract did not owe its existence to the particular law of New York; it did not depend on that law, but could be enforced without the territory of that State, as well as within it. Nevertheless, though legal, though thus independently existing, though thus binding the party everywhere, and capable of being enforced everywhere, yet the statute of New York says that it shall be discharged without payment. This, we say, impairs the obligation of that contract. It is admitted to have been legal in its inception, legal in its full extent, and capable of being enforced by other tribunals according to its terms. An act, then, purporting to discharge it without payment, is, as we contend, an act impairing its obligation.

Here, however, we meet the opposite argument, stated on different occasions in different terms, but usually summed up in this, that the law itself is a part of the contract, and therefore cannot impair it. What does this mean? Let us seek for clear ideas. It does not mean that the law gives any particular construction to the terms of the contract, or that it makes the promise, or the consideration, or the time of performance, other than is expressed in the instrument itself. It can only mean, that it is to be taken as a part of the contract, or understanding of the parties, that the contract itself shall be enforced by such laws and regulations, respecting remedy and for the enforcement of contracts, as are in being in the State where it is made at the time of entering into it. This is meant, or nothing very clearly intelligible is meant, by saying the law is part of the contract.

There is no authority in adjudged cases for the plaintiff in error but the State decisions which have been cited, and, as has already been stated, they all rest on this reason, that the law is part of the contract.

Against this we contend,--

1st. That, if the proposition were true, the consequence would not follow.

2d. That the proposition itself cannot be maintained.

1. If it were true that the law is to be considered as part of the contract, the consequence contended for would not follow; because, if this statute be part of the contract, so is every other legal or constitutional provision existing at the time which affects the contract, or which is capable of affecting it; and especially this very article of the Constitution of the United States is part of the contract. The plaintiff in error argues in a complete circle. He supposes the parties to have had reference to it because it was a binding law, and yet he proves it to be a binding law only upon the ground that such reference was made to it. We come before the court alleging the law to be void, as unconstitutional; they stop the inquiry by opposing to us the law itself. Is this logical? Is it not precisely objectio ejus, cujus dissolutio petitur? If one bring a bill to set aside a judgment, is that judgment itself a good plea in bar to the bill? We propose to inquire if this law is of force to control our contract, or whether, by the Constitution of the United States, such force be not denied to it. The plaintiff in error stops us by saying that it does control the contract, and so arrives shortly at the end of the debate. Is it not obvious, that, supposing the act of New York to be a part of the contract, the question still remains as undecided as ever. What is that act? Is it a law, or is it a nullity? a thing of force, or a thing of no force? Suppose the parties to have contemplated this act, what did they contemplate? its words only, or its legal effect? its words, or the force which the Constitution of the United States allows to it? If the parties contemplated any law, they contemplated all the law that bore on their contract, the aggregate of all the statute and constitutional provisions. To suppose that they had in view one statute without regarding others, or that they contemplated a statute without considering that paramount constitutional provisions might control or qualify that statute, or abrogate it altogether, is unreasonable and inadmissible. "This contract," says one of the authorities relied on, "is to be construed as if the law were specially recited in it." Let it be so for the sake of argument. But it is also to be construed as if the prohibitory clause of the Constitution were recited in it, and this brings us back again to the precise point from which we departed.

The Constitution always accompanies the law, and the latter can have no force which the former does not allow to it. If the reasoning were thrown into the form of special pleading, it would stand thus: the plaintiff declares on his debt; the defendant pleads his discharge under the law; the plaintiff alleges the law unconstitutional; but the defendant says, You knew of its existence; to which the answer is obvious and irresistible, I knew its existence on the statute-book of New York, but I knew, at the same time, it was null and void under the Constitution of the United States.

The language of another leading decision is, "A law in force at the time of making the contract does not violate that contract"; but the very question is, whether there be any such law "in force"; for if the States have no authority to pass such laws, then no such law can be in force. The Constitution is a part of the contract as much as the law, and was as much in the contemplation of the parties. So that the proposition, if it be admitted that the law is part of the contract, leaves us just where it found us: that is to say, under the necessity of comparing the law with the Constitution, and of deciding by such comparison whether it be valid or invalid. If the law be unconstitutional, it is void, and no party can be supposed to have had reference to a void law. If it be constitutional, no reference to it need be supposed.

2. But the proposition itself cannot be maintained. The law is no part of the contract. What part is it? the promise? the consideration? the condition? Clearly, it is neither of these. It is no term of the contract. It acts upon the contract only when it is broken, or to discharge the party from its obligation after it is broken. The municipal law is the force of society employed to compel the performance of contracts. In every judgment in a suit on contract, the damages are given, and the imprisonment of the person or sale of goods awarded, not in performance of the contract, or as part of the contract, but as an indemnity for the breach of the contract. Even interest, which is a strong case, where it is not expressed in the contract itself, can only be given as damages. It is all but absurd to say that a man's goods are sold on a fieri facias, or that he himself goes to jail, in pursuance of his contract. These are the penalties which the law inflicts for the breach of his contract. Doubtless, parties, when they enter into contracts, may well consider both what their rights and what their liabilities will be by the law, if such contracts be broken; but this contemplation of consequences which can ensue only when the contract is broken, is no part of the contract itself. The law has nothing to do with the contract till it be broken; how, then, can it be said to form a part of the contract itself?

But there are other cogent and more specific reasons against considering the law as part of the contract. (1.) If the law be part of the contract, it cannot be repealed or altered; because, in such case, the repealing or modifying law itself would impair the obligation of the contract. The insolvent law of New York, for example, authorizes the discharge of a debtor on the consent of two thirds of his creditors. A subsequent act requires the consent of three fourths; but if the existing law be part of the contract, this latter law would be void. In short, nothing which is part of the contract can be varied but by consent of the parties; therefore the argument runs in absurdum; for it proves that no laws for enforcing the contract, or giving remedies upon it, or any way affecting it, can be changed or modified between its creation and its end. If the law in question binds one party on the ground of assent to it, it binds both, and binds them until they agree to terminate its operation. (2.) If the party be bound by an implied assent to the law, as thereby making the law a part of the contract, how would it be if the parties had expressly dissented, and agreed that the law should make no part of the contract? Suppose the promise to have been, that the promisor would pay at all events, and not take advantage of the statute; still, would not the statute operate on the whole,--on this particular agreement and all? and does not this show that the law is no part of the contract, but something above it? (3.) If the law of the place be part of the contract, one of its terms and conditions, how could it be enforced, as we all know it might be, in another jurisdiction, which should have no regard to the law of the place? Suppose the parties, after the contract, to remove to another State, do they carry the law with them as part of their contract? We all know they do not. Or take a common case. Some States have laws abolishing imprisonment for debt; these laws, according to the argument, are all parts of the contract; how, then, can the party, when sued in another State, be imprisoned contrary to the terms of his contract? (4.) The argument proves too much, inasmuch as it applies as strongly to prior as to subsequent contracts. It is founded on a supposed assent to the exercise of legislative authority, without considering whether that exercise be legal or illegal. But it is equally fair to found the argument on an implied assent to the potential exercise of that authority. The implied reference to the control of legislative power is as reasonable and as strong when that power is dormant, as while it is in exercise. In one case, the argument is, "The law existed, you knew it, and acquiesced." In the other it is, "The power to pass the law existed, you knew it, and took your chance." There is as clear an assent in one instance as in the other. Indeed, it is more reasonable and more sensible to imply a general assent to all the laws of society, present and to come, from the fact of living in it, than it is to imply a particular assent to a particular existing enactment. The true view of the matter is, that every man is presumed to submit to all power which may be lawfully exercised over him or his right, and no one should be presumed to submit to illegal acts of power, whether actual or contingent. (5.) But a main objection to this argument is, that it would render the whole constitutional provision idle and inoperative; and no explanatory words, if such words had been added in the Constitution, could have prevented this consequence. The law, it is said, is part of the contract; it cannot, therefore, impair the contract, because a contract cannot impair itself. Now, if this argument be sound, the case would have been the same, whatever words the Constitution had used. If, for example, it had declared that no State should pass any law impairing contracts prospectively or retrospectively; or any law impairing contracts, whether existing or future; or, whatever terms it had used to prohibit precisely such a law as is now before the court,--the prohibition would be totally nugatory if the law is to be taken as part of the contract; and the result would be, that, whatever may be the laws which the States by this clause of the Constitution are prohibited from passing, yet, if they in fact do pass such laws, those laws are valid, and bind parties by a supposed assent.

But further, this idea, if well founded, would enable the States to defeat the whole constitutional provision by a general enactment. Suppose a State should declare, by law, that all contracts entered into therein should be subject to such laws as the legislature, at any time, or from time to time, might see fit to pass. This law, according to the argument, would enter into the contract, become a part of it, and authorize the interference of the legislative power with it, for any and all purposes, wholly uncontrolled by the Constitution of the United States.

So much for the argument that the law is a part of the contract. We think it is shown to be not so; and if it were, the expected consequence would not follow.

The inquiry, then, recurs, whether the law in question be such a law as the legislature of New York had authority to pass. The question is general. We differ from our learned adversaries on general principles. We differ as to the main scope and end of this constitutional provision. They think it entirely remedial; we regard it as preventive. They think it adopted to secure redress for violated private rights; to us, it seems intended to guard against great public mischiefs. They argue it as if it were designed as an indemnity or protection for injured private rights, in individual cases of meum and tuum; we look upon it as a great political provision, favorable to the commerce and credit of the whole country. Certainly we do not deny its application to cases of violated private right. Such cases are clearly and unquestionably within its operation. Still, we think its main scope to be general and political. And this, we think, is proved by reference to the history of the country, and to the great objects which were sought to be attained by the establishment of the present government. Commerce, credit, and confidence were the principal things which did not exist under the old Confederation, and which it was a main object of the present Constitution to create and establish. A vicious system of legislation, a system of paper money and tender laws, had completely paralyzed industry, threatened to beggar every man of property, and ultimately to ruin the country. The relation between debtor and creditor, always delicate, and always dangerous whenever it divides society, and draws out the respective parties into different ranks and classes, was in such a condition in the years 1787, 1788, and 1789, as to threaten the overthrow of all government; and a revolution was menaced, much more critical and alarming than that through which the country had recently passed. The object of the new Constitution was to arrest these evils; to awaken industry by giving security to property; to establish confidence, credit, and commerce, by salutary laws, to be enforced by the power of the whole community. The Revolutionary War was over, the country had peace, but little domestic tranquillity; it had liberty, but few of its enjoyments, and none of its security. The States had struggled together, but their union was imperfect. They had freedom, but not an established course of justice. The Constitution was therefore framed, as it professes, "to form a more perfect union, to establish justice, to secure the blessings of liberty, and to insure domestic tranquillity."

It is not pertinent to this occasion to advert to all the means by which these desirable ends were to be obtained. Some of them, closely connected with the subject now under consideration, are obvious and prominent. The objects were commerce, credit, and mutual confidence in matters of property; and these required, among other things, a uniform standard of value or medium of payments. One of the first powers given to Congress, therefore, is that of coining money and fixing the value of foreign coins; and one of the first restraints imposed on the States is the total prohibition to coin money. These two provisions are industriously followed up and completed by denying to the States all power to emit bills of credit, or to make any thing but gold and silver a tender in the payment of debts. The whole control, therefore, over the standard of value and medium of payments is vested in the general government. And here the question instantly suggests itself. Why should such pains be taken to confide to Congress alone this exclusive power of fixing on a standard of value, and of prescribing the medium in which debts shall be paid, if it is, after all, to be left to every State to declare that debts may be discharged, and to prescribe how they may be discharged, without any payment at all? Why say that no man shall be obliged to take, in discharge of a debt, paper money issued by the authority of a State, and yet say that by the same authority the debt may be discharged without any payment whatever?

We contend, that the Constitution has not left its work thus unfinished. We contend, that, taking its provisions together, it is apparent it was intended to provide for two things, intimately connected with each other. These are,--

1. A medium for the payment of debts; and,

2. A uniform manner of discharging debts, when they are to be discharged without payment.

The arrangement of the grants and prohibitions contained in the Constitution is fit to be regarded on this occasion. The grant to Congress and the prohibition on the States, though they are certainly to be construed together, are not contained in the same clauses. The powers granted to Congress are enumerated one after another in the eighth section; the principal limitations on those powers, in the ninth section; and the prohibitions to the States, in the tenth section. Now, in order to understand whether any particular power be exclusively vested in Congress, it is necessary to read the terms of the grant, together with the terms of the prohibition. Take an example from that power of which we have been speaking, the coinage power. Here the grant to Congress is, "To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coins." Now, the correlative prohibition on the States, though found in another section, is undoubtedly to be taken in immediate connection with the foregoing, as much as if it had been found in the same clause. The only just reading of these provisions, therefore, is this: "Congress shall have power to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin; but no State shall coin money, emit bills of credit, or make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in payment of debts."

These provisions respect the medium of payment, or standard of value, and, thus collated, their joint result is clear and decisive. We think the result clear, also, of those provisions which respect the discharge of debts without payment. Collated in like manner, they stand thus: "Congress shall have power to establish uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States, but no State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts." This collocation cannot be objected to, if they refer to the same subject-matter; and that they do refer to the same subject-matter we have the authority of this court for saying, because this court solemnly determined, in Sturges v. Crowninshield, that this prohibition on the States did apply to systems of bankruptcy. It must be now taken, therefore, that State bankrupt laws were in the mind of the Convention when the prohibition was adopted, and therefore the grant to Congress on the subject of bankrupt laws, and the prohibition to the States on the same subject, are properly to be taken and read together; and being thus read together, is not the intention clear to take away from the States the power of passing bankrupt laws, since, while enacted by them, such laws would not be uniform, and to confer the power exclusively on Congress, by whom uniform laws could be established?

Suppose the order of arrangement in the Constitution had been otherwise than it is, and that the prohibitions to the States had preceded the grants of power to Congress, the two powers, when collated, would then have read thus: "No State shall pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts; but Congress may establish uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies." Could any man have doubted, in that case, that the meaning was, that the States should not pass laws discharging debts without payment, but that Congress might establish uniform bankrupt acts? And yet this inversion of the order of the clauses does not alter their sense. We contend, that Congress alone possesses the power of establishing bankrupt laws; and although we are aware that, in Sturges v. Crowninshield, the court decided that such an exclusive power could not be inferred from the words of the grant in the seventh section, we yet would respectfully request the bench to reconsider this point. We think it could not have been intended that both the States and general government should exercise this power; and therefore, that a grant to one implies a prohibition on the other. But not to press a topic which the court has already had under its consideration, we contend, that, even without reading the clauses of the Constitution in the connection which we have suggested, and which is believed to be the true one, the prohibition in the tenth section, taken by itself, does forbid the enactment of State bankrupt laws, as applied to future as well as present debts. We argue this from the words of the prohibition, from the association they are found in, and from the objects intended.

1. The words are general. The States can pass no law impairing contracts; that is, any contract. In the nature of things a law may impair a future contract, and therefore such contract is within the protection of the Constitution. The words being general, it is for the other side to show a limitation; and this, it is submitted, they have wholly failed to do, unless they shall have established the doctrine that the law itself is part of the contract. It may be added, that the particular expression of the Constitution is worth regarding. The thing prohibited is called a law, not an act. A law, in its general acceptation, is a rule prescribed for future conduct, not a legislative interference with existing rights. The framers of the Constitution would hardly have given the appellation of law to violent invasions of individual right, or individual property, by acts of legislative power. Although, doubtless, such acts fall within this prohibition, yet they are prohibited also by general principles, and by the constitutions of the States, and therefore further provision against such acts was not so necessary as against other mischiefs.

2. The most conclusive argument, perhaps, arises from the connection in which the clause stands. The words of the prohibition, so far as it applies to civil rights, or rights of property, are, that "no State shall coin money, emit bills of credit, make any thing but gold and silver coin a tender in the payment of debts, or pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts." The prohibition of attainders, and ex post facto laws, refers entirely to criminal proceedings, and therefore should be considered as standing by itself; but the other parts of the prohibition are connected by the subject-matter, and ought, therefore, to be construed together. Taking the words thus together, according to their natural connection, how is it possible to give a more limited construction to the term "contracts," in the last branch of the sentence, than to the word "debts," in that immediately preceding? Can a State make any thing but gold and silver a tender in payment of future debts? This nobody pretends. But what ground is there for a distinction? No State shall make any thing but gold and silver a tender in the payment of debts, nor pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts. Now, by what reasoning is it made out that the debts here spoken of are any debts, either existing or future, but that the contracts spoken of are subsisting contracts only? Such a distinction seems to us wholly arbitrary. We see no ground for it. Suppose the article, where it uses the word debts, had used the word contracts. The sense would have been the same then that it now is; but the identity of terms would have made the nature of the distinction now contended for somewhat more obvious. Thus altered, the clause would read, that no State should make any thing but gold and silver a tender in discharge of contracts, nor pass any law impairing the obligation of contracts; yet the first of these expressions would have been held to apply to all contracts, and the last to subsisting contracts only. This shows the consequence of what is now contended for in a strong light. It is certain that the substitution of the word contracts for debts would not alter the sense; and an argument that could not be sustained, if such substitution were made, cannot be sustained now. We maintain, therefore, that, if tender laws may not be made for future debts, neither can bankrupt laws be made for future contracts. All the arguments used here may be applied with equal force to tender laws for future debts. It may be said, for instance, that, when it speaks of debts, the Constitution means existing debts, and not mere possibilities of future debt; that the object was to preserve vested rights; and that if a man, after a tender law had passed, had contracted a debt, the manner in which that tender law authorized that debt to be discharged became part of the contract, and that the whole debt, or whole obligation, was thus qualified by the pre-existing law, and was no more than a contract to deliver so much paper money, or whatever other article might be made a tender, as the original bargain expressed. Arguments of this sort will not be found wanting in favor of tender laws, if the court yield to similar arguments in favor of bankrupt laws.

These several prohibitions of the Constitution stand in the same paragraph; they have the same purpose, and were introduced for the same object; they are expressed in words of similar import, in grammar, and in sense; they are subject to the same construction, and we think no reason has yet been given for imposing an important restriction on one part of them, which does not equally show that the same restriction might be imposed also on the other part.

We have already endeavored to maintain, that one great political object intended by the Constitution would be defeated, if this construction were allowed to prevail. As an object of political regulation, it was not important to prevent the States from passing bankrupt laws applicable to present debts, while the power was left to them in regard to future debts; nor was it at all important, in a political point of view, to prohibit tender laws as to future debts, while it was yet left to the States to pass laws for the discharge of such debts, which, after all, are little different in principle from tender laws. Look at the law before the court in this view. It provides, that, if the debtor will surrender, offer, or tender to trustees, for the benefit of his creditors, all his estate and effects, he shall be discharged from all his debts. If it had authorized a tender of any thing but money to any one creditor, though it were of a value equal to the debt, and thereupon provided for a discharge, it would have been clearly invalid. Yet it is maintained to be good, merely because it is made for all creditors, and seeks a discharge from all debts; although the thing tendered may not be equivalent to a shilling in the pound of those debts. This shows, again, very clearly, how the Constitution has failed of its purpose, if, having in terms prohibited all tender laws, and taken so much pains to establish a uniform medium of payment, it has yet left the States the power of discharging debts, as they may see fit, without any payment at all.

To recapitulate what has been said, we maintain, first, that the Constitution, by its grants to Congress and its prohibitions on the States, has sought to establish one uniform standard of value, or medium of payment. Second, that, by like means, it has endeavored to provide for one uniform mode of discharging debts, when they are to be discharged without payment. Third, that these objects are connected, and that the first loses much of its importance, if the last, also, be not accomplished. Fourth, that, reading the grant to Congress and the prohibition on the States together, the inference is strong that the Constitution intended to confer an exclusive power to pass bankrupt laws on Congress. Fifth, that the prohibition in the tenth section reaches to all contracts, existing or future, in the same way that the other prohibition in the same section extends to all debts existing or future. Sixthly, that, upon any other construction, one great political object of the Constitution will fail of its accomplishment.

[Footnote 1: Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. Rep. 122.]

THE MURDER OF CAPTAIN JOSEPH WHITE.

AN ARGUMENT ON THE TRIAL OF JOHN FRANCIS KNAPP, FOR THE MURDER OF JOSEPH WHITE, OF SALEM, IN ESSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS, ON THE NIGHT OF THE 6TH OF APRIL, 1830.

[The following argument was addressed to the jury at a trial for a remarkable murder. A more extraordinary case never occurred in this country, nor is it equalled in strange interest by any trial in the French Causes Célèbres or the English State Trials. Deep sensation and intense curiosity were excited through the whole country, at the time of the occurrence of the event, not only by the atrocity of the crime, but by the position of the victim, and the romantic incidents in the detection and fate of the assassin and his accomplices.

The following outline of the facts will assist the reader to understand the bearings of the argument.

Joseph White, Esq. was found murdered in his bed, in his mansion-house, on the morning of the 7th of April, 1830. He was a wealthy merchant of Salem, eighty-two years of age, and had for many years given up active business. His servant-man rose that morning at six o'clock, and on going down into the kitchen, and opening the shutters of the window, saw that the back window of the east parlor was open, and that a plank was raised to the window from the back yard; he then went into the parlor, but saw no trace of any person having been there. He went to the apartment of the maid-servant, and told her, and then into Mr. White's chamber by its back door, and saw that the door of his chamber, leading into the front entry, was open. On approaching the bed, he found the bed-clothes turned down, and Mr. White dead, his countenance pallid, and his night-clothes and bed drenched in blood. He hastened to the neighboring houses to make known the event. He and the maid-servant were the only persons who slept in the house that night, except Mr. White himself, whose niece, Mrs. Beckford, his house-keeper, was then absent on a visit to her daughter, at Wenham.

The physicians and the coroner's jury, who were called to examine the body, found on it thirteen deep stabs, made as if by a sharp dirk or poniard, and the appearance of a heavy blow on the left temple, which had fractured the skull, but not broken the skin. The body was cold, and appeared to have been lifeless many hours.

On examining the apartments of the house, it did not appear that any valuable articles had been taken, or the house ransacked for them; there was a rouleau of doubloons in an iron chest in his chamber, and costly plate in other apartments, none of which was missing.

The perpetration of such an atrocious crime, in the most populous and central part of the town and in the most compactly built street, and under circumstances indicating the utmost coolness, deliberation, and audacity, deeply agitated and aroused the whole community; ingenuity was baffled in attempting even to conjecture a motive for the deed; and all the citizens were led to fear that the same fate might await them in the defenceless and helpless hours of slumber. For several days, persons passing through the streets might hear the continual sound of the hammer, while carpenters and smiths were fixing bolts to doors and fastenings to windows. Many, for defence, furnished themselves with cutlasses, fire-arms, and watch-dogs. Large rewards for the detection of the author or authors of the murder were offered by the heirs of the deceased, by the selectmen of the town, and by the Governor of the State. The citizens held a public meeting, and appointed a Committee of Vigilance, of twenty-seven members, to make all possible exertions to ferret out the offenders.

While the public mind was thus excited and anxious, it was announced that a bold attempt at highway robbery was made in Wenham, by three footpads, on Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. and John Francis Knapp, on the evening of the 27th of April, while they were returning in a chaise from Salem to their residence in Wenham. They appeared before the investigating committee, and testified that, after nine o'clock, near the Wenham Pond, they discovered three men approaching. One came near, seized the bridle, and stopped the horse, while the other two came, one on each side, and seized a trunk in the bottom of the chaise. Frank Knapp drew a sword from his cane and made a thrust at one, and Joseph with the but-end of his whip gave the other a heavy blow across the face. This bold resistance made them fall back. Joseph sprung from the chaise to assail the robbers. One of them then gave a shrill whistle, when they fled, and, leaping over the wall, were soon lost in the darkness. One had a weapon like an ivory dirk-handle, was clad in a sailor's short jacket, cap, and had whiskers; another wore a long coat, with bright buttons; all three were good-sized men. Frank, too, sprung from the chaise, and pursued with vigor, but all in vain.

The account of this unusual and bold attempt at robbery, thus given by the Knapps was immediately published in the Salem newspapers, with the editorial remark, that "these gentlemen are well known in this town, and their respectability and veracity are not questioned by any of our citizens."

Not the slightest clew to the murder could be found for several weeks, and the mystery seemed to be impenetrable. At length a rumor reached the ear of the committee that a prisoner in the jail at New Bedford, seventy miles from Salem, confined there on a charge of shoplifting, had intimated that he could make important disclosures. A confidential messenger was immediately sent, to ascertain what he knew on the subject. The prisoner's name was Hatch; he had been committed before the murder. He stated that, some months before the murder, while he was at large, he had associated in Salem with Richard Crowninshield, Jr., of Danvers, and had often heard Crowninshield express his intention to destroy the life of Mr. White. Crowninshield was a young man, of bad reputation; though he had never been convicted of any offence, he was strongly suspected of several heinous robberies. He was of dark and reserved deportment, temperate and wicked, daring and wary, subtle and obdurate, of great adroitness, boldness, and self-command. He had for several years frequented the haunts of vice in Salem; and though he was often spoken of as a dangerous man, his person was known to few, for he never walked the streets by daylight. Among his few associates he was a leader and a despot.

The disclosures of Hatch received credit. When the Supreme Court met at Ipswich, the Attorney-General, Morton, moved for a writ of habeas corpus ad testif., and Hatch was carried in chains from New Bedford before the grand jury, and on his testimony an indictment was found against Crowninshield. Other witnesses testified that, on the night of the murder, his brother, George Crowninshield, Colonel Benjamin Selman, of Marblehead, and Daniel Chase, of Lynn, were together in Salem, at a gambling-house usually frequented by Richard; these were indicted as accomplices in the crime. They were all arrested on the 2d of May, arraigned on the indictment, and committed to prison to await the sitting of a court that should have jurisdiction of the offence.

The Committee of Vigilance, however, continued to hold frequent meetings in order to discover further proof, for it was doubted by many whether the evidence already obtained would be sufficient to convict the accused.

A fortnight afterwards, on the 15th of May, Captain Joseph J. Knapp, a shipmaster and merchant, a man of good character, received by mail the following letter:--

CHARLES GRANT, JR., TO JOSEPH J. KNAPP.

"Belfast, May 12, 1830.

"Dear Sir,--I have taken the pen at this time to address an utter stranger, and, strange as it may seem to you, it is for the purpose of requesting the loan of three hundred and fifty-dollars, for which I can give you no security but my word, and in this case consider this to be sufficient. My call for money at this time is pressing, or I would not trouble you; but with that sum, I have the prospect of turning it to so much advantage, as to be able to refund it with interest in the course of six months. At all events, I think it will be for your interest to comply with my request, and that immediately,--that is, not to put off any longer than you receive this. Then set down and enclose me the money with as much despatch as possible, for your own interest. This, Sir, is my advice; and if you do not comply with it, the short period between now and November will convince you that you have denied a request, the granting of which will never injure you, the refusal of which will ruin you. Are you surprised at this assertion--rest assured that I make it, reserving to myself the reasons and a series of facts, which are founded on such a bottom as will bid defiance to property or quality. It is useless for me to enter into a discussion of facts which must inevitably harrow up your soul. No, I will merely tell you that I am acquainted with your brother Franklin, and also the business that he was transacting for you on the 2d of April last; and that I think that you was very extravagant in giving one thousand dollars to the person that would execute the business for you. But you know best about that; you see that such things will leak out. To conclude, Sir, I will inform you that there is a gentleman of my acquaintance in Salem, that will observe that you do not leave town before the first of June, giving you sufficient time between now and then to comply with my request: and if I do not receive a line from you, together with the above sum, before the 22d of this month, I shall wait upon you with an assistant. I have said enough to convince you of my knowledge, and merely inform you that you can, when you answer, be as brief as possible.

"Direct yours to

"CHARLES GRANT, Jr., of Prospect, Maine."

This letter was an unintelligible enigma to Captain Knapp; he knew no man of the name of Charles Grant, Jr., and had no acquaintance at Belfast, a town in Maine, two hundred miles distant from Salem. After poring over it in vain, he handed it to his son, Nathaniel Phippen Knapp, a young lawyer; to him also the letter was an inexplicable riddle. The receiving of such a threatening letter, at a time when so many felt insecure, and were apprehensive of danger, demanded their attention. Captain Knapp and his son Phippen, therefore, concluded to ride to Wenham, seven miles distant, and show the letter to Captain Knapp's other two sons, Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. and John Francis Knapp, who were then residing at Wenham with Mrs. Beckford, the niece and late house-keeper of Mr. White, and the mother of the wife of J.J. Knapp, Jr. The latter perused the letter, told his father it "contained a devilish lot of trash," and requested him to hand it to the Committee of Vigilance. Captain Knapp, on his return to Salem that evening, accordingly delivered the letter to the chairman of the Committee.

The next day J.J. Knapp, Jr. went to Salem, and requested one of his friends to drop into the Salem post-office the two following pseudonymous letters.

"May 13, 1830.

"GENTLEMEN OF THE COMMITTEE OF VIGILANCE,--Hearing that you have taken up four young men on suspicion of being concerned in the murder of Mr. White, I think it time to inform you that Steven White came to me one night and told me, if I would remove the old gentleman, he would give me five thousand dollars; he said he was afraid he would alter his will if he lived any longer. I told him I would do it, but I was afeared to go into the house, so he said he would go with me, that he would try to get into the house in the evening and open the window, would then go home and go to bed and meet me again about eleven. I found him, and we both went into his chamber. I struck him on the head with a heavy piece of lead, and then stabbed him with a dirk; he made the finishing strokes with another. He promised to send me the money next evening, and has not sent it yet which is the reason that I mention this.

"Yours, &c.,

"GRANT."

This letter was directed on the outside to the "Hon. Gideon Barstow, Salem," and put into the post-office on Sunday evening, May 16, 1830.

"Lynn, May 12, 1830.

"Mr. White will send the $5,000, or a part of it, before to-morrow night, or suffer the painful consequences.

"N. CLAXTON, 4TH."

This letter was addressed to the "Hon. Stephen White, Salem, Mass.," and was also put into the post-office in Salem on Sunday evening.

When Knapp delivered these letters to his friend, he said his father had received an anonymous letter, and "What I want you for is to put these in the post-office in order to nip this silly affair in the bud."

The Hon. Stephen White, mentioned in these letters, was a nephew of Joseph White, and the legatee of the principal part of his large property.

When the Committee of Vigilance read and considered the letter, purporting to be signed by Charles Grant, Jr., which had been delivered to them by Captain Knapp, they were impressed with the belief that it contained a clew which might lead to important disclosures. As they had spared no pains or expense in their investigations, they immediately despatched a discreet messenger to Prospect, in Maine; he explained his business confidentially to the postmaster there, deposited a letter addressed to Charles Grant, Jr., and awaited the call of Grant to receive it. He soon called for it, when an officer, stationed in the house, stepped forward and arrested Grant. On examining him, it appeared that his true name was Palmer, a young man of genteel appearance, resident in the adjoining town of Belfast. He had been a convict in Maine, and had served a term in the State's prison in that State. Conscious that the circumstances justified the belief that he had had a hand in the murder, he readily made known, while he protested his own innocence, that he could unfold the whole mystery. He then disclosed that he had been an associate of R. Crowninshield, Jr. and George Crowninshield; had spent part of the winter at Danvers and Salem, under the name of Carr; part of the time he had been their inmate, concealed in their father's house in Danvers; that on the 2d of April he saw from the windows of the house Frank Knapp and a young man named Allen ride up to the house; that George walked away with Frank, and Richard with Allen; that on their return, George told Richard that Frank wished them to undertake to kill Mr. White, and that J.J. Knapp, Jr. would pay one thousand dollars for the job. They proposed various modes of executing it, and asked Palmer to be concerned, which he declined. George said the house-keeper would be away at the time; that the object of Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. was to destroy the will, because it gave most of the property to Stephen White; that Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. was first to destroy the will; that he could get from the house-keeper the keys of the iron chest in which it was kept; that Frank called again the same day, in a chaise, and rode away with Richard; and that on the night of the murder Palmer stayed at the Half-way House, in Lynn.

The messenger, on obtaining this disclosure from Palmer, without delay communicated it by mail to the Committee, and on the 26th of May, a warrant was issued against Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. and John Francis Knapp, and they were taken into custody at Wenham, where they were residing in the family of Mrs. Beckford, mother of the wife of Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. They were then imprisoned to await the arrival of Palmer, for their examination.

The two Knapps were young shipmasters, of a respectable family.

Joseph J. Knapp, Jr., on the third day of his imprisonment, made a full confession that he projected the murder. He knew that Mr. White had made his will, and given to Mrs. Beckford a legacy of fifteen thousand dollars; but if he died without leaving a will, he expected she would inherit nearly two hundred thousand dollars. In February he made known to his brother his desire to make way with Mr. White, intending first to abstract and destroy the will. Frank agreed to employ an assassin, and negotiated with R. Crowninshield, Jr., who agreed to do the deed for a reward of one thousand dollars; Joseph agreed to pay that sum, and, as he had access to the house at his pleasure, he was to unbar and unfasten the back window, so that Crowninshield might gain easy entrance. Four days before the murder, while they were deliberating on the mode of compassing it, he went into Mr. White's chamber, and, finding the key in the iron chest, unlocked it, took the will, put it in his chaise-box, covered it with hay, carried it to Wenham, kept it till after the murder, and then burned it. After securing the will, he gave notice to Crowninshield that all was ready. In the evening of that day he had a meeting with Crowninshield at the centre of the common, who showed him a bludgeon and dagger, with which the murder was to be committed. Knapp asked him if he meant to do it that night; Crowninshield said he thought not, he did not feel like it; Knapp then went to Wenham. Knapp ascertained on Sunday, the 4th of April, that Mr. White had gone to take tea with a relative in Chestnut Street. Crowninshield intended to dirk him on his way home in the evening, but Mr. White returned before dark. It was next arranged for the night of the 6th, and Knapp was on some pretext to prevail on Mrs. Beckford to visit her daughters at Wenham, and to spend the night there. He said that, all preparations being thus complete, Crowninshield and Frank met about ten o'clock in the evening of the 6th, in Brown Street, which passes the rear of the garden of Mr. White, and stood some time in a spot from which they could observe the movements in the house, and perceive when Mr. White and his two servants retired to bed. Crowninshield requested Frank to go home; he did so, but soon returned to the same spot. Crowninshield, in the mean time, had started and passed round through Newbury Street and Essex Street to the front of the house, entered the postern gate, passed to the rear of the house, placed a plank against the house, climbed to the window, opened it, entered the house alone, passed up the staircase, opened the door of the sleeping-chamber, approached the bedside, gave Mr. White a heavy and mortal blow on the head with a bludgeon, and then with a dirk gave him many stabs in his body. Crowninshield said, that, after he had "done for the old man," he put his fingers on his pulse to make certain he was dead. He then retired from the house, hurried back through Brown Street, where he met Frank, waiting to learn the event. Crowninshield ran down Howard Street, a solitary place, and hid the club under the steps of a meeting-house. He then went home to Danvers.

Joseph confessed further that the account of the Wenham robbery, on the 27th of April, was a sheer fabrication. After the murder Crowninshield went to Wenham in company with Frank to call for the one thousand dollars. He was not able to pay the whole, but gave him one hundred five-franc pieces. Crowninshield related to him the particulars of the murder, told him where the club was hid, and said he was sorry Joseph had not got the right will, for if he had known there was another, he would have got it. Joseph sent Frank afterwards to find and destroy the club, but he said he could not find it. When Joseph made the confession, he told the place where the club was concealed, and it was there found; it was heavy, made of hickory, twenty-two and a half inches long, of a smooth surface and large oval head, loaded with lead, and of a form adapted to give a mortal blow on the skull without breaking the skin; the handle was suited for a firm grasp. Crowninshield said he turned it in a lathe. Joseph admitted he wrote the two anonymous letters.

Crowninshield had hitherto maintained a stoical composure of feeling; but when he was informed of Knapp's arrest, his knees smote beneath him, the sweat started out on his stern and pallid face, and he subsided upon his bunk.

Palmer was brought to Salem in irons on the 3d of June, and committed to prison. Crowninshield saw him taken from the carriage. He was put in the cell directly under that in which Crowninshield was kept. Several members of the Committee entered Palmer's cell to talk with him; while they were talking, they heard a loud whistle, and, on looking up, saw that Crowninshield had picked away the mortar from the crevice between the blocks of the granite floor of his cell. After the loud whistle, he cried out, "Palmer! Palmer!" and soon let down a string, to which were tied a pencil and a slip of paper. Two lines of poetry were written on the paper, in order that, if Palmer was really there, he should make it known by capping the verses. Palmer shrunk away into a corner, and was soon transferred to another cell. He seemed to stand in awe of Crowninshield.

On the 12th of June a quantity of stolen goods was found concealed in the barn of Crowninshield, in consequence of information from Palmer.

Crowninshield, thus finding the proofs of his guilt and depravity thicken, on the 15th of June committed suicide by hanging himself to the bars of his cell with a handkerchief. He left letters to his father and brother, expressing in general terms the viciousness of his life, and his hopelessness of escape from punishment. When his associates in guilt heard his fate, they said it was not unexpected by them, for they had often heard him say he would never live to submit to an ignominious punishment.

A special term of the Supreme Court was held at Salem on the 20th of July, for the trial of the prisoners charged with the murder; it continued in session till the 20th of August, with a few days' intermission. An indictment for the murder was found against John Francis Knapp, as principal, and Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. and George Crowninshield, as accessories. Selman and Chase were discharged by the Attorney-General.

The principal, John Francis Knapp, was first put on trial. As the law then stood, an accessory in a murder could not be tried until a principal had been convicted. He was defended by Messrs. Franklin Dexter and William H. Gardiner, advocates of high reputation for ability and eloquence; the trial was long and arduous, and the witnesses numerous. His brother Joseph, who had made a full confession, on the government's promise of impunity if he would in good faith testify the truth, was brought into court, called to the stand as a witness, but declined to testify. To convict the prisoner, it was necessary for the government to prove that he was present, actually or constructively, as an aider or abettor in the murder. The evidence was strong that there was a conspiracy to commit the murder, that the prisoner was one of the conspirators, that at the time of the murder he was in Brown Street at the rear of Mr. White's garden, and the jury were satisfied that he was in that place to aid and abet in the murder, ready to afford assistance, if necessary. He was convicted.

Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. was afterwards tried as an accessory before the fact, and convicted.

George Crowninshield proved an alibi, and was discharged.

The execution of John Francis Knapp and Joseph J. Knapp, Jr. closed the tragedy.

If Joseph, after turning State's evidence, had not changed his mind, neither he nor his brother, nor any of the conspirators, could have been convicted; if he had testified, and disclosed the whole truth, it would have appeared that John Francis Knapp was in Brown Street, not to render assistance to the assassin; but that Crowninshield, when he started to commit the murder, requested Frank to go home and go to bed; that Frank did go home, retire to bed, soon after arose, secretly left his father's house, and hastened to Brown Street, to await the coming out of the assassin, in order to learn whether the deed was accomplished, and all the particulars. If Frank had not been convicted as principal, none of the accessories could by law have been convicted. Joseph would not have been even tried, for the government stipulated, that, if he would be a witness for the State, he should go clear.

The whole history of this occurrence is of romantic interest. The murder itself, the corpus delicti, was strange; planned with deliberation and sagacity, and executed with firmness and vigor. While conjecture was baffled in ascertaining either the motive or the perpetrator, it was certain that the assassin had acted upon design, and not at random. He must have had knowledge of the house, for the window had been unfastened from within. He had entered stealthily, threaded his way in silence through the apartments, corridors, and staircases, and coolly given the mortal blow. To make assurance doubly sure, he inflicted many fatal stabs, "the least a death to nature," and stayed not his hand till he had deliberately felt the pulse of his victim, to make certain that life was extinct.

It was strange that Crowninshield, the real assassin, should have been indicted and arrested on the testimony of Hatch, who was himself in prison, in a distant part of the State, at the time of the murder, and had no actual knowledge on the subject.

It was very strange that J.J. Knapp, Jr. should have been the instrument of bringing to light the mystery of the whole murderous conspiracy; for when he received from the hand of his father the threatening letter of Palmer, consciousness of guilt so confounded his faculties, that, instead of destroying it, he stupidly handed it back and requested his father to deliver it to the Committee of Vigilance.

It was strange that the murder should have been committed on a mistake in law. Joseph, some time previous to the murder, had made inquiry how Mr. White's estate would be distributed in case he died without a will, and had been erroneously told that Mrs. Beckford, his mother-in-law, the sole issue and representative of a deceased sister of Mr. White, would inherit half of the estate, and that the four children and representatives of a deceased brother of Mr. White, of whom the Hon. Stephen White was one, would inherit the other half. Joseph had privately read the will, and knew that Mr. White had bequeathed to Mrs. Beckford much less than half.

It was strange that the murder should have been committed on a mistake in fact also. Joseph furtively abstracted a will, and expected Mr. White would die intestate; but, after the decease, the will, the last will, was found by his heirs in its proper place; and it could never have been known, or conjectured, without the aid of Joseph's confession, that he had made either of those blunders.

Finally, it was a strange fact that Knapp should, on the night following the murder, have watched with the mangled corpse, and at the funeral followed the hearse as one of the chief mourners, without betraying on either occasion the slightest emotion which could awaken a suspicion of his guilt.

* * * * *

The following note was prefixed to this argument in the former edition:--

Mr. White, a highly respectable and wealthy citizen of Salem, about eighty years of age, was found, on the morning of the 7th of April, 1830, in his bed, murdered, under such circumstances as to create a strong sensation in that town and throughout the community.

Richard Crowninshield, George Crowninshield, Joseph J. Knapp, and John F. Knapp were, a few weeks after, arrested on a charge of having perpetrated the murder, and committed for trial. Joseph J. Knapp, soon after, under the promise of favor from government, made a full confession of the crime and the circumstances attending it. In a few days after this disclosure was made, Richard Crowninshield, who was supposed to have been the principal assassin, committed suicide.

A special session of the Supreme Court was ordered by the legislature, for the trial of the prisoners, at Salem, in July. At that time, John F. Knapp was indicted as principal in the murder, and George Crowninshield and Joseph J. Knapp as accessories.

On account of the death of Chief Justice Parker, which occurred on the 26th of July, the court adjourned to Tuesday, the third day of August, when it proceeded in the trial of John F. Knapp. Joseph J. Knapp, being called upon, refused to testify, and the pledge of the government was withdrawn.

At the request of the prosecuting officers of the government, Mr. Webster appeared as counsel, and assisted in the trial.

Mr. Franklin Dexter addressed the jury on behalf of the prisoner, and was succeeded by Mr. Webster in the following speech.]

I am little accustomed, Gentlemen, to the part which I am now attempting to perform. Hardly more than once or twice has it happened to me to be concerned on the side of the government in any criminal prosecution whatever; and never, until the present occasion, in any case affecting life.

But I very much regret that it should have been thought necessary to suggest to you that I am brought here to "hurry you against the law and beyond the evidence." I hope I have too much regard for justice, and too much respect for my own character, to attempt either; and were I to make such attempt, I am sure that in this court nothing can be carried against the law, and that gentlemen, intelligent and just as you are, are not, by any power, to be hurried beyond the evidence. Though I could well have wished to shun this occasion, I have not felt at liberty to withhold my professional assistance, when it is supposed that I may be in some degree useful in investigating and discovering the truth respecting this most extraordinary murder. It has seemed to be a duty incumbent on me, as on every other citizen, to do my best and my utmost to bring to light the perpetrators of this crime. Against the prisoner at the bar, as an individual, I cannot have the slightest prejudice. I would not do him the smallest injury or injustice. But I do not affect to be indifferent to the discovery and the punishment of this deep guilt. I cheerfully share in the opprobrium, how great soever it may be, which is cast on those who feel and manifest an anxious concern that all who had a part in planning, or a hand in executing, this deed of midnight assassination, may be brought to answer for their enormous crime at the bar of public justice.

Gentlemen, it is a most extraordinary case. In some respects, it has hardly a precedent anywhere; certainly none in our New England history. This bloody drama exhibited no suddenly excited, ungovernable rage. The actors in it were not surprised by any lion-like temptation springing upon their virtue, and overcoming it, before resistance could begin. Nor did they do the deed to glut savage vengeance, or satiate long-settled and deadly hate. It was a cool, calculating, money-making murder. It was all "hire and salary, not revenge." It was the weighing of money against life; the counting out of so many pieces of silver against so many ounces of blood.

An aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house, and in his own bed, is made the victim of a butcherly murder, for mere pay. Truly, here is a new lesson for painters and poets. Whoever shall hereafter draw the portrait of murder, if he will show it as it has been exhibited, where such example was last to have been looked for, in the very bosom of our New England society, let him not give it the grim visage of Moloch, the brow knitted by revenge, the face black with settled hate, and the bloodshot eye emitting livid fires of malice. Let him draw, rather, a decorous, smooth-faced, bloodless demon; a picture in repose, rather than in action; not so much an example of human nature in its depravity, and in its paroxysms of crime, as an infernal being, a fiend, in the ordinary display and development of his character.

The deed was executed with a degree of self-possession and steadiness equal to the wickedness with which it was planned. The circumstances now clearly in evidence spread out the whole scene before us. Deep sleep had fallen on the destined victim, and on all beneath his roof. A healthful old man, to whom sleep was sweet, the first sound slumbers of the night held him in their soft but strong embrace. The assassin enters, through the window already prepared, into an unoccupied apartment. With noiseless foot he paces the lonely hall, half lighted by the moon; he winds up the ascent of the stairs, and reaches the door of the chamber. Of this, he moves the lock, by soft and continued pressure, till it turns on its hinges without noise; and he enters, and beholds his victim before him. The room is uncommonly open to the admission of light. The face of the innocent sleeper is turned from the murderer, and the beams of the moon, resting on the gray locks of his aged temple, show him where to strike. The fatal blow is given! and the victim passes, without a struggle or a motion, from the repose of sleep to the repose of death! It is the assassin's purpose to make sure work; and he plies the dagger, though it is obvious that life has been destroyed by the blow of the bludgeon. He even raises the aged arm, that he may not fail in his aim at the heart, and replaces it again over the wounds of the poniard! To finish the picture, he explores the wrist for the pulse! He feels for it, and ascertains that it beats no longer! It is accomplished. The deed is done. He retreats, retraces his steps to the window, passes out through it as he came in, and escapes. He has done the murder. No eye has seen him, no ear has heard him. The secret is his own, and it is safe!

Ah! Gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe nowhere. The whole creation of God has neither nook nor corner where the guilty can bestow it, and say it is safe. Not to speak of that eye which pierces through all disguises, and beholds every thing as in the splendor of noon, such secrets of guilt are never safe from detection, even by men. True it is, generally speaking, that "murder will out." True it is, that Providence hath so ordained, and doth so govern things, that those who break the great law of Heaven by shedding man's blood seldom succeed in avoiding discovery. Especially, in a case exciting so much attention as this, discovery must come, and will come, sooner or later. A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every man, every thing, every circumstance, connected with the time and place; a thousand ears catch every whisper; a thousand excited minds intensely dwell on the scene, shedding all their light, and ready to kindle the slightest circumstance into a blaze of discovery. Meantime the guilty soul cannot keep its own secret. It is false to itself; or rather it feels an irresistible impulse of conscience to be true to itself. It labors under its guilty possession, and knows not what to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of such an inhabitant. It finds itself preyed on by a torment, which it dares not acknowledge to God or man. A vulture is devouring it, and it can ask no sympathy or assistance, either from heaven or earth. The secret which the murderer possesses soon comes to possess him; and, like the evil spirits of which we read, it overcomes him, and leads him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost hears its workings in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarrass him, and the net of circumstance to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles with still greater violence to burst forth. It must be confessed, it will be confessed; there is no refuge from confession but suicide, and suicide is confession.

Much has been said, on this occasion, of the excitement which has existed, and still exists, and of the extraordinary measures taken to discover and punish the guilty. No doubt there has been, and is, much excitement, and strange indeed it would be had it been otherwise. Should not all the peaceable and well-disposed naturally feel concerned, and naturally exert themselves to bring to punishment the authors of this secret assassination? Was it a thing to be slept upon or forgotten? Did you, Gentlemen, sleep quite as quietly in your beds after this murder as before? Was it not a case for rewards, for meetings, for committees, for the united efforts of all the good, to find out a band of murderous conspirators, of midnight ruffians, and to bring them to the bar of justice and law? If this be excitement, is it an unnatural or an improper excitement?

It seems to me, Gentlemen, that there are appearances of another feeling, of a very different nature and character; not very extensive, I would hope, but still there is too much evidence of its existence. Such is human nature, that some persons lose their abhorrence of crime in their admiration of its magnificent exhibitions. Ordinary vice is reprobated by them, but extraordinary guilt, exquisite wickedness, the high flights and poetry of crime, seize on the imagination, and lead them to forget the depths of the guilt, in admiration of the excellence of the performance, or the unequalled atrocity of the purpose. There are those in our day who have made great use of this infirmity of our nature, and by means of it done infinite injury to the cause of good morals. They have affected not only the taste, but I fear also the principles, of the young, the heedless, and the imaginative, by the exhibition of interesting and beautiful monsters. They render depravity attractive, sometimes by the polish of its manners, and sometimes by its very extravagance; and study to show off crime under all the advantages of cleverness and dexterity. Gentlemen, this is an extraordinary murder, but it is still a murder. We are not to lose ourselves in wonder at its origin, or in gazing on its cool and skilful execution. We are to detect and to punish it; and while we proceed with caution against the prisoner, and are to be sure that we do not visit on his head the offences of others, we are yet to consider that we are dealing with a case of most atrocious crime, which has not the slightest circumstance about it to soften its enormity. It is murder; deliberate, concerted, malicious murder.

Although the interest of this case may have diminished by the repeated investigation of the facts; still, the additional labor which it imposes upon all concerned is not to be regretted, if it should result in removing all doubts of the guilt of the prisoner.

The learned counsel for the prisoner has said truly, that it is your individual duty to judge the prisoner; that it is your individual duty to determine his guilt or innocence; and that you are to weigh the testimony with candor and fairness. But much at the same time has been said, which, although it would seem to have no distinct bearing on the trial, cannot be passed over without some notice.

A tone of complaint so peculiar has been indulged, as would almost lead us to doubt whether the prisoner at the bar, or the managers of this prosecution, are now on trial. Great pains have been taken to complain of the manner of the prosecution. We hear of getting up a case; of setting in motion trains of machinery; of foul testimony; of combinations to overwhelm the prisoner; of private prosecutors; that the prisoner is hunted, persecuted, driven to his trial; that everybody is against him; and various other complaints, as if those who would bring to punishment the authors of this murder were almost as bad as they who committed it.

In the course of my whole life, I have never heard before so much said about the particular counsel who happen to be employed; as if it were extraordinary that other counsel than the usual officers of the government should assist in the management of a case on the part of the government. In one of the last criminal trials in this county, that of Jackman for the "Goodridge robbery" (so called), I remember that the learned head of the Suffolk Bar, Mr. Prescott, came down in aid of the officers of the government. This was regarded as neither strange nor improper. The counsel for the prisoner, in that case, contented themselves with answering his arguments, as far as they were able, instead of carping at his presence.

Complaint is made that rewards were offered, in this case, and temptations held out to obtain testimony. Are not rewards always offered, when great and secret offences are committed? Rewards were offered in the case to which I have alluded; and every other means taken to discover the offenders, that ingenuity or the most persevering vigilance could suggest. The learned counsel have suffered their zeal to lead them into a strain of complaint at the manner in which the perpetrators of this crime were detected, almost indicating that they regard it as a positive injury to them to have found out their guilt. Since no man witnessed it, since they do not now confess it, attempts to discover it are half esteemed as officious intermeddling and impertinent inquiry.

It is said, that here even a Committee of Vigilance was appointed. This is a subject of reiterated remark. This committee are pointed at, as though they had been officiously intermeddling with the administration of justice. They are said to have been "laboring for months" against the prisoner. Gentlemen, what must we do in such a case? Are people to be dumb and still, through fear of overdoing? Is it come to this, that an effort cannot be made, a hand cannot be lifted, to discover the guilty, without its being said there is a combination to overwhelm innocence? Has the community lost all moral sense? Certainly, a community that would not be roused to action upon an occasion such as this was, a community which should not deny sleep to their eyes, and slumber to their eyelids, till they had exhausted all the means of discovery and detection, must indeed be lost to all moral sense, and would scarcely deserve protection from the laws. The learned counsel have endeavored to persuade you, that there exists a prejudice against the persons accused of this murder. They would have you understand that it is not confined to this vicinity alone; but that even the legislature have caught this spirit. That through the procurement of the gentleman here styled private prosecutor, who is a member of the Senate, a special session of this court was appointed for the trial of these offenders. That the ordinary movements of the wheels of justice were too slow for the purposes devised. But does not everybody see and know, that it was matter of absolute necessity to have a special session of the court? When or how could the prisoners have been tried without a special session? In the ordinary arrangement of the courts, but one week in a year is allotted for the whole court to sit in this county. In the trial of all capital offences a majority of the court, at least, is required to be present. In the trial of the present case alone, three weeks have already been taken up. Without such special session, then, three years would not have been sufficient for the purpose. It is answer sufficient to all complaints on this subject to say, that the law was drawn by the late Chief Justice himself,[1] to enable the court to accomplish its duties, and to afford the persons accused an opportunity for trial without delay.

Again, it is said that it was not thought of making Francis Knapp, the prisoner at the bar, a PRINCIPAL till after the death of Richard Crowninshield, Jr.; that the present indictment is an after-thought; that "testimony was got up" for the occasion. It is not so. There is no authority for this suggestion. The case of the Knapps had not then been before the grand jury. The officers of the government did not know what the testimony would be against them. They could not, therefore, have determined what course they should pursue. They intended to arraign all as principals who should appear to have been principals, and all as accessories who should appear to have been accessories. All this could be known only when the evidence should be produced.

But the learned counsel for the defendant take a somewhat loftier flight still. They are more concerned, they assure us, for the law itself, than even for their client. Your decision in this case, they say, will stand as a precedent. Gentlemen, we hope it will. We hope it will be a precedent both of candor and intelligence, of fairness and of firmness; a precedent of good sense and honest purpose pursuing their investigation discreetly, rejecting loose generalities, exploring all the circumstances, weighing each, in search of truth, and embracing and declaring the truth when found.

It is said, that "laws are made, not for the punishment of the guilty, but for the protection of the innocent." This is not quite accurate, perhaps, but if so, we hope they will be so administered as to give that protection. But who are the innocent whom the law would protect? Gentlemen, Joseph White was innocent. They are innocent who, having lived in the fear of God through the day, wish to sleep in his peace through the night, in their own beds. The law is established that those who live quietly may sleep quietly; that they who do no harm may feel none. The gentleman can think of none that are innocent except the prisoner at the bar, not yet convicted. Is a proved conspirator to murder innocent? Are the Crowninshields and the Knapps innocent? What is innocence? How deep stained with blood, how reckless in crime, how deep in depravity may it be, and yet retain innocence? The law is made, if we would speak with entire accuracy, to protect the innocent by punishing the guilty. But there are those innocent out of a court, as well as in; innocent citizens not suspected of crime, as well as innocent prisoners at the bar. The criminal law is not founded in a principle of vengeance. It does not punish that it may inflict suffering. The humanity of the law feels and regrets every pain it causes, every hour of restraint it imposes, and more deeply still every life it forfeits. But it uses evil as the means of preventing greater evil. It seeks to deter from crime by the example of punishment. This is its true, and only true main object. It restrains the liberty of the few offenders, that the many who do not offend may enjoy their liberty. It takes the life of the murderer, that other murders may not be committed. The law might open the jails, and at once set free all persons accused of offences, and it ought to do so if it could be made certain that no other offences would hereafter be committed, because it punishes, not to satisfy any desire to inflict pain, but simply to prevent the repetition of crimes. When the guilty, therefore, are not punished, the law has so far failed of its purpose; the safety of the innocent is so far endangered. Every unpunished murder takes away something from the security of every man's life. Whenever a jury, through whimsical and ill-founded scruples, suffer the guilty to escape, they make themselves answerable for the augmented danger of the innocent.

We wish nothing to be strained against this defendant. Why, then, all this alarm? Why all this complaint against the manner in which the crime is discovered? The prisoner's counsel catch at supposed flaws of evidence, or bad character of witnesses, without meeting the case. Do they mean to deny the conspiracy? Do they mean to deny that the two Crowninshields and the two Knapps were conspirators? Why do they rail against Palmer, while they do not disprove, and hardly dispute, the truth of any one fact sworn to by him? Instead of this, it is made matter of sentimentality that Palmer has been prevailed upon to betray his bosom companions and to violate the sanctity of friendship. Again I ask, Why do they not meet the case? If the fact is out, why not meet it? Do they mean to deny that Captain White is dead? One would have almost supposed even that, from some remarks that have been made. Do they mean to deny the conspiracy? Or, admitting a conspiracy, do they mean to deny only that Frank Knapp, the prisoner at the bar, was abetting in the murder, being present, and so deny that he was a principal? If a conspiracy is proved, it bears closely upon every subsequent subject of inquiry. Why do they not come to the fact? Here the defence is wholly indistinct. The counsel neither take the ground, nor abandon it. They neither fly, nor light. They hover. But they must come to a closer mode of contest. They must meet the facts, and either deny or admit them. Had the prisoner at the bar, then, a knowledge of this conspiracy or not? This is the question. Instead of laying out their strength in complaining of the manner in which the deed is discovered, of the extraordinary pains taken to bring the prisoner's guilt to light, would it not be better to show there was no guilt? Would it not be better to show his innocence? They say, and they complain, that the community feel a great desire that he should be punished for his crimes. Would it not be better to convince you that he has committed no crime?

Gentlemen, let us now come to the case. Your first inquiry, on the evidence, will be, Was Captain White murdered in pursuance of a conspiracy, and was the defendant one of this conspiracy? If so, the second inquiry is, Was he so connected with the murder itself as that he is liable to be convicted as a principal? The defendant is indicted as a principal. If not guilty as such, you cannot convict him. The indictment contains three distinct classes of counts. In the first, he is charged as having done the deed with his own hand; in the second, as an aider and abettor to Richard Crowninshield, Jr., who did the deed; in the third, as an aider and abettor to some person unknown. If you believe him guilty on either of these counts, or in either of these ways, you must convict him.

It may be proper to say, as a preliminary remark, that there are two extraordinary circumstances attending this trial. One is, that Richard Crowninshield, Jr., the supposed immediate perpetrator of the murder, since his arrest, has committed suicide. He has gone to answer before a tribunal of perfect infallibility. The other is, that Joseph Knapp, the supposed originator and planner of the murder, having once made a full disclosure of the facts, under a promise of indemnity, is, nevertheless, not now a witness. Notwithstanding his disclosure and his promise of indemnity, he now refuses to testify. He chooses to return to his original state, and now stands answerable himself, when the time shall come for his trial. These circumstances it is fit you should remember, in your investigation of the case.

Your decision may affect more than the life of this defendant. If he be not convicted as principal, no one can be. Nor can any one be convicted of a participation in the crime as accessory. The Knapps and George Crowninshield will be again on the community. This shows the importance of the duty you have to perform, and serves to remind you of the care and wisdom necessary to be exercised in its performance. But certainly these considerations do not render the prisoner's guilt any clearer, nor enhance the weight of the evidence against him. No one desires you to regard consequences in that light. No one wishes any thing to be strained, or too far pressed against the prisoner. Still, it is fit you should see the full importance of the duty which devolves upon you.

And now, Gentlemen, in examining this evidence, let us begin at the beginning, and see first what we know independent of the disputed testimony. This is a case of circumstantial evidence. And these circumstances, we think, are full and satisfactory. The case mainly depends upon them, and it is common that offences of this kind must be proved in this way. Midnight assassins take no witnesses. The evidence of the facts relied on has been somewhat sneeringly denominated, by the learned counsel, "circumstantial stuff," but it is not such stuff as dreams are made of. Why does he not rend this stuff? Why does he not scatter it to the winds? He dismisses it a little too summarily. It shall be my business to examine this stuff, and try its cohesion.

The letter from Palmer at Belfast, is that no more than flimsy stuff?

The fabricated letters from Knapp to the committee and to Mr. White, are they nothing but stuff?

The circumstance, that the house-keeper was away at the time the murder was committed, as it was agreed she would be, is that, too, a useless piece of the same stuff?

The facts, that the key of the chamber door was taken out and secreted; that the window was unbarred and unbolted; are these to be so slightly and so easily disposed of?

It is necessary, Gentlemen, to settle now, at the commencement, the great question of a conspiracy. If there was none, or the defendant was not a party, then there is no evidence here to convict him. If there was a conspiracy, and he is proved to have been a party, then these two facts have a strong bearing on others, and all the great points of inquiry. The defendant's counsel take no distinct ground, as I have already said, on this point, either to admit or to deny. They choose to confine themselves to a hypothetical mode of speech. They say, supposing there was a conspiracy, non sequitur that the prisoner is guilty as principal. Be it so. But still, if there was a conspiracy, and if he was a conspirator, and helped to plan the murder, this may shed much light on the evidence which goes to charge him with the execution of that plan.

We mean to make out the conspiracy; and that the defendant was a party to it; and then to draw all just inferences from these facts.

Let me ask your attention, then, in the first place, to those appearances, on the morning after the murder, which have a tendency to show that it was done in pursuance of a preconcerted plan of operation. What are they? A man was found murdered in his bed. No stranger had done the deed, no one unacquainted with the house had done it. It was apparent that somebody within had opened, and that somebody without had entered. There had obviously and certainly been concert and co-operation. The inmates of the house were not alarmed when the murder was perpetrated. The assassin had entered without any riot or any violence. He had found the way prepared before him. The house had been previously opened. The window was unbarred from within, and its fastening unscrewed. There was a lock on the door of the chamber in which Mr. White slept, but the key was gone. It had been taken away and secreted. The footsteps of the murderer were visible, out-doors, tending toward the window. The plank by which he entered the window still remained. The road he pursued had been thus prepared for him. The victim was slain, and the murderer had escaped. Every thing indicated that somebody within had co-operated with somebody without. Every thing proclaimed that some of the inmates, or somebody having access to the house, had had a hand in the murder. On the face of the circumstances, it was apparent, therefore, that this was a premeditated, concerted murder; that there had been a conspiracy to commit it. Who, then, were the conspirators? If not now found out, we are still groping in the dark, and the whole tragedy is still a mystery.

If the Knapps and the Crowninshields were not the conspirators in this murder, then there is a whole set of conspirators not yet discovered. Because, independent of the testimony of Palmer and Leighton, independent of all disputed evidence, we know, from uncontroverted facts, that this murder was, and must have been, the result of concert and co-operation between two or more. We know it was not done without plan and deliberation; we see, that whoever entered the house, to strike the blow, was favored and aided by some one who had been previously in the house, without suspicion, and who had prepared the way. This is concert, this is co-operation, this is conspiracy. If the Knapps and the Crowninshields, then, were not the conspirators, who were? Joseph Knapp had a motive to desire the death of Mr. White, and that motive has been shown.

He was connected by marriage with the family of Mr. White. His wife was the daughter of Mrs. Beckford, who was the only child of a sister of the deceased. The deceased was more than eighty years old, and had no children. His only heirs were nephews and nieces. He was supposed to be possessed of a very large fortune, which would have descended, by law, to his several nephews and nieces in equal shares; or, if there was a will, then according to the will. But as he had but two branches of heirs, the children of his brother, Henry White, and of Mrs. Beckford, each of these branches, according to the common idea, would have shared one half of his property.

This popular idea is not legally correct. But it is common, and very probably was entertained by the parties. According to this idea, Mrs. Beckford, on Mr. White's death without a will, would have been entitled to one half of his ample fortune; and Joseph Knapp had married one of her three children. There was a will, and this will gave the bulk of the property to others; and we learn from Palmer that one part of the design was to destroy the will before the murder was committed. There had been a previous will, and that previous will was known or believed to have been more favorable than the other to the Beckford family. So that, by destroying the last will, and destroying the life of the testator at the same time, either the first and more favorable will would be set up, or the deceased would have no will, which would be, as was supposed, still more favorable. But the conspirators not having succeeded in obtaining and destroying the last will, though they accomplished the murder, that will being found in existence and safe, and that will bequeathing the mass of the property to others, it seemed at the time impossible for Joseph Knapp, as for any one else, indeed, but the principal devisee, to have any motive which should lead to the murder. The key which unlocks the whole mystery is the knowledge of the intention of the conspirators to steal the will. This is derived from Palmer, and it explains all. It solves the whole marvel. It shows the motive which actuated those, against whom there is much evidence, but who, without the knowledge of this intention, were not seen to have had a motive. This intention is proved, as I have said, by Palmer; and it is so congruous with all the rest of the case, it agrees so well with all facts and circumstances, that no man could well withhold his belief, though the facts were stated by a still less credible witness. If one desirous of opening a lock turns over and tries a bunch of keys till he finds one that will open it, he naturally supposes he has found the key of that lock. So, in explaining circumstances of evidence which are apparently irreconcilable or unaccountable, if a fact be suggested which at once accounts for all, and reconciles all, by whomsoever it may be stated, it is still difficult not to believe that such fact is the true fact belonging to the case. In this respect, Palmer's testimony is singularly confirmed. If it were false, his ingenuity could not furnish us such clear exposition of strange appearing circumstances. Some truth not before known can alone do that.

When we look back, then, to the state of things immediately on the discovery of the murder, we see that suspicion would naturally turn at once, not to the heirs at law, but to those principally benefited by the will. They, and they alone, would be supposed or seem to have a direct object for wishing Mr. White's life to be terminated. And, strange as it may seem, we find counsel now insisting, that, if no apology, it is yet mitigation of the atrocity of the Knapps' conduct in attempting to charge this foul murder on Mr. White, the nephew and principal devisee, that public suspicion was already so directed! As if assassination of character were excusable in proportion as circumstances may render it easy. Their endeavors, when they knew they were suspected themselves, to fix the charge on others, by foul means and by falsehood, are fair and strong proof of their own guilt. But more of that hereafter.

The counsel say that they might safely admit that Richard Crowninshield, Jr. was the perpetrator of this murder.

But how could they safely admit that? If that were admitted, every thing else would follow. For why should Richard Crowninshield, Jr. kill Mr. White? He was not his heir, nor his devisee; nor was he his enemy. What could be his motive? If Richard Crowninshield, Jr. killed Mr. White, he did it at some one's procurement who himself had a motive. And who, having any motive, is shown to have had any intercourse with Richard Crowninshield, Jr., but Joseph Knapp, and this principally through the agency of the prisoner at the bar? It is the infirmity, the distressing difficulty of the prisoner's case, that his counsel cannot and dare not admit what they yet cannot disprove, and what all must believe. He who believes, on this evidence, that Richard Crowninshield, Jr. was the immediate murderer, cannot doubt that both the Knapps were conspirators in that murder. The counsel, therefore, are wrong, I think, in saying they might safely admit this. The admission of so important and so connected a fact would render it impossible to contend further against the proof of the entire conspiracy, as we state it.

What, then, was this conspiracy? J.J. Knapp, Jr., desirous of destroying the will, and of taking the life of the deceased, hired a ruffian, who, with the aid of other ruffians, was to enter the house, and murder him in his bed.

As far back as January this conspiracy began. Endicott testifies to a conversation with J.J. Knapp at that time, in which Knapp told him that Captain White had made a will, and given the principal part of his property to Stephen White. When asked how he knew, he said, "Black and white don't lie." When asked if the will was not locked up, he said, "There is such a thing as two keys to the same lock." And speaking of the then late illness of Captain White, he said, that Stephen White would not have been sent for if he had been there.

Hence it appears, that as early as January Knapp had a knowledge of the will, and that he had access to it by means of false keys. This knowledge of the will, and an intent to destroy it, appear also from Palmer's testimony, a fact disclosed to him by the other conspirators. He says that he was informed of this by the Crowninshields on the 2d of April. But then it is said, that Palmer is not to be credited; that by his own confession he is a felon; that he has been in the State prison in Maine; and, above all, that he was intimately associated with these conspirators themselves. Let us admit these facts. Let us admit him to be as bad as they would represent him to be; still, in law, he is a competent witness. How else are the secret designs of the wicked to be proved, but by their wicked companions, to whom they have disclosed them? The government does not select its witnesses. The conspirators themselves have chosen Palmer. He was the confidant of the prisoners. The fact, however, does not depend on his testimony alone. It is corroborated by other proof; and, taken in connection with the other circumstances, it has strong probability. In regard to the testimony of Palmer, generally, it may be said that it is less contradicted, in all parts of it, either by himself or others, than that of any other material witness, and that every thing he has told is corroborated by other evidence, so far as it is susceptible of confirmation. An attempt has been made to impair his testimony, as to his being at the Half-way House on the night of the murder; you have seen with what success. Mr. Babb is called to contradict him. You have seen how little he knows, and even that not certainly; for he himself is proved to have been in an error by supposing Palmer to have been at the Half-way House on the evening of the 9th of April. At that time he is proved to have been at Dustin's, in Danvers. If, then, Palmer, bad as he is, has disclosed the secrets of the conspiracy, and has told the truth, there is no reason why it should not be believed. Truth is truth, come whence it may.

The facts show that this murder had been long in agitation; that it was not a new proposition on the 2d of April; that it had been contemplated for five or six weeks. Richard Crowninshield was at Wenham in the latter part of March, as testified by Starrett. Frank Knapp was at Danvers in the latter part of February, as testified by Allen. Richard Crowninshield inquired whether Captain Knapp was about home, when at Wenham. The probability is, that they would open the case to Palmer as a new project. There are other circumstances that show it to have been some weeks in agitation. Palmer's testimony as to the transaction on the 2d of April is corroborated by Allen, and by Osborn's books. He says that Frank Knapp came there in the afternoon, and again in the evening. So the book shows. He says that Captain White had gone out to his farm on that day. So others prove. How could this fact, or these facts, have been known to Palmer, unless Frank Knapp had brought the knowledge? And was it not the special object of this visit to give information of this fact, that they might meet him and execute their purpose on his return from his farm? The letter of Palmer, written at Belfast, bears intrinsic marks of genuineness. It was mailed at Belfast, May 13th. It states facts that he could not have known, unless his testimony be true. This letter was not an after-thought; it is a genuine narrative. In fact, it says, "I know the business your brother Frank was transacting on the 2d of April." How could he have possibly known this, unless he had been there? The "one thousand dollars that was to be paid,"--where could he have obtained this knowledge? The testimony of Endicott, of Palmer, and these facts, are to be taken together; and they most clearly show that the death of Captain White was caused by somebody interested in putting an end to his life.

As to the testimony of Leighton, as far as manner of testifying goes, he is a bad witness; but it does not follow from this that he is not to be believed. There are some strange things about him. It is strange, that he should make up a story against Captain Knapp, the person with whom he lived; that he never voluntarily told any thing: all that he has said was screwed out of him. But the story could not have been invented by him; his character for truth is unimpeached; and he intimated to another witness, soon after the murder happened, that he knew something he should not tell. There is not the least contradiction in his testimony, though he gives a poor account of withholding it. He says that he was extremely bothered by those who questioned him. In the main story that he relates, he is entirely consistent with himself. Some things are for him, and some against him. Examine the intrinsic probability of what he says. See if some allowance is not to be made for him, on account of his ignorance of things of this kind. It is said to be extraordinary, that he should have heard just so much of the conversation, and no more; that he should have heard just what was necessary to be proved, and nothing else. Admit that this is extraordinary; still, this does not prove it untrue. It is extraordinary that you twelve gentlemen should be called upon, out of all the men in the county, to decide this case; no one could have foretold this three weeks since. It is extraordinary that the first clew to this conspiracy should have been derived from information given by the father of the prisoner at the bar. And in every case that comes to trial there are many things extraordinary. The murder itself is a most extraordinary one; but still we do not doubt its reality.

It is argued, that this conversation between Joseph and Frank could not have been as Leighton has testified, because they had been together for several hours before; this subject must have been uppermost in their minds, whereas this appears to have been the commencement of their conversation upon it. Now this depends altogether upon the tone and manner of the expression; upon the particular word in the sentence which was emphatically spoken. If he had said, "When did you see Dick, Frank?" this would not seem to be the beginning of the conversation. With what emphasis it was uttered, it is not possible to learn; and therefore nothing can be made of this argument. If this boy's testimony stood alone, it should be received with caution. And the same may be said of the testimony of Palmer. But they do not stand alone. They furnish a clew to numerous other circumstances, which, when known, mutually confirm what would have been received with caution without such corroboration. How could Leighton have made up this conversation? "When did you see Dick?" "I saw him this morning." "When is he going to kill the old man?" "I don't know." "Tell him, if he don't do it soon, I won't pay him." Here is a vast amount in few words. Had he wit enough to invent this? There is nothing so powerful as truth; and often nothing so strange. It is not ever suggested that the story was made for him. There is nothing so extraordinary in the whole matter, as it would have been for this ignorant country boy to invent this story.

The acts of the parties themselves furnish strong presumption of their guilt. What was done on the receipt of the letter from Maine? This letter was signed by Charles Grant, Jr., a person not known to either of the Knapps, nor was it known to them that any other person beside the Crowninshields knew of the conspiracy. This letter, by the accidental omission of the word Jr., fell into the hands of the father, when intended for the son. The father carried it to Wenham, where both the sons were. They both read it. Fix your eye steadily on this part of the circumstantial stuff which is in the case, and see what can be made of it. This was shown to the two brothers on Saturday, the 15th of May. Neither of them knew Palmer. And if they had known him, they could not have known him to have been the writer of this letter. It was mysterious to them how any one at Belfast could have had knowledge of this affair. Their conscious guilt prevented due circumspection. They did not see the bearing of its publication. They advised their father to carry it to the Committee of Vigilance, and it was so carried. On the Sunday following, Joseph began to think there might be something in it. Perhaps, in the mean time, he had seen one of the Crowninshields. He was apprehensive that they might be suspected; he was anxious to turn attention from their family. What course did he adopt to effect this? He addressed one letter, with a false name, to Mr. White, and another to the Committee; and to complete the climax of his folly, he signed the letter addressed to the Committee, "Grant," the same name as that which was signed to the letter received from Belfast. It was in the knowledge of the Committee, that no person but the Knapps had seen this letter from Belfast; and that no other person knew its signature. It therefore must have been irresistibly plain to them that one of the Knapps was the writer of the letter received by the Committee, charging the murder on Mr. White. Add to this the fact of its having been dated at Lynn, and mailed at Salem four days after it was dated, and who could doubt respecting it? Have you ever read or known of folly equal to this? Can you conceive of crime more odious and abominable? Merely to explain the apparent mysteries of the letter from Palmer, they excite the basest suspicions against a man, whom, if they were innocent, they had no reason to believe guilty; and whom, if they were guilty, they most certainly knew to be innocent. Could they have adopted a more direct method of exposing their own infamy? The letter to the Committee has intrinsic marks of a knowledge of this transaction. It tells the time and the manner in which the murder was committed. Every line speaks the writer's condemnation. In attempting to divert attention from his family, and to charge the guilt upon another, he indelibly fixes it upon himself.

Joseph Knapp requested Allen to put these letters into the post-office, because, said he, "I wish to nip this silly affair in the bud." If this were not the order of an overruling Providence, I should say that it was the silliest piece of folly that was ever practised. Mark the destiny of crime. It is ever obliged to resort to such subterfuges; it trembles in the broad light; it betrays itself in seeking concealment. He alone walks safely who walks uprightly. Who for a moment can read these letters and doubt of Joseph Knapp's guilt? The constitution of nature is made to inform against him. There is no corner dark enough to conceal him. There is no turnpike-road broad enough or smooth enough for a man so guilty to walk in without stumbling. Every step proclaims his secret to every passenger. His own acts come out to fix his guilt. In attempting to charge another with his own crime, he writes his own confession. To do away the effect of Palmer's letter, signed Grant, he writes a letter himself and affixes to it the name of Grant. He writes in a disguised hand; but could it happen that the same Grant should be in Salem that was at Belfast? This has brought the whole thing out. Evidently he did it, because he has adopted the same style. Evidently he did it, because he speaks of the price of blood, and of other circumstances connected with the murder, that no one but a conspirator could have known.

Palmer says he made a visit to the Crowninshields, on the 9th of April. George then asked him whether he had heard of the murder. Richard inquired whether he had heard the music at Salem. They said that they were suspected, that a committee had been appointed to search houses; and that they had melted up the dagger, the day after the murder, because it would be a suspicious circumstance to have it found in their possession. Now this committee was not appointed, in fact, until Friday evening. But this proves nothing against Palmer; it does not prove that George did not tell him so; it only proves that he gave a false reason for a fact. They had heard that they were suspected; how could they have heard this, unless it were from the whisperings of their own consciences? Surely this rumor was not then public.

About the 27th of April, another attempt was made by the Knapps to give a direction to public suspicion. They reported themselves to have been robbed, in passing from Salem to Wenham, near Wenham Pond. They came to Salem and stated the particulars of the adventure. They described persons, their dress, size, and appearance, who had been suspected of the murder. They would have it understood that the community was infested by a band of ruffians, and that they themselves were the particular objects of their vengeance. Now this turns out to be all fictitious, all false. Can you conceive of any thing more enormous, any wickedness greater, than the circulation of such reports? than the allegation of crimes, if committed, capital? If no such crime had been committed, then it reacts with double force upon themselves, and goes very far to show their guilt. How did they conduct themselves on this occasion? Did they make hue and cry? Did they give information that they had been assaulted that night at Wenham? No such thing. They rested quietly that night; they waited to be called on for the particulars of their adventure; they made no attempt to arrest the offenders; this was not their object. They were content to fill the thousand mouths of rumor, to spread abroad false reports, to divert the attention of the public from themselves; for they thought every man suspected them, because they knew they ought to be suspected.

The manner in which the compensation for this murder was paid is a circumstance worthy of consideration. By examining the facts and dates, it will satisfactorily appear that Joseph Knapp paid a sum of money to Richard Crowninshield, in five-franc pieces, on the 24th of April. On the 21st of April, Joseph Knapp received five hundred five-franc pieces, as the proceeds of an adventure at sea. The remainder of this species of currency that came home in the vessel was deposited in a bank at Salem. On Saturday, the 24th of April, Frank and Richard rode to Wenham. They were there with Joseph an hour or more, and appeared to be negotiating private business. Richard continued in the chaise; Joseph came to the chaise and conversed with him. These facts are proved by Hart and Leighton, and by Osborn's books. On Saturday evening, about this time, Richard Crowninshield is proved, by Lummus, to have been at Wenham, with another person whose appearance corresponds with Frank's. Can any one doubt this being the same evening? What had Richard Crowninshield to do at Wenham, with Joseph, unless it were this business? He was there before the murder; he was there after the murder; he was there clandestinely, unwilling to be seen. If it were not upon this business, let it be told what it was for. Joseph Knapp could explain it; Frank Knapp might explain it. But they do not explain it; and the inference is against them.

Immediately after this, Richard passes five-franc pieces; on the same evening, one to Lummus, five to Palmer; and near this time George passes three or four in Salem. Here are nine of these pieces passed by them in four days; this is extraordinary. It is an unusual currency; in ordinary business, few men would pass nine such pieces in the course of a year. If they were not received in this way, why not explain how they came by them? Money was not so flush in their pockets that they could not tell whence it came, if it honestly came there. It is extremely important to them to explain whence this money came, and they would do it if they could. If, then, the price of blood was paid at this time, in the presence and with the knowledge of this defendant, does not this prove him to have been connected with this conspiracy?

Observe, also, the effect on the mind of Richard of Palmer's being arrested and committed to prison; the various efforts he makes to discover the fact; the lowering, through the crevices of the rock, the pencil and paper for him to write upon; the sending two lines of poetry, with the request that he would return the corresponding lines; the shrill and peculiar whistle; the inimitable exclamations of "Palmer! Palmer! Palmer!" All these things prove how great was his alarm; they corroborate Palmer's story, and tend to establish the conspiracy.

Joseph Knapp had a part to act in this matter. He must have opened the window, and secreted the key; he had free access to every part of the house; he was accustomed to visit there; he went in and out at his pleasure; he could do this without being suspected. He is proved to have been there the Saturday preceding.

If all these things, taken in connection, do not prove that Captain White was murdered in pursuance of a conspiracy, then the case is at an end.

Savary's testimony is wholly unexpected. He was called for a different purpose. When asked who the person was that he saw come out of Captain White's yard between three and four o'clock in the morning, he answered, Frank Knapp. It is not clear that this is not true. There may be many circumstances of importance connected with this, though we believe the murder to have been committed between ten and eleven o'clock. The letter to Dr. Barstow states it to have been done about eleven o'clock; it states it to have been done with a blow on the head, from a weapon loaded with lead. Here is too great a correspondence with the reality not to have some meaning in it. Dr. Peirson was always of the opinion, that the two classes of wounds were made with different instruments, and by different hands. It is possible that one class was inflicted at one time, and the other at another. It is possible that on the last visit the pulse might not have entirely ceased to beat, and then the finishing stroke was given. It is said, that, when the body was discovered, some of the wounds wept, while the others did not. They may have been inflicted from mere wantonness. It was known that Captain White was accustomed to keep specie by him in his chamber; this perhaps may explain the last visit. It is proved, that this defendant was in the habit of retiring to bed, and leaving it afterwards, without the knowledge of his family; perhaps he did so on this occasion. We see no reason to doubt the fact; and it does not shake our belief that the murder was committed early in the night.

What are the probabilities as to the time of the murder? Mr. White was an aged man; he usually retired to bed at about half-past nine. He slept soundest in the early part of the night; usually awoke in the middle and latter part; and his habits were perfectly well known. When would persons, with a knowledge of these facts, be most likely to approach him? Most certainly, in the first hour of his sleep. This would be the safest time. If seen then going to or from the house, the appearance would be least suspicious. The earlier hour would then have been most probably selected.

Gentlemen, I shall dwell no longer on the evidence which tends to prove that there was a conspiracy, and that the prisoner was a conspirator. All the circumstances concur to make out this point. Not only Palmer swears to it, in effect, and Leighton, but Allen mainly supports Palmer, and Osborn's books lend confirmation, so far as possible, from such a source. Palmer is contradicted in nothing, either by any other witness, or any proved circumstance or occurrence. Whatever could be expected to support him does support him. All the evidence clearly manifests, I think, that there was a conspiracy; that it originated with Joseph Knapp; that defendant became a party to it, and was one of its conductors, from first to last. One of the most powerful circumstances is Palmer's letter from Belfast. The amount of this is a direct charge on the Knapps of the authorship of this murder. How did they treat this charge; like honest men, or like guilty men? We have seen how it was treated. Joseph Knapp fabricated letters, charging another person, and caused them to be put into the post-office.

I shall now proceed on the supposition, that it is proved that there was a conspiracy to murder Mr. White, and that the prisoner was party to it.

The second and the material inquiry is, Was the prisoner present at the murder, aiding and abetting therein?

This leads to the legal question in the case. What does the law mean, when it says, that, in order to charge him as a principal, "he must be present aiding and abetting in the murder"?

In the language of the late Chief Justice, "It is not required that the abettor shall be actually upon the spot when the murder is committed, or even in sight of the more immediate perpetrator of the victim, to make him a principal. If he be at a distance, co-operating in the act, by watching to prevent relief, or to give an alarm, or to assist his confederate in escape, having knowledge of the purpose and object of the assassin, this in the eye of the law is being present, aiding and abetting, so as to make him a principal in the murder."

"If he be at a distance co-operating." This is not a distance to be measured by feet or rods; if the intent to lend aid combine with a knowledge that the murder is to be committed, and the person so intending be so situate that he can by any possibility lend this aid in any manner, then he is present in legal contemplation. He need not lend any actual aid; to be ready to assist is assisting.

There are two sorts of murder; the distinction between them it is of essential importance to bear in mind: 1. Murder in an affray, or upon sudden and unexpected provocation. 2. Murder secretly, with a deliberate, predetermined intention to commit the crime. Under the first class, the question usually is, whether the offence be murder or manslaughter, in the person who commits the deed. Under the second class, it is often a question whether others than he who actually did the deed were present, aiding and assisting therein. Offences of this kind ordinarily happen when there is nobody present except those who go on the same design. If a riot should happen in the court-house, and one should kill another, this may be murder, or it may not, according to the intention with which it was done; which is always matter of fact, to be collected from the circumstances at the time. But in secret murders, premeditated and determined on, there can be no doubt of the murderous intention; there can be no doubt, if a person be present, knowing a murder is to be done, of his concurring in the act. His being there is a proof of his intent to aid and abet; else, why is he there?

It has been contended, that proof must be given that the person accused did actually afford aid, did lend a hand in the murder itself; and without this proof, although he may be near by, he may be presumed to be there for an innocent purpose; he may have crept silently there to hear the news, or from mere curiosity to see what was going on.[2] Preposterous, absurd! Such an idea shocks all common sense. A man is found to be a conspirator to commit a murder; he has planned it; he has assisted in arranging the time, the place and the means; and he is found in the place, and at the time, and yet it is suggested that he might have been there, not for co-operation and concurrence, but from curiosity! Such an argument deserves no answer. It would be difficult to give it one, in decorous terms. Is it not to be taken for granted, that a man seeks to accomplish his own purposes? When he has planned a murder, and is present at its execution, is he there to forward or to thwart his own design? is he there to assist, or there to prevent? But "Curiosity"! He may be there from mere "curiosity"! Curiosity to witness the success of the execution of his own plan of murder! The very walls of a court-house ought not to stand, the ploughshare should run through the ground it stands on, where such an argument could find toleration.[3]

It is not necessary that the abettor should actually lend a hand, that he should take a part in the act itself; if he be present ready to assist, that is assisting. Some of the doctrines advanced would acquit the defendant, though he had gone to the bedchamber of the deceased, though he had been standing by when the assassin gave the blow. This is the argument we have heard to-day.

The court here said, they did not so understand the argument of the counsel for defendant. Mr. Dexter said, "The intent and power alone must co-operate."

No doubt the law is, that being ready to assist is assisting, if the party has the power to assist, in case of need. It is so stated by Foster, who is a high authority. "If A happeneth to be present at a murder, for instance, and taketh no part in it, nor endeavoreth to prevent it, nor apprehendeth the murderer, nor levyeth hue and cry after him, this strange behavior of his, though highly criminal, will not of itself render him either principal or accessory." "But if a fact amounting to murder should be committed in prosecution of some unlawful purpose, though it were but a bare trespass, to which A in the case last stated had consented, and he had gone in order to give assistance, if need were, for carrying it into execution, this would have amounted to murder in him, and in every person present and joining with him." "If the fact was committed in prosecution of the original purpose which was unlawful, the whole party will be involved in the guilt of him who gave the blow. For in combinations of this kind, the mortal stroke, though given by one of the party, is considered in the eye of the law, and of sound reason too, as given by every individual present and abetting. The person actually giving the stroke is no more than the hand or instrument by which the others strike." The author, in speaking of being present, means actual presence; not actual in opposition to constructive, for the law knows no such distinction. There is but one presence, and this is the situation from which aid, or supposed aid, may be rendered. The law does not say where the person is to go, or how near he is to go, but that he must be where he may give assistance, or where the perpetrator may believe that he may be assisted by him. Suppose that he is acquainted with the design of the murderer, and has a knowledge of the time when it is to be carried into effect, and goes out with a view to render assistance, if need be; why, then, even though the murderer does not know of this, the person so going out will be an abettor in the murder.

It is contended that the prisoner at the bar could not be a principal, he being in Brown Street, because he could not there render assistance; and you are called upon to determine this case, according as you may be of opinion whether Brown Street was, or was not, a suitable, convenient, well-chosen place to aid in this murder. This is not the true question. The inquiry is not whether you would have selected this place in preference to all others, or whether you would have selected it at all. If the parties chose it, why should we doubt about it? How do we know the use they intended to make of it, or the kind of aid that he was to afford by being there? The question for you to consider is, Did the defendant go into Brown Street in aid of this murder? Did he go there by agreement, by appointment with the perpetrator?[4] If so, every thing else follows. The main thing, indeed the only thing, is to inquire whether he was in Brown Street by appointment with Richard Crowninshield. It might be to keep general watch; to observe the lights, and advise as to time of access; to meet the murderer on his return, to advise him as to his escape; to examine his clothes, to see if any marks of blood were upon them; to furnish exchange of clothes, or new disguise, if necessary; to tell him through what streets he could safely retreat, or whether he could deposit the club in the place designed; or it might be without any distinct object, but merely to afford that encouragement which would proceed from Richard Crowninshield's consciousness that he was near. It is of no consequence whether, in your opinion, the place was well chosen or not, to afford aid; if it was so chosen, if it was by appointment that he was there, it is enough. Suppose Richard Crowninshield, when applied to to commit the murder, had said, "I won't do it unless there can be some one near by to favor my escape; I won't go unless you will stay in Brown Street." Upon the gentleman's argument, he would not be an aider and abettor in the murder, because the place was not well chosen; though it is apparent that the being in the place chosen was a condition, without which the murder would never have happened.

You are to consider the defendant as one in the league, in the combination to commit the murder. If he was there by appointment with the perpetrator, he is an abettor. The concurrence of the perpetrator in his being there is proved by the previous evidence of the conspiracy. If Richard Crowninshield, for any purpose whatsoever, made it a condition of the agreement, that Frank Knapp should stand as backer, then Frank Knapp was an aider and abettor; no matter what the aid was, or what sort it was, or degree, be it ever so little; even if it were to judge of the hour when it was best to go, or to see when the lights were extinguished, or to give an alarm if any one approached. Who better calculated to judge of these things than the murderer himself? and if he so determined them, that is sufficient.

Now as to the facts. Frank Knapp knew that the murder was that night to be committed; he was one of the conspirators, he knew the object, he knew the time. He had that day been to Wenham to see Joseph, and probably to Danvers to see Richard Crowninshield, for he kept his motions secret. He had that day hired a horse and chaise of Osborn, and attempted to conceal the purpose for which it was used; he had intentionally left the place and the price blank on Osborn's books. He went to Wenham by the way of Danvers; he had been told the week before to hasten Dick; he had seen the Crowninshields several times within a few days; he had a saddle-horse the Saturday night before; he had seen Mrs. Beckford at Wenham, and knew she would not return that night. She had not been away before for six weeks, and probably would not soon be again. He had just come from Wenham. Every day, for the week previous, he had visited one or another of these conspirators, save Sunday, and then probably he saw them in town. When he saw Joseph on the 6th, Joseph had prepared the house, and would naturally tell him of it; there were constant communications between them; daily and nightly visitation; too much knowledge of these parties and this transaction, to leave a particle of doubt on the mind of any one, that Frank Knapp knew the murder was to be committed this night. The hour was come, and he knew it; if so, and he was in Brown Street, without explaining why he was there, can the jury for a moment doubt whether he was there to countenance, aid, or support; or for curiosity alone; or to learn how the wages of sin and death were earned by the perpetrator?

Here Mr. Webster read the law from Hawkins. 1 Hawk. 204, Lib. 1, ch. 32 sec. 7.

The perpetrator would derive courage, and strength, and confidence, from the knowledge that one of his associates was near by. If he was in Brown Street, he could have been there for no other purpose. If there for this purpose, then he was, in the language of the law, present, aiding and abetting in the murder.

His interest lay in being somewhere else. If he had nothing to do with the murder, no part to act, why not stay at home? Why should he jeopard his own life, if it was not agreed that he should be there? He would not voluntarily go where the very place would cause him to swing if detected. He would not voluntarily assume the place of danger. His taking this place proves that he went to give aid. His staying away would have made an alibi. If he had nothing to do with the murder, he would be at home, where he could prove his alibi. He knew he was in danger, because he was guilty of the conspiracy, and, if he had nothing to do, would not expose himself to suspicion or detection.

Did the prisoner at the bar countenance this murder? Did he concur, or did he non-concur, in what the perpetrator was about to do? Would he have tried to shield him? Would he have furnished his cloak for protection? Would he have pointed out a safe way of retreat? As you would answer these questions, so you should answer the general question, whether he was there consenting to the murder, or whether he was there as a spectator only.

One word more on this presence, called constructive presence. What aid is to be rendered? Where is the line to be drawn, between acting, and omitting to act? Suppose he had been in the house, suppose he had followed the perpetrator to the chamber, what could he have done? This was to be a murder by stealth; it was to be a secret assassination. It was not their purpose to have an open combat; they were to approach their victim unawares, and silently give the fatal blow. But if he had been in the chamber, no one can doubt that he would have been an abettor; because of his presence, and ability to render services, if needed. What service could he have rendered, if there? Could he have helped him to fly? Could he have aided the silence of his movements? Could he have facilitated his retreat, on the first alarm? Surely, this was a case where there was more of safety in going alone than with another; where company would only embarrass. Richard Crowninshield would prefer to go alone. He knew his errand too well. His nerves needed no collateral support. He was not the man to take with him a trembling companion. He would prefer to have his aid at a distance. He would not wish to be encumbered by his presence. He would prefer to have him out of the house. He would prefer that he should be in Brown Street. But whether in the chamber, in the house, in the garden, or in the street, whatsoever is aiding in actual presence is aiding in constructive presence; any thing that is aid in one case is aid in the other.[5]

If, then, the aid be anywhere, so as to embolden the perpetrator, to afford him hope or confidence in his enterprise, it is the same as though the person stood at his elbow with his sword drawn. His being there ready to act, with the power to act, is what makes him an abettor.

Here Mr. Webster referred to the cases of Kelly, of Hyde, and others, cited by counsel for the defendant, and showed that they did not militate with the doctrine for which he contended. The difference is, in those cases there was open violence; this was a case of secret assassination. The aid must meet the occasion. Here no acting was necessary, but watching, concealment of escape, management.

What are the facts in relation to this presence? Frank Knapp is proved to have been a conspirator, proved to have known that the deed was now to be done. Is it not probable that he was in Brown Street to concur in the murder? There were four conspirators. It was natural that some one of them should go with the perpetrator. Richard Crowninshield was to be the perpetrator; he was to give the blow. There is no evidence of any casting of the parts for the others. The defendant would probably be the man to take the second part. He was fond of exploits, he was accustomed to the use of sword-canes and dirks. If any aid was required, he was the man to give it. At least, there is no evidence to the contrary of this.

Aid could not have been received from Joseph Knapp, or from George Crowninshield. Joseph Knapp was at Wenham, and took good care to prove that he was there. George Crowninshield has proved satisfactorily where he was; that he was in other company, such as it was, until eleven o'clock. This narrows the inquiry. This demands of the prisoner to show, if he was not in this place, where he was. It calls on him loudly to show this, and to show it truly. If he could show it, he would do it. If he does not tell, and that truly, it is against him. The defence of an alibi is a double-edged sword. He knew that he was in a situation where he might be called upon to account for himself. If he had had no particular appointment or business to attend to, he would have taken care to be able so to account. He would have been out of town, or in some good company. Has he accounted for himself on that night to your satisfaction?

The prisoner has attempted to prove an alibi in two ways. In the first place, by four young men with whom he says he was in company, on the evening of the murder, from seven o'clock till near ten o'clock. This depends upon the certainty of the night. In the second place, by his family, from ten o'clock afterwards. This depends upon the certainty of the time of the night. These two classes of proof have no connection with each other. One may be true, and the other false; or they may both be true, or both be false. I shall examine this testimony with some attention, because, on a former trial, it made more impression on the minds of the court than on my own mind. I think, when carefully sifted and compared, it will be found to have in it more of plausibility than reality.

Mr. Page testifies, that on the evening of the 6th of April he was in company with Burchmore, Balch, and Forrester, and that he met the defendant about seven o'clock, near the Salem Hotel; that he afterwards met him at Remond's, about nine o'clock, and that he was in company with him a considerable part of the evening. This young gentleman is a member of college, and says that he came to town the Saturday evening previous; that he is now able to say that it was the night of the murder when he walked with Frank Knapp, from the recollection of the fact, that he called himself to an account, on the morning after the murder, as it is natural for men to do when an extraordinary occurrence happens. Gentlemen, this kind of evidence is not satisfactory; general impressions as to time are not to be relied on. If I were called on to state the particular day on which any witness testified in this cause, I could not do it. Every man will notice the same thing in his own mind. There is no one of these young men that could give an account of himself for any other day in the month of April. They are made to remember the fact, and then they think they remember the time. The witness has no means of knowing it was Tuesday rather than any other time. He did not know it at first; he could not know it afterwards. He says he called himself to an account. This has no more to do with the murder than with the man in the moon. Such testimony is not worthy to be relied on in any forty-shilling cause. What occasion had he to call himself to an account? Did he suppose that he should be suspected? Had he any intimation of this conspiracy?

Suppose, Gentlemen, you were either of you asked where you were, or what you were doing, on the fifteenth day of June; you could not answer this question without calling to mind some events to make it certain. Just as well may you remember on what you dined each day of the year past. Time is identical. Its subdivisions are all alike. No man knows one day from another, or one hour from another, but by some fact connected with it. Days and hours are not visible to the senses, nor to be apprehended and distinguished by the understanding. The flow of time is known only by something which marks it; and he who speaks of the date of occurrences with nothing to guide his recollection speaks at random, and is not to be relied on. This young gentleman remembers the facts and occurrences; he knows nothing why they should not have happened on the evening of the 6th; but he knows no more. All the rest is evidently conjecture or impression.

Mr. White informs you, that he told him he could not tell what night it was. The first thoughts are all that are valuable in such case. They miss the mark by taking second aim.

Mr. Balch believes, but is not sure, that he was with Frank Knapp on the evening of the murder. He has given different accounts of the time. He has no means of making it certain. All he knows is, that it was some evening before Fast-day. But whether Monday, Tuesday, or Saturday, he cannot tell.

Mr. Burchmore says, to the best of his belief, it was the evening of the murder. Afterwards he attempts to speak positively, from recollecting that he mentioned the circumstance to William Peirce, as he went to the Mineral Spring on Fast-day. Last Monday morning he told Colonel Putnam he could not fix the time. This witness stands in a much worse plight than either of the others. It is difficult to reconcile all he has said with any belief in the accuracy of his recollections.

Mr. Forrester does not speak with any certainty as to the night; and it is very certain that he told Mr. Loring and others, that he did not know what night it was.

Now, what does the testimony of these four young men amount to? The only circumstance by which they approximate to an identifying of the night is, that three of them say it was cloudy; they think their walk was either on Monday or Tuesday evening, and it is admitted that Monday evening was clear, whence they draw the inference that it must have been Tuesday.

But, fortunately, there is one fact disclosed in their testimony that settles the question. Balch says, that on the evening, whenever it was, he saw the prisoner; the prisoner told him he was going out of town on horseback, for a distance of about twenty minutes' drive, and that he was going to get a horse at Osborn's. This was about seven o'clock. At about nine, Balch says he saw the prisoner again, and was then told by him that he had had his ride, and had returned. Now it appears by Osborn's books, that the prisoner had a saddle-horse from his stable, not on Tuesday evening, the night of the murder, but on the Saturday evening previous. This fixes the time about which these young men testify, and is a complete answer and refutation of the attempted alibi on Tuesday evening.

I come now to speak of the testimony adduced by the defendant to explain where he was after ten o'clock on the night of the murder. This comes chiefly from members of the family; from his father and brothers.

It is agreed that the affidavit of the prisoner should be received as evidence of what his brother, Samuel H. Knapp, would testify if present. Samuel H. Knapp says, that, about ten minutes past ten o'clock, his brother, Frank Knapp, on his way to bed, opened his chamber door, made some remarks, closed the door, and went to his chamber; and that he did not hear him leave it afterwards. How is this witness able to fix the time at ten minutes past ten? There is no circumstance mentioned by which he fixes it. He had been in bed, probably asleep, and was aroused from his sleep by the opening of the door. Was he in a situation to speak of time with precision? Could he know, under such circumstances, whether it was ten minutes past ten, or ten minutes before eleven, when his brother spoke to him? What would be the natural result in such a case? But we are not left to conjecture this result. We have positive testimony on this point. Mr. Webb tells you that Samuel told him, on the 8th of June, "that he did not know what time his brother Frank came home, and that he was not at home when he went to bed." You will consider this testimony of Mr. Webb as indorsed upon this affidavit; and with this indorsement upon it, you will give it its due weight. This statement was made to him after Frank was arrested.

I come to the testimony of the father. I find myself incapable of speaking of him or his testimony with severity. Unfortunate old man! Another Lear, in the conduct of his children; another Lear, I apprehend, in the effect of his distress upon his mind and understanding. He is brought here to testify, under circumstances that disarm severity, and call loudly for sympathy. Though it is impossible not to see that his story cannot be credited, yet I am unable to speak of him otherwise than in sorrow and grief. Unhappy father! he strives to remember, perhaps persuades himself that he does remember, that on the evening of the murder he was himself at home at ten o'clock. He thinks, or seems to think, that his son came in at about five minutes past ten. He fancies that he remembers his conversation; he thinks he spoke of bolting the door; he thinks he asked the time of night; he seems to remember his then going to his bed. Alas! these are but the swimming fancies of an agitated and distressed mind. Alas! they are but the dreams of hope, its uncertain lights, flickering on the thick darkness of parental distress. Alas! the miserable father knows nothing, in reality, of all these things.

Mr. Shepard says that the first conversation he had with Mr. Knapp was soon after the murder, and before the arrest of his sons. Mr. Knapp says it was after the arrest of his sons. His own fears led him to say to Mr. Shepard, that his "son Frank was at home that night; and so Phippen told him," or "as Phippen told him." Mr. Shepard says that he was struck with the remark at the time; that it made an unfavorable impression on his mind; he does not tell you what that impression was, but when you connect it with the previous inquiry he had made, whether Frank had continued to associate with the Crowninshields, and recollect that the Crowninshields were then known to be suspected of this crime, can you doubt what this impression was? can you doubt as to the fears he then had?

This poor old man tells you, that he was greatly perplexed at the time; that he found himself in embarrassed circumstances; that on this very night he was engaged in making an assignment of his property to his friend, Mr. Shepard. If ever charity should furnish a mantle for error, it should be here. Imagination cannot picture a more deplorable, distressed condition.

The same general remarks may be applied to his conversation with Mr. Treadwell, as have been made upon that with Mr. Shepard. He told him, that he believed Frank was at home about the usual time. In his conversations with either of these persons, he did not pretend to know, of his own knowledge, the time that he came home. He now tells you positively that he recollects the time, and that he so told Mr. Shepard. He is directly contradicted by both these witnesses, as respectable men as Salem affords.

This idea of an alibi is of recent origin. Would Samuel Knapp have gone to sea if it were then thought of? His testimony, if true, was too important to be lost. If there be any truth in this part of the alibi, it is so near in point or time that it cannot be relied on. The mere variation of half an hour would avoid it. The mere variations of different timepieces would explain it.

Has the defendant proved where he was on that night? If you doubt about it, there is an end of it. The burden is upon him to satisfy you beyond all reasonable doubt. Osborn's books, in connection with what the young men state, are conclusive, I think, on this point. He has not, then, accounted for himself; he has attempted it, and has failed. I pray you to remember, Gentlemen, that this is a case in which the prisoner would, more than any other, be rationally able to account for himself on the night of the murder, if he could do so. He was in the conspiracy, he knew the murder was then to be committed, and if he himself was to have no hand in its actual execution, he would of course, as a matter of safety and precaution, be somewhere else, and be able to prove afterwards that he had been somewhere else. Having this motive to prove himself elsewhere, and the power to do it if he were elsewhere, his failing in such proof must necessarily leave a very strong inference against him.

But, Gentlemen, let us now consider what is the evidence produced on the part of the government to prove that John Francis Knapp, the prisoner at the bar, was in Brown Street on the night of the murder. This is a point of vital importance in this cause. Unless this be made out, beyond reasonable doubt, the law of presence does not apply to the case. The government undertake to prove that he was present aiding in the murder, by proving that he was in Brown Street for this purpose. Now, what are the undoubted facts? They are, that two persons were seen in that street, several times during that evening, under suspicious circumstances; under such circumstances as induced those who saw them to watch their movements. Of this there can be no doubt. Mirick saw a man standing at the post opposite his store from fifteen minutes before nine until twenty minutes after, dressed in a full frock-coat, glazed cap, and so forth, in size and general appearance answering to the prisoner at the bar. This person was waiting there; and whenever any one approached him, he moved to and from the corner, as though he would avoid being suspected or recognized. Afterwards, two persons were seen by Webster, walking in Howard Street, with a slow, deliberate movement that attracted his attention. This was about half-past nine. One of these he took to be the prisoner at the bar, the other he did not know.

About half-past ten a person is seen sitting on the rope-walk steps, wrapped in a cloak. He drops his head when passed, to avoid being known. Shortly after, two persons are seen to meet in this street, without ceremony or salutation, and in a hurried manner to converse for a short time; then to separate, and run off with great speed. Now, on this same night a gentleman is slain, murdered in his bed, his house being entered by stealth from without; and his house situated within three hundred feet of this street. The windows of his chamber were in plain sight from this street; a weapon of death is afterwards found in a place where these persons were seen to pass, in a retired place, around which they had been seen lingering. It is now known that this murder was committed by four persons, conspiring together for this purpose. No account is given who these suspected persons thus seen in Brown Street and its neighborhood were. Now, I ask, Gentlemen, whether you or any man can doubt that this murder was committed by the persons who were thus in and about Brown Street. Can any person doubt that they were there for purposes connected with this murder? If not for this purpose, what were they there for? When there is a cause so near at hand, why wander into conjecture for an explanation? Common-sense requires you to take the nearest adequate cause for a known effect. Who were these suspicious persons in Brown Street? There was something extraordinary about them; something noticeable, and noticed at the time; something in their appearance that aroused suspicion. And a man is found the next morning murdered in the near vicinity.

Now, so long as no other account shall be given of those suspicious persons, so long the inference must remain irresistible that they were the murderers. Let it be remembered, that it is already shown that this murder was the result of conspiracy and of concert; let it be remembered, that the house, having been opened from within, was entered by stealth from without. Let it be remembered that Brown Street, where these persons were repeatedly seen under such suspicious circumstances, was a place from which every occupied room in Mr. White's house is clearly seen; let it be remembered, that the place, though thus very near to Mr. White's house, is a retired and lonely place; and let it be remembered that the instrument of death was afterwards found concealed very near the same spot.

Must not every man come to the conclusion, that these persons thus seen in Brown Street were the murderers? Every man's own judgment, I think, must satisfy him that this must be so. It is a plain deduction of common sense. It is a point on which each one of you may reason like a Hale or a Mansfield. The two occurrences explain each other. The murder shows why these persons were thus lurking, at that hour, in Brown Street; and their lurking in Brown Street shows who committed the murder.

If, then, the persons in and about Brown Street were the plotters and executers of the murder of Captain White, we know who they were, and you know that there is one of them.

This fearful concatenation of circumstances puts him to an account. He was a conspirator. He had entered into this plan of murder. The murder is committed, and he is known to have been within three minutes' walk of the place. He must account for himself, He has attempted this, and failed. Then, with all these general reasons to show he was actually in Brown Street, and his failures in his alibi, let us see what is the direct proof of his being there. But first, let me ask, is it not very remarkable that there is no attempt to show where Richard Crowninshield, Jr. was on that night? We hear nothing of him. He was seen in none of his usual haunts about the town. Yet, if he was the actual perpetrator of the murder, which nobody doubts, he was in the town somewhere. Can you, therefore, entertain a doubt that he was one of the persons seen in Brown Street? And as to the prisoner, you will recollect, that, since the testimony of the young men has failed to show where he was on that evening, the last we hear or know of him, on the day preceding the murder, is, that at four o'clock, P.M., he was at his brother's in Wenham. He had left home, after dinner, in a manner doubtless designed to avoid observation, and had gone to Wenham, probably by way of Danvers. As we hear nothing of him after four o'clock, P.M., for the remainder of the day and evening; as he was one of the conspirators; as Richard Crowninshield, Jr. was another; as Richard Crowninshield, Jr. was in town in the evening, and yet seen in no usual place of resort,--the inference is very fair, that Richard Crowninshield, Jr. and the prisoner were together, acting in execution of their conspiracy. Of the four conspirators, J.J. Knapp, Jr. was at Wenham, and George Crowninshield has been accounted for; so that if the persons seen in Brown Street were the murderers, one of them must have been Richard Crowninshield, Jr., and the other must have been the prisoner at the bar.

Now, as to the proof of his identity with one of the persons seen in Brown Street, Mr. Mirick, a cautious witness, examined the person he saw, closely, in a light night, and says that he thinks the prisoner at the bar is the person; and that he should not hesitate at all, if he were seen in the same dress. His opinion is formed partly from his own observation, and partly from the description of others. But this description turns out to be only in regard to the dress. It is said, that he is now more confident than on the former trial. If he has varied in his testimony make such allowance as you may think proper. I do not perceive any material variance. He thought him the same person, when he was first brought to court, and as he saw him get out of the chaise. This is one of the cases in which a witness is permitted to give an opinion. This witness is as honest as yourselves, neither willing nor swift; but he says, he believes it was the man. His words are, "This is my opinion "; and this opinion it is proper for him to give. If partly founded on what he has heard, then this opinion is not to be taken; but if on what he saw, then you can have no better evidence. I lay no stress on similarity of dress. No man will ever lose his life by my voice on such evidence. But then it is proper to notice, that no inferences drawn from any dissimilarity of dress can be given in the prisoner's favor; because, in fact, the person seen by Mirick was dressed like the prisoner.

The description of the person seen by Mirick answers to that of the prisoner at the bar. In regard to the supposed discrepancy of statements, before and now, there would be no end to such minute inquiries. It would not be strange if witnesses should vary. I do not think much of slight shades of variation. If I believe the witness is honest, that is enough. If he has expressed himself more strongly now than then, this does not prove him false.

Peter E. Webster saw the prisoner at the bar, as he then thought, and still thinks, walking in Howard Street at half-past nine o'clock. He then thought it was Frank Knapp, and has not altered his opinion since. He knew him well; he had long known him. If he then thought it was he, this goes far to prove it. He observed him the more, as it was unusual to see gentlemen walk there at that hour. It was a retired, lonely street. Now, is there reasonable doubt that Mr. Webster did see him there that night? How can you have more proof than this? He judged by his walk, by his general appearance, by his deportment. We all judge in this manner. If you believe he is right, it goes a great way in this case. But then this person, it is said, had a cloak on, and that he could not, therefore, be the same person that Mirick saw. If we were treating of men that had no occasion to disguise themselves or their conduct, there might be something in this argument. But as it is, there is little in it. It may be presumed that they would change their dress. This would help their disguise. What is easier than to throw off a cloak, and again put it on? Perhaps he was less fearful of being known when alone, than when with the perpetrator.

Mr. Southwick swears all that a man can swear. He has the best means of judging that could be had at the time. He tells you that he left his father's house at half-past ten o'clock, and as he passed to his own house in Brown Street he saw a man sitting on the steps of the rope-walk; that he passed him three times, and each time he held down his head, so that he did not see his face. That the man had on a cloak, which was not wrapped around him, and a glazed cap. That he took the man to be Frank Knapp at the time; that, when he went into his house, he told his wife that he thought it was Frank Knapp; that he knew him well, having known him from a boy. And his wife swears that he did so tell her when he came home. What could mislead this witness at the time? He was not then suspecting Frank Knapp of any thing. He could not then be influenced by any prejudice. If you believe that the witness saw Frank Knapp in this position at this time, it proves the case. Whether you believe it or not depends upon the credit of the witness. He swears it. If true, it is solid evidence. Mrs. Southwick supports her husband. Are they true? Are they worthy of belief? If he deserves the epithets applied to him, then he ought not to be believed. In this fact they cannot be mistaken; they are right, or they are perjured. As to his not speaking to Frank Knapp, that depends upon their intimacy. But a very good reason is, Frank chose to disguise himself. This makes nothing against his credit. But it is said that he should not be believed. And why? Because, it is said, he himself now tells you, that, when he testified before the grand jury at Ipswich, he did not then say that he thought the person he saw in Brown Street was Frank Knapp, but that "the person was about the size of Selman." The means of attacking him, therefore, come from himself. If he is a false man, why should he tell truths against himself? They rely on his veracity to prove that he is a liar. Before you can come to this conclusion, you will consider whether all the circumstances are now known, that should have a bearing on this point. Suppose that, when he was before the grand jury, he was asked by the attorney this question, "Was the person you saw in Brown Street about the size of Selman?" and he answered Yes. This was all true. Suppose, also, that he expected to be inquired of further, and no further questions were put to him. Would it not be extremely hard to impute to him perjury for this? It is not uncommon for witnesses to think that they have done all their duty, when they have answered the questions put to them. But suppose that we admit that he did not then tell all he knew, this does not affect the fact at all; because he did tell, at the time, in the hearing of others, that the person he saw was Frank Knapp. There is not the slightest suggestion against the veracity or accuracy of Mrs. Southwick. Now she swears positively, that her husband came into the house and told her that he had seen a person on the rope-walk steps, and believed it was Frank Knapp.

It is said that Mr. Southwick is contradicted, also, by Mr. Shillaber. I do not so understand Mr. Shillaber's testimony. I think what they both testify is reconcilable, and consistent. My learned brother said, on a similar occasion, that there is more probability, in such cases, that the persons hearing should misunderstand, than that the person speaking should contradict himself. I think the same remark applicable here.

You have all witnessed the uncertainty of testimony, when witnesses are called to testify what other witnesses said. Several respectable counsellors have been summoned, on this occasion, to give testimony of that sort. They have, every one of them, given different versions. They all took minutes at the time, and without doubt intend to state the truth. But still they differ. Mr. Shillaber's version is different from every thing that Southwick has stated elsewhere. But little reliance is to be placed on slight variations in testimony, unless they are manifestly intentional. I think that Mr. Shillaber must be satisfied that he did not rightly understand Mr. Southwick. I confess I misunderstood Mr. Shillaber on the former trial, if I now rightly understand him. I, therefore, did not then recall Mr. Southwick to the stand. Mr. Southwick, as I read it, understood Mr. Shillaber as asking him about a person coming out of Newbury Street, and whether, for aught he knew, it might not be Richard Crowninshield, Jr. He answered, that he could not tell. He did not understand Mr. Shillaber as questioning him as to the person whom he saw sitting on the steps of the rope-walk. Southwick, on this trial, having heard Mr. Shillaber, has been recalled to the stand, and states that Mr. Shillaber entirely misunderstood him. This is certainly most probable, because the controlling fact in the case is not controverted; that is, that Southwick did tell his wife, at the very moment he entered his house, that he had seen a person on the rope-walk steps, whom he believed to be Frank Knapp. Nothing can prove with more certainty than this, that Southwick, at the time, thought the person whom he thus saw to be the prisoner at the bar.

Mr. Bray is an acknowledged accurate and intelligent witness. He was highly complimented by my brother on the former trial, although he now charges him with varying his testimony. What could be his motive? You will be slow in imputing to him any design of this kind. I deny altogether that there is any contradiction. There may be differences, but not contradiction. These arise from the difference in the questions put; the difference between believing and knowing. On the first trial, he said he did not know the person, and now says the same. Then, we did not do all we had a right to do. We did not ask him who he thought it was. Now, when so asked, he says he believes it was the prisoner at the bar. If he had then been asked this question, he would have given the same answer. That he has expressed himself more strongly, I admit; but he has not contradicted himself. He is more confident now; and that is all. A man may not assert a thing, and still may have no doubt upon it. Cannot every man see this distinction to be consistent? I leave him in that attitude; that only is the difference. On questions of identity, opinion is evidence. We may ask the witness, either if he knew who the person seen was, or who he thinks he was. And he may well answer, as Captain Bray has answered, that he does not know who it was, but that he thinks it was the prisoner.

We have offered to produce witnesses to prove, that, as soon as Bray saw the prisoner, he pronounced him the same person. We are not at liberty to call them to corroborate our own witness. How, then, could this fact of the prisoner's being in Brown Street be better proved? If ten witnesses had testified to it, it would be no better. Two men, who knew him well, took it to be Frank Knapp, and one of them so said, when there was nothing to mislead them. Two others, who examined him closely, now swear to their opinion that he is the man.

Miss Jaqueth saw three persons pass by the rope-walk, several evenings before the murder. She saw one of them pointing towards Mr. White's house. She noticed that another had something which appeared to be like an instrument of music; that he put it behind him and attempted to conceal it. Who were these persons? This was but a few steps from the place where this apparent instrument of music (of music such as Richard Crowninshield, Jr. spoke of to Palmer) was afterwards found. These facts prove this a point of rendezvous for these parties. They show Brown Street to have been the place for consultation and observation; and to this purpose it was well suited.

Mr. Burns's testimony is also important. What was the defendant's object in his private conversation with Burns? He knew that Burns was out that night; that he lived near Brown Street, and that he had probably seen him; and he wished him to say nothing. He said to Burns, "If you saw any of your friends out that night, say nothing about it; my brother Joe and I are your friends." This is plain proof that he wished to say to him, if you saw me in Brown Street that night, say nothing about it.

But it is said that Burns ought not to be believed, because he mistook the color of the dagger, and because he has varied in his description of it. These are slight circumstances, if his general character be good. To my mind they are of no importance. It is for you to make what deduction you may think proper, on this account, from the weight of his evidence. His conversation with Burns, if Burns is believed, shows two things; first, that he desired Burns not to mention it, if he had seen him on the night of the murder; second, that he wished to fix the charge of murder on Mr. Stephen White. Both of these prove his own guilt.

I think you will be of opinion, that Brown Street was a probable place for the conspirators to assemble, and for an aid to be stationed. If we knew their whole plan, and if we were skilled to judge in such a case, then we could perhaps determine on this point better. But it is a retired place, and still commands a full view of the house; a lonely place, but still a place of observation. Not so lonely that a person would excite suspicion to be seen walking there in an ordinary manner; not so public as to be noticed by many. It is near enough to the scene of action in point of law. It was their point of centrality. The club was found near the spot, in a place provided for it, in a place that had been previously hunted out, in a concerted place of concealment. Here was their point of rendezvous. Here might the lights be seen. Here might an aid be secreted. Here was he within call. Here might he be aroused by the sound of the whistle. Here might he carry the weapon. Here might he receive the murderer after the murder.

Then, Gentlemen, the general question occurs, Is it satisfactorily proved, by all these facts and circumstances, that the defendant was in and about Brown Street on the night of the murder? Considering that the murder was effected by a conspiracy; considering that he was one of the four conspirators; considering that two of the conspirators have accounted for themselves on the night of the murder, and were not in Brown Street; considering that the prisoner does not account for himself, nor show where he was; considering that Richard Crowninshield, the other conspirator and the perpetrator, is not accounted for, nor shown to be elsewhere; considering that it is now past all doubt that two persons were seen lurking in and about Brown Street at different times, avoiding observation, and exciting so much suspicion that the neighbors actually watched them; considering that, if these persons thus lurking in Brown Street at that hour were not the murderers, it remains to this day wholly unknown who they were or what their business was; considering the testimony of Miss Jaqueth, and that the club was afterwards found near this place; considering, finally, that Webster and Southwick saw these persons, and then took one of them for the defendant, and that Southwick then told his wife so, and that Bray and Mirick examined them closely, and now swear to their belief that the prisoner was one of them;--it is for you to say, putting these considerations together, whether you believe the prisoner was actually in Brown Street at the time of the murder.

By the counsel for the prisoner, much stress has been laid upon the question, whether Brown Street was a place in which aid could be given, a place in which actual assistance could be rendered in this transaction. This must be mainly decided by their own opinion who selected the place; by what they thought at the time, according to their plan of operation.

If it was agreed that the prisoner should be there to assist, it is enough. If they thought the place proper for their purpose, according to their plan, it is sufficient. Suppose we could prove expressly that they agreed that Frank should be there, and he was there, and you should think it not a well-chosen place for aiding and abetting, must he be acquitted? No! It is not what I think or you think of the appropriateness of the place; it is what they thought at the time. If the prisoner was in Brown Street by appointment and agreement with the perpetrator, for the purpose of giving assistance if assistance should be needed, it may safely be presumed that the place was suited to such assistance as it was supposed by the parties might chance to become requisite.

If in Brown Street, was he there by appointment? was he there to aid, if aid were necessary? was he there for, or against, the murderer? to concur, or to oppose? to favor, or to thwart? Did the perpetrator know he was there, there waiting? If so, then it follows that he was there by appointment. He was at the post half an hour; he was waiting for somebody. This proves appointment, arrangement, previous agreement; then it follows that he was there to aid, to encourage, to embolden the perpetrator; and that is enough. If he were in such a situation as to afford aid, or that he was relied upon for aid, then he was aiding and abetting. It is enough that the conspirator desired to have him there. Besides, it may be well said, that he could afford just as much aid there as if he had been in Essex Street, as if he had been standing even at the gate, or at the window. It was not an act of power against power that was to be done; it was a secret act, to be done by stealth. The aid was to be placed in a position secure from observation. It was important to the security of both that he should be in a lonely place. Now it is obvious that there are many purposes for which he might be in Brown Street.

1. Richard Crowninshield might have been secreted in the garden, and waiting for a signal;

2. Or he might be in Brown Street to advise him as to the time of making his entry into the house;

3. Or to favor his escape;

4. Or to see if the street was clear when he came out;

5. Or to conceal the weapon or the clothes;

6. To be ready for any unforeseen contingency.

Richard Crowninshield lived in Danvers. He would retire by the most secret way. Brown Street is that way. If you find him there, can you doubt why he was there?

If, Gentlemen, the prisoner went into Brown Street, by appointment with the perpetrator, to render aid or encouragement in any of these ways, he was present, in legal contemplation, aiding and abetting in this murder. It is not necessary that he should have done any thing; it is enough that he was ready to act, and in a place to act. If his being in Brown Street, by appointment, at the time of the murder, emboldened the purpose and encouraged the heart of the murderer, by the hope of instant aid, if aid should become necessary, then, without doubt, he was present, aiding and abetting, and was a principal in the murder.

I now proceed, Gentlemen, to the consideration of the testimony of Mr. Colman. Although this evidence bears on every material part of the cause, I have purposely avoided every comment on it till the present moment, when I have done with the other evidence in the case. As to the admission of this evidence, there has been a great struggle, and its importance demanded it. The general rule of law is, that confessions are to be received as evidence. They are entitled to great or to little consideration, according to the circumstances under which they are made. Voluntary, deliberate confessions are the most important and satisfactory evidence, but confessions hastily made, or improperly obtained, are entitled to little or no consideration. It is always to be inquired, whether they were purely voluntary, or were made under any undue influence of hope or fear; for, in general, if any influence were exerted on the mind of the person confessing, such confessions are not to be submitted to a jury.

Who is Mr. Colman? He is an intelligent, accurate, and cautious witness; a gentleman of high and well-known character, and of unquestionable veracity; as a clergyman, highly respectable; as a man, of fair name and fame.

Why was Mr. Colman with the prisoner? Joseph J. Knapp was his parishioner; he was the head of a family, and had been married by Mr. Colman. The interests of that family were dear to him. He felt for their afflictions, and was anxious to alleviate their sufferings. He went from the purest and best of motives to visit Joseph Knapp. He came to save, not to destroy; to rescue, not to take away life. In this family he thought there might be a chance to save one. It is a misconstruction of Mr. Colman's motives, at once the most strange and the most uncharitable, a perversion of all just views of his conduct and intentions the most unaccountable, to represent him as acting, on this occasion, in hostility to any one, or as desirous of injuring or endangering any one. He has stated his own motives, and his own conduct, in a manner to command universal belief and universal respect. For intelligence, for consistency, for accuracy, for caution, for candor, never did witness acquit himself better, or stand fairer. In all that he did as a man, and all he has said as a witness, he has shown himself worthy of entire regard.

Now, Gentlemen, very important confessions made by the prisoner are sworn to by Mr. Colman. They were made in the prisoner's cell, where Mr. Colman had gone with the prisoner's brother, N. Phippen Knapp. Whatever conversation took place was in the presence of N.P. Knapp. Now, on the part of the prisoner, two things are asserted; first, that such inducements were suggested to the prisoner, in this interview, that no confessions made by him ought to be received; second, that, in point of fact, he made no such confessions as Mr. Colman testifies to, nor, indeed, any confessions at all. These two propositions are attempted to be supported by the testimony of N.P. Knapp. These two witnesses, Mr. Colman and N.P. Knapp, differ entirely. There is no possibility of reconciling them. No charity can cover both. One or the other has sworn falsely. If N.P. Knapp be believed, Mr. Colman's testimony must be wholly disregarded. It is, then, a question of credit, a question of belief between the two witnesses. As you decide between these, so you will decide on all this part of the case.

Mr. Colman has given you a plain narrative, a consistent account, and has uniformly stated the same things. He is not contradicted, except by the testimony of Phippen Knapp. He is influenced, as far as we can see, by no bias, or prejudice, any more than other men, except so far as his character is now at stake. He has feelings on this point, doubtless, and ought to have. If what he has stated be not true, I cannot see any ground for his escape. If he be a true man, he must have heard what he testifies. No treachery of memory brings to memory things that never took place. There is no reconciling his evidence with good intention, if the facts in it are not as he states them. He is on trial as to his veracity.

The relation in which the other witness stands deserves your careful consideration. He is a member of the family. He has the lives of two brothers depending, as he may think, on the effect of his evidence; depending on every word he speaks. I hope he has not another responsibility resting upon him. By the advice of a friend, and that friend Mr. Colman, J. Knapp made a full and free confession, and obtained a promise of pardon. He has since, as you know, probably by the advice of other friends, retracted that confession, and rejected the offered pardon. Events will show who of these friends and advisers advised him best, and befriended him most. In the mean time, if this brother, the witness, be one of these advisers, and advised the retraction, he has, most emphatically, the lives of his brothers resting upon his evidence and upon his conduct. Compare the situation of these two witnesses. Do you not see mighty motive enough on the one side, and want of all motive on the other? I would gladly find an apology for that witness, in his agonized feelings, in his distressed situation; in the agitation of that hour, or of this. I would gladly impute it to error, or to want of recollection, to confusion of mind, or disturbance of feeling. I would gladly impute to any pardonable source that which cannot be reconciled to facts and to truth; but, even in a case calling for so much sympathy, justice must yet prevail, and we must come to the conclusion, however reluctantly, which that demands from us.

It is said, Phippen Knapp was probably correct, because he knew he should probably be called as a witness. Witness to what? When he says there was no confession, what could he expect to bear witness of? But I do not put it on the ground that he did not hear; I am compelled to put it on the other ground, that he did hear, and does not now truly tell what he heard.

If Mr. Colman were out of the case, there are other reasons why the story of Phippen Knapp should not be believed. It has in it inherent improbabilities. It is unnatural, and inconsistent with the accompanying circumstances. He tells you that they went "to the cell of Frank, to see if he had any objection to taking a trial, and suffering his brother to accept the offer of pardon"; in other words, to obtain Frank's consent to Joseph's making a confession; and in case this consent was not obtained, that the pardon would be offered to Frank. Did they bandy about the chance of life, between these two, in this way? Did Mr. Colman, after having given this pledge to Joseph, and after having received a disclosure from Joseph, go to the cell of Frank for such a purpose as this? It is impossible; it cannot be so.

Again, we know that Mr. Colman found the club the next day; that he went directly to the place of deposit, and found it at the first attempt, exactly where he says he had been informed it was. Now Phippen Knapp says, that Frank had stated nothing respecting the club; that it was not mentioned in that conversation. He says, also, that he was present in the cell of Joseph all the time that Mr. Colman was there; that he believes he heard all that was said in Joseph's cell; and that he did not himself know where the club was, and never had known where it was, until he heard it stated in court. Now it is certain that Mr. Colman says he did not learn the particular place of deposit of the club from Joseph; that he only learned from him that it was deposited under the steps of the Howard Street meeting-house, without defining the particular steps. It is certain, also, that he had more knowledge of the position of the club than this; else how could he have placed his hand on it so readily? and where else could he have obtained this knowledge, except from Frank?

Here Mr. Dexter said that Mr. Colman had had other interviews with Joseph, and might have derived the information from him at previous visits. Mr. Webster replied, that Mr. Colman had testified that he learned nothing in relation to the club until this visit. Mr. Dexter denied there being any such testimony. Mr. Colman's evidence was read, from the notes of the judges, and several other persons, and Mr. Webster then proceeded.

My point is to show that Phippen Knapp's story is not true, is not consistent with itself; that, taking it for granted, as he says, that he heard all that was said to Mr. Colman in both cells, by Joseph and by Frank; and that Joseph did not state particularly where the club was deposited; and that he knew as much about the place of deposit of the club as Mr. Colman knew; why, then Mr. Colman must either have been miraculously informed respecting the club, or Phippen Knapp has not told you the whole truth. There is no reconciling this, without supposing that Mr. Colman has misrepresented what took place in Joseph's cell, as well as what took place in Frank's cell.

Again, Phippen Knapp is directly contradicted by Mr. Wheatland. Mr. Wheatland tells the same story, as coming from Phippen Knapp, that Colman now tells. Here there are two against one. Phippen Knapp says that Frank made no confessions, and that he said he had none to make. In this he is contradicted by Wheatland. He, Phippen Knapp, told Wheatland, that Mr. Colman did ask Frank some questions, and that Frank answered them. He told him also what these answers were. Wheatland does not recollect the questions or answers, but recollects his reply; which was, "Is not this premature? I think this answer is sufficient to make Frank a principal." Here Phippen Knapp opposes himself to Wheatland, as well as to Mr. Colman. Do you believe Phippen Knapp against these two respectable witnesses, or them against him?

Is not Mr. Colman's testimony credible, natural, and proper? To judge of this, you must go back to that scene.

The murder had been committed; the two Knapps were now arrested; four persons were already in jail supposed to be concerned in it, the Crowninshields, and Selman, and Chase. Another person at the Eastward was supposed to be in the plot; it was important to learn the facts. To do this, some one of those suspected must be admitted to turn state's witness. The contest was, Who should have this privilege? It was understood that it was about to be offered to Palmer, then in Maine; there was no good reason why he should have the preference. Mr. Colman felt interested for the family of the Knapps, and particularly for Joseph. He was a young man who had hitherto maintained a fair standing in society; he was a husband. Mr. Colman was particularly intimate with his family. With these views he went to the prison. He believed that he might safely converse with the prisoner, because he thought confessions made to a clergyman were sacred, and that he could not be called upon to disclose them. He went, the first time, in the morning, and was requested to come again. He went again at three o'clock; and was requested to call again at five o'clock. In the mean time he saw the father and Phippen, and they wished he would not go again, because it would be said the prisoners were making confession. He said he had engaged to go again at five o'clock; but would not, if Phippen would excuse him to Joseph. Phippen engaged to do this, and to meet him at his office at five o'clock. Mr. Colman went to the office at the time, and waited; but, as Phippen was not there, he walked down street, and saw him coming from the jail. He met him, and while in conversation near the church, he saw Mrs. Beckford and Mrs. Knapp going in a chaise towards the jail. He hastened to meet them, as he thought it not proper for them to go in at that time. While conversing with them near the jail, he received two distinct messages from Joseph, that he wished to see him. He thought it proper to go; and accordingly went to Joseph's cell, and it was while there that the disclosures were made. Before Joseph had finished his statement, Phippen came to the door; he was soon after admitted. A short interval ensued, and they went together to the cell of Frank. Mr. Colman went in by invitation of Phippen; he had come directly from the cell of Joseph, where he had for the first time learned the incidents of the tragedy. He was incredulous as to some of the facts which he had learned, they were so different from his previous impressions. He was desirous of knowing whether he could place confidence in what Joseph had told him. He, therefore, put the questions to Frank, as he has testified before you; in answer to which Frank Knapp informed him,--

1. "That the murder took place between ten and eleven o'clock."

2. "That Richard Crowninshield was alone in the house."

3. "That he, Frank Knapp, went home afterwards."

4. "That the club was deposited under the steps of the Howard Street meeting-house, and under the part nearest the burying-ground, in a rat hole."

5. "That the dagger or daggers had been worked up at the factory."

It is said that these five answers just fit the case; that they are just what was wanted, and neither more nor less. True, they are; but the reason is, because truth always fits. Truth is always congruous and agrees with itself: every truth in the universe agrees with every other truth in the universe, whereas falsehoods not only disagree with truths, but usually quarrel among themselves. Surely Mr. Colman is influenced by no bias, no prejudice; he has no feelings to warp him, except, now that he is contradicted, he may feel an interest to be believed.

If you believe Mr. Colman, then the evidence is fairly in the case.

I shall now proceed on the ground that you do believe Mr. Colman.

When told that Joseph had determined to confess, the defendant said, "It is hard, or unfair, that Joseph should have the benefit of confessing, since the thing was done for his benefit." What thing was done for his benefit? Does not this carry an implication of the guilt of the defendant? Does it not show that he had a knowledge of the object and history of the murder?

The defendant said, "I told Joseph, when he proposed it, that it was a silly business, and would get us into trouble." He knew, then, what this business was; he knew that Joseph proposed it, and that he agreed to it, else he could not get us into trouble; he understood its bearing and its consequences. Thus much was said, under circumstances that make it clearly evidence against him, before there is any pretence of an inducement held out. And does not this prove him to have had a knowledge of the conspiracy?

He knew the daggers had been destroyed, and he knew who committed the murder. How could he have innocently known these facts? Why, if by Richard's story, this shows him guilty of a knowledge of the murder, and of the conspiracy. More than all, he knew when the deed was done, and that he went home afterwards. This shows his participation in that deed. "Went home afterwards"! Home, from what scene? home, from what fact? home, from what transaction? home, from what place? This confirms the supposition that the prisoner was in Brown Street for the purposes ascribed to him. These questions were directly put, and directly answered. He does not intimate that he received the information from another. Now, if he knows the time, and went home afterwards, and does not excuse himself, is not this an admission that he had a hand in this murder? Already proved to be a conspirator in the murder, he now confesses that he knew who did it, at what time it was done, that he was himself out of his own house at the time, and went home afterwards. Is not this conclusive, if not explained? Then comes the club. He told where it was. This is like possession of stolen goods. He is charged with the guilty knowledge of this concealment. He must show, not say, how he came by this knowledge. If a man be found with stolen goods, he must prove how he came by them. The place of deposit of the club was premeditated and selected, and he knew where it was.

Joseph Knapp was an accessory, and an accessory only; he knew only what was told him. But the prisoner knew the particular spot in which the club might be found. This shows his knowledge something more than that of an accessory. This presumption must be rebutted by evidence, or it stands strong against him. He has too much knowledge of this transaction to have come innocently by it. It must stand against him until he explains it.

This testimony of Mr. Colman is represented as new matter, and therefore an attempt has been made to excite a prejudice against it. It is not so. How little is there in it, after all, that did not appear from other sources? It is mainly confirmatory. Compare what you learn from this confession with what you before knew.

As to its being proposed by Joseph, was not that known?

As to Richard's being alone in the house, was not that known?

As to the daggers, was not that known?

As to the time of the murder, was not that known?

As to his being out that night, was not that known?

As to his returning afterwards, was not that known?

As to the club, was not that known?

So this information confirms what was known before, and fully confirms it.

One word as to the interview between Mr. Colman and Phippen Knapp on the turnpike. It is said that Mr. Colman's conduct in this matter is inconsistent with his testimony. There does not appear to me to be any inconsistency. He tells you that his object was to save Joseph, and to hurt no one, and least of all the prisoner at the bar. He had probably told Mr. White the substance of what he heard at the prison. He had probably told him that Frank confirmed what Joseph had confessed. He was unwilling to be the instrument of harm to Frank. He therefore, at the request of Phippen Knapp, wrote a note to Mr. White, requesting him to consider Joseph as authority for the information he had received. He tells you that this is the only thing he has to regret, as it may seem to be an evasion, as he doubts whether it was entirely correct. If it was an evasion, if it was a deviation, if it was an error, it was an error of mercy, an error of kindness,--an error that proves he had no hostility to the prisoner at the bar. It does not in the least vary his testimony, or affect its correctness. Gentlemen, I look on the evidence of Mr. Colman as highly important; not as bringing into the cause new facts, but as confirming, in a very satisfactory manner, other evidence. It is incredible that he can be false, and that he is seeking the prisoner's life through false swearing. If he is true, it is incredible that the prisoner can be innocent.

Gentlemen, I have gone through with the evidence in this case, and have endeavored to state it plainly and fairly before you. I think there are conclusions to be drawn from it, the accuracy of which you cannot doubt. I think you cannot doubt that there was a conspiracy formed for the purpose of committing this murder, and who the conspirators were:

That you cannot doubt that the Crowninshields and the Knapps were the parties in this conspiracy:

That you cannot doubt that the prisoner at the bar knew that the murder was to be done on the night of the 6th of April:

That you cannot doubt that the murderers of Captain White were the suspicious persons seen in and about Brown Street on that night:

That you cannot doubt that Richard Crowninshield was the perpetrator of that crime:

That you cannot doubt that the prisoner at the bar was in Brown Street on that night.

If there, then it must be by agreement, to countenance, to aid the perpetrator. And if so, then he is guilty as PRINCIPAL.

Gentlemen, your whole concern should be to do your duty, and leave consequences to take care of themselves. You will receive the law from the court. Your verdict, it is true, may endanger the prisoner's life, but then it is to save other lives. If the prisoner's guilt has been shown and proved beyond all reasonable doubt, you will convict him. If such reasonable doubts of guilt still remain, you will acquit him. You are the judges of the whole case. You owe a duty to the public, as well as to the prisoner at the bar. You cannot presume to be wiser than the law. Your duty is a plain, straightforward one. Doubtless we would all judge him in mercy. Towards him, as an individual, the law inculcates no hostility; but towards him, if proved to be a murderer, the law, and the oaths you have taken, and public justice, demand that you do your duty.

With consciences satisfied with the discharge of duty, no consequences can harm you. There is no evil that we cannot either face or fly from, but the consciousness of duty disregarded. A sense of duty pursues us ever. It is omnipresent, like the Deity. If we take to ourselves the wings of the morning, and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, duty performed, or duty violated, is still with us, for our happiness or our misery. If we say the darkness shall cover us, in the darkness as in the light our obligations are yet with us. We cannot escape their power, nor fly from their presence. They are with us in this life, will be with us at its close; and in that scene of inconceivable solemnity, which lies yet farther onward, we shall still find ourselves surrounded by the consciousness of duty, to pain us wherever it has been violated, and to console us so far as God may have given us grace to perform it.

[Footnote 1: Chief Justice Parker.]

[Footnote 2: This seems to have been actually the case as regards J.F. Knapp.]

[Footnote 3: And yet this argument, so absurd in Mr. Webster's opinion, was based on the exact fact.]

[Footnote 4: He did not.]

[Footnote 5: 4 Hawk. 201, Lib. 4, ch. 29, sec. 8.]

THE REPLY TO HAYNE.

SECOND SPEECH ON "FOOT'S RESOLUTION," DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE 26TH AND 27TH OF JANUARY, 1830.

[Mr. Webster having completed on January 20th his first speech on Foot's resolution, Mr. Benton spoke in reply, on the 20th and 21st of January, 1830. Mr. Hayne of South Carolina followed on the same side, but, after some time, gave way for a motion for adjournment. On Monday, the 25th, Mr. Hayne resumed, and concluded his argument. Mr. Webster immediately rose in reply, but yielded the floor for a motion for adjournment.

The next day (26th January, 1830) Mr. Webster took the floor and delivered the following speech, which has given such great celebrity to the debate. The circumstances connected with this remarkable effort of parliamentary eloquence are vividly set forth in Mr. Everett's Memoir, prefixed to the first volume of Mr. Webster's Works.]

Mr. President,--When the mariner has been tossed for many days in thick weather, and on an unknown sea, he naturally avails himself of the first pause in the storm, the earliest glance of the sun, to take his latitude, and ascertain how far the elements have driven him from his true course. Let us imitate this prudence, and, before we float farther on the waves of this debate, refer to the point from which we departed, that we may at least be able to conjecture where we now are. I ask for the reading of the resolution before the Senate.

The Secretary read the resolution, as follows:--

"Resolved, That the Committee on Public Lands be instructed to inquire and report the quantity of public lands remaining unsold within each State and Territory, and whether it be expedient to limit for a certain period the sales of the public lands to such lands only as have heretofore been offered for sale, and are now subject to entry at the minimum price. And, also, whether the office of Surveyor-General, and some of the land offices, may not be abolished without detriment to the public interest; or whether it be expedient to adopt measures to hasten the sales and extend more rapidly the surveys of the public lands."

We have thus heard, Sir, what the resolution is which is actually before us for consideration; and it will readily occur to every one, that it is almost the only subject about which something has not been said in the speech, running through two days, by which the Senate has been entertained by the gentleman from South Carolina. Every topic in the wide range of our public affairs, whether past or present,--every thing, general or local, whether belonging to national politics or party politics,--seems to have attracted more or less of the honorable member's attention, save only the resolution before the Senate. He has spoken of every thing but the public lands; they have escaped his notice. To that subject, in all his excursions, he has not paid even the cold respect of a passing glance.

When this debate, Sir, was to be resumed, on Thursday morning, it so happened that it would have been convenient for me to be elsewhere. The honorable member, however, did not incline to put off the discussion to another day. He had a shot, he said, to return, and he wished to discharge it. That shot, Sir, which he thus kindly informed us was coming, that we might stand out of the way, or prepare ourselves to fall by it and die with decency, has now been received. Under all advantages, and with expectation awakened by the tone which preceded it, it has been discharged, and has spent its force. It may become me to say no more of its effect, than that, if nobody is found, after all, either killed or wounded, it is not the first time, in the history of human affairs, that the vigor and success of the war have not quite come up to the lofty and sounding phrase of the manifesto.

The gentleman, Sir, in declining to postpone the debate, told the Senate, with the emphasis of his hand upon his heart, that there was something rankling here, which he wished to relieve. [Mr. Hayne rose, and disclaimed having used the word rankling.] It would not, Mr. President, be safe for the honorable member to appeal to those around him, upon the question whether he did in fact make use of that word. But he may have been unconscious of it. At any rate, it is enough that he disclaims it. But still, with or without the use of that particular word, he had yet something here, he said, of which he wished to rid himself by an immediate reply. In this respect, Sir, I have a great advantage over the honorable gentleman. There is nothing here, Sir, which gives me the slightest uneasiness; neither fear, nor anger, nor that which is sometimes more troublesome than either, the consciousness of having been in the wrong. There is nothing, either originating here, or now received here by the gentleman's shot. Nothing originating here, for I had not the slightest feeling of unkindness towards the honorable member. Some passages, it is true, had occurred since our acquaintance in this body, which I could have wished might have been otherwise; but I had used philosophy and forgotten them. I paid the honorable member the attention of listening with respect to his first speech; and when he sat down, though surprised, and I must even say astonished, at some of his opinions, nothing was farther from my intention than to commence any personal warfare. Through the whole of the few remarks I made in answer, I avoided, studiously and carefully, every thing which I thought possible to be construed into disrespect. And, Sir, while there is thus nothing originating here which I have wished at any time, or now wish, to discharge, I must repeat, also, that nothing has been received here which rankles, or in any way gives me annoyance. I will not accuse the honorable member of violating the rules of civilized war; I will not say, that he poisoned his arrows. But whether his shafts were, or were not, dipped in that which would have caused rankling if they had reached their destination, there was not, as it happened, quite strength enough in the bow to bring them to their mark. If he wishes now to gather up those shafts, he must look for them elsewhere; they will not be found fixed and quivering in the object at which they were aimed.

The honorable member complained that I had slept on his speech. I must have slept on it, or not slept at all. The moment the honorable member sat down, his friend from Missouri rose, and, with much honeyed commendation of the speech, suggested that the impressions which it had produced were too charming and delightful to be disturbed by other sentiments or other sounds, and proposed that the Senate should adjourn. Would it have been quite amiable in me, Sir, to interrupt this excellent good feeling? Must I not have been absolutely malicious, if I could have thrust myself forward, to destroy sensations thus pleasing? Was it not much better and kinder, both to sleep upon them myself, and to allow others also the pleasure of sleeping upon them? But if it be meant, by sleeping upon his speech, that I took time to prepare a reply to it, it is quite a mistake. Owing to other engagements, I could not employ even the interval between the adjournment of the Senate and its meeting the next morning, in attention to the subject of this debate. Nevertheless, Sir, the mere matter of fact is undoubtedly true. I did sleep on the gentleman's speech, and slept soundly. And I slept equally well on his speech of yesterday, to which I am now replying. It is quite possible that in this respect, also, I possess some advantage over the honorable member, attributable, doubtless, to a cooler temperament on my part; for, in truth, I slept upon his speeches remarkably well.

But the gentleman inquires why he was made the object of such a reply. Why was he singled out? If an attack has been made on the East, he, he assures us, did not begin it; it was made by the gentleman from Missouri. Sir, I answered the gentleman's speech because I happened to hear it; and because, also, I chose to give an answer to that speech, which, if unanswered, I thought most likely to produce injurious impressions. I did not stop to inquire who was the original drawer of the bill. I found a responsible indorser before me, and it was my purpose to hold him liable, and to bring him to his just responsibility, without delay. But, Sir, this interrogatory of the honorable member was only introductory to another. He proceeded to ask me whether I had turned upon him, in this debate, from the consciousness that I should find an overmatch, if I ventured on a contest with his friend from Missouri. If, Sir, the honorable member, modestiae gratia, had chosen thus to defer to his friend, and to pay him a compliment, without intentional disparagement to others, it would have been quite according to the friendly courtesies of debate, and not at all ungrateful to my own feelings. I am not one of those, Sir, who esteem any tribute of regard, whether light and occasional, or more serious and deliberate, which may be bestowed on others, as so much unjustly withholden from themselves. But the tone and manner of the gentleman's question forbid me thus to interpret it. I am not at liberty to consider it as nothing more than a civility to his friend. It had an air of taunt and disparagement, something of the loftiness of asserted superiority, which does not allow me to pass it over without notice. It was put as a question for me to answer, and so put as if it were difficult for me to answer, whether I deemed the member from Missouri an overmatch for myself in debate here. It seems to me, Sir, that this is extraordinary language, and an extraordinary tone, for the discussions of this body.

Matches and overmatches! Those terms are more applicable elsewhere than here, and fitter for other assemblies than this. Sir, the gentleman seems to forget where and what we are. This is a Senate, a Senate of equals, of men of individual honor and personal character, and of absolute independence. We know no masters, we acknowledge no dictators. This is a hall for mutual consultation and discussion; not an arena for the exhibition of champions. I offer myself, Sir, as a match for no man; I throw the challenge of debate at no man's feet. But then, Sir, since the honorable member has put the question in a manner that calls for an answer, I will give him an answer; and I tell him, that, holding myself to be the humblest of the members here, I yet know nothing in the arm of his friend from Missouri, either alone or when aided by the arm of his friend from South Carolina, that need deter even me from espousing whatever opinions I may choose to espouse, from debating whenever I may choose to debate, or from speaking whatever I may see fit to say, on the floor of the Senate. Sir, when uttered as matter of commendation or compliment, I should dissent from nothing which the honorable member might say of his friend. Still less do I put forth any pretensions of my own. But when put to me as matter of taunt, I throw it back, and say to the gentleman, that he could possibly say nothing less likely than such a comparison to wound my pride of personal character. The anger of its tone rescued the remark from intentional irony, which otherwise, probably, would have been its general acceptation. But, Sir, if it be imagined that by this mutual quotation and commendation; if it be supposed that, by casting the characters of the drama assigning to each his part, to one the attack, to another the cry of onset; or if it be thought that, by a loud and empty vaunt of anticipated victory, any laurels are to be won here; if it be imagined, especially, that any or all these things will shake any purpose of mine,--I can tell the honorable member, once for all, that he is greatly mistaken, and that he is dealing with one of whose temper and character he has yet much to learn. Sir, I shall not allow myself, on this occasion, I hope on no occasion, to be betrayed into any loss of temper; but if provoked, as I trust I never shall be, into crimination and recrimination, the honorable member may perhaps find, that, in that contest, there will be blows to take as well as blows to give; that others can state comparisons as significant, at least, as his own, and that his impunity may possibly demand of him whatever powers of taunt and sarcasm he may possess. I commend him to a prudent husbandry of his resources.

But, Sir, the Coalition! The Coalition! Ay, "the murdered Coalition!" The gentleman asks, if I were led or frighted into this debate by the spectre of the Coalition. "Was it the ghost of the murdered Coalition," he exclaims, "which haunted the member from Massachusetts; and which, like the ghost of Banquo, would never down?" "The murdered Coalition!" Sir, this charge of a coalition, in reference to the late administration, is not original with the honorable member. It did not spring up in the Senate. Whether as a fact, as an argument, or as an embellishment, it is all borrowed. He adopts it, indeed, from a very low origin, and a still lower present condition. It is one of the thousand calumnies with which the press teemed, during an excited political canvass. It was a charge, of which there was not only no proof or probability, but which was in itself wholly impossible to be true. No man of common information ever believed a syllable of it. Yet it was of that class of falsehoods, which, by continued repetition, through all the organs of detraction and abuse, are capable of misleading those who are already far misled, and of further fanning passion already kindling into flame. Doubtless it served in its day, and in greater or less degree, the end designed by it. Having done that, it has sunk into the general mass of stale and loathed calumnies. It is the very cast-off slough of a polluted and shameless press. Incapable of further mischief, it lies in the sewer, lifeless and despised. It is not now, Sir, in the power of the honorable member to give it dignity or decency, by attempting to elevate it, and to introduce it into the Senate. He cannot change it from what it is, an object of general disgust and scorn. On the contrary, the contact, if he choose to touch it, is more likely to drag him down, down, to the place where it lies itself.

But, Sir, the honorable member was not, for other reasons, entirely happy in his allusion to the story of Banquo's murder and Banquo's ghost. It was not, I think, the friends, but the enemies of the murdered Banquo, at whose bidding his spirit would not down. The honorable gentleman is fresh in his reading of the English classics, and can put me right if I am wrong: but, according to my poor recollection, it was at those who had begun with caresses and ended with foul and treacherous murder that the gory locks were shaken. The ghost of Banquo, like that of Hamlet, was an honest ghost. It disturbed no innocent man. It knew where its appearance would strike terror, and who would cry out, A ghost! It made itself visible in the right quarter, and compelled the guilty and the conscience-smitten, and none others, to start, with,

"Pr'ythee, see there! behold!--look! lo, If I stand here, I saw him!"

THEIR eyeballs were seared (was it not so, Sir?) who had thought to shield themselves by concealing their own hand, and laying the imputation of the crime on a low and hireling agency in wickedness; who had vainly attempted to stifle the workings of their own coward consciences by ejaculating through white lips and chattering teeth, "Thou canst not say I did it!" I have misread the great poet if those who had no way partaken in the deed of the death, either found that they were, or feared that they should be, pushed from their stools by the ghost of the slain, or exclaimed to a spectre created by their own fears and their own remorse, "Avaunt! and quit our sight!"

There is another particular, Sir, in which the honorable member's quick perception of resemblances might, I should think, have seen something in the story of Banquo, making it not altogether a subject of the most pleasant contemplation. Those who murdered Banquo, what did they win by it? Substantial good? Permanent power? Or disappointment, rather, and sore mortification,--dust and ashes, the common fate of vaulting ambition overleaping itself? Did not even-handed justice erelong commend the poisoned chalice to their own lips? Did they not soon find that for another they had "filed their mind"? that their ambition, though apparently for the moment successful, had but put a barren sceptre in their grasp? Ay, Sir,

"a barren sceptre in their gripe, _Thence to be wrenched with an unlineal hand, No son of theirs succeeding_."

Sir, I need pursue the allusion no farther. I leave the honorable gentleman to run it out at his leisure, and to derive from it all the gratification it is calculated to administer. If he finds himself pleased with the associations, and prepared to be quite satisfied, though the parallel should be entirely completed, I had almost said, I am satisfied also; but that I shall think of. Yes, Sir, I will think of that.

In the course of my observations the other day, Mr. President, I paid a passing tribute of respect to a very worthy man, Mr. Dane of Massachusetts. It so happened that he drew the Ordinance of 1787, for the government of the Northwestern Territory. A man of so much ability, and so little pretence; of so great a capacity to do good, and so unmixed a disposition to do it for its own sake; a gentleman who had acted an important part, forty years ago, in a measure the influence of which is still deeply felt in the very matter which was the subject of debate,--might, I thought, receive from me a commendatory recognition. But the honorable member was inclined to be facetious on the subject. He was rather disposed to make it matter of ridicule, that I had introduced into the debate the name of one Nathan Dane, of whom he assures us he had never before heard. Sir, if the honorable member had never before heard of Mr. Dane, I am sorry for it. It shows him less acquainted with the public men of the country than I had supposed. Let me tell him, however, that a sneer from him at the mention of the name of Mr. Dane is in bad taste. It may well be a high mark of ambition, Sir, either with the honorable gentleman or myself, to accomplish as much to make our names known to advantage, and remembered with gratitude, as Mr. Dane has accomplished. But the truth is, Sir, I suspect, that Mr. Dane lives a little too far north. He is of Massachusetts, and too near the north star to be reached by the honorable gentleman's telescope. If his sphere had happened to range south of Mason and Dixon's line, he might, probably, have come within the scope of his vision.

I spoke, Sir, of the Ordinance of 1787, which prohibits slavery, in all future times, northwest of the Ohio, as a measure of great wisdom and foresight, and one which had been attended with highly beneficial and permanent consequences. I supposed that, on this point, no two gentlemen in the Senate could entertain different opinions. But the simple expression of this sentiment has led the gentleman, not only into a labored defence of slavery, in the abstract, and on principle, but also into a warm accusation against me, as having attacked the system of domestic slavery now existing in the Southern States. For all this, there was not the slightest foundation, in any thing said or intimated by me. I did not utter a single word which any ingenuity could torture into an attack on the slavery of the South. I said, only, that it was highly wise and useful, in legislating for the Northwestern country while it was yet a wilderness, to prohibit the introduction of slaves; and I added, that I presumed there was no reflecting and intelligent person, in the neighboring State of Kentucky, who would doubt that, if the same prohibition had been extended, at the same early period, over that commonwealth, her strength and population would, at this day, have been far greater than they are. If these opinions be thought doubtful, they are nevertheless, I trust, neither extraordinary nor disrespectful. They attack nobody and menace nobody. And yet, Sir, the gentleman's optics have discovered, even in the mere expression of this sentiment, what he calls the very spirit of the Missouri question! He represents me as making an onset on the whole South, and manifesting a spirit which would interfere with, and disturb, their domestic condition!

Sir, this injustice no otherwise surprises me, than as it is committed here, and committed without the slightest pretence of ground for it. I say it only surprises me as being done here; for I know full well, that it is, and has been, the settled policy of some persons in the South, for years, to represent the people of the North as disposed to interfere with them in their own exclusive and peculiar concerns. This is a delicate and sensitive point in Southern feeling; and of late years it has always been touched, and generally with effect, whenever the object has been to unite the whole South against Northern men or Northern measures. This feeling, always carefully kept alive, and maintained at too intense a heat to admit discrimination or reflection, is a lever of great power in our political machine. It moves vast bodies, and gives to them one and the same direction. But it is without adequate cause, and the suspicion which exists is wholly groundless. There is not, and never has been, a disposition in the North to interfere with these interests of the South. Such interference has never been supposed to be within the power of government; nor has it been in any way attempted. The slavery of the South has always been regarded as a matter of domestic policy, left with the States themselves, and with which the Federal government had nothing to do. Certainly, Sir, I am, and ever have been, of that opinion. The gentleman, indeed, argues that slavery, in the abstract, is no evil. Most assuredly I need not say I differ with him, altogether and most widely, on that point. I regard domestic slavery as one of the greatest evils, both moral and political. But whether it be a malady, and whether it be curable, and if so, by what means; or, on the other hand, whether it be the vulnus immedicabile of the social system, I leave it to those whose right and duty it is to inquire and to decide. And this I believe, Sir, is, and uniformly has been, the sentiment of the North. Let us look a little at the history of this matter.

When the present Constitution was submitted for the ratification of the people, there were those who imagined that the powers of the government which it proposed to establish might, in some possible mode, be exerted in measures tending to the abolition of slavery. This suggestion would of course attract much attention in the Southern conventions. In that of Virginia, Governor Randolph said:--

"I hope there is none here, who, considering the subject in the calm light of philosophy, will make an objection dishonorable to Virginia; that, at the moment they are securing the rights of their citizens, an objection is started, that there is a spark of hope that those unfortunate men now held in bondage may, by the operation of the general government, be made free."

At the very first Congress, petitions on the subject were presented, if I mistake not, from different States. The Pennsylvania society for promoting the abolition of slavery took a lead, and laid before Congress a memorial, praying Congress to promote the abolition by such powers as it possessed. This memorial was referred, in the House of Representatives, to a select committee, consisting of Mr. Foster of New Hampshire, Mr. Gerry of Massachusetts, Mr. Huntington of Connecticut, Mr. Lawrence of New York, Mr. Sinnickson of New Jersey, Mr. Hartley of Pennsylvania, and Mr. Parker of Virginia,--all of them, Sir, as you will observe, Northern men but the last. This committee made a report, which was referred to a committee of the whole House, and there considered and discussed for several days; and being amended, although without material alteration, it was made to express three distinct propositions, on the subject of slavery and the slave-trade. First, in the words of the Constitution, that Congress could not, prior to the year 1808, prohibit the migration or importation of such persons as any of the States then existing should think proper to admit; and, secondly, that Congress had authority to restrain the citizens of the United States from carrying on the African slave-trade, for the purpose of supplying foreign countries. On this proposition, our early laws against those who engage in that traffic are founded. The third proposition, and that which bears on the present question, was expressed in the following terms:--

"Resolved, That Congress have no authority to interfere in the emancipation of slaves, or in the treatment of them in any of the States; it remaining with the several States alone to provide rules and regulations therein which humanity and true policy may require."

This resolution received the sanction of the House of Representatives so early as March, 1790. And now, Sir, the honorable member will allow me to remind him, that not only were the select committee who reported the resolution, with a single exception, all Northern men, but also that, of the members then composing the House of Representatives, a large majority, I believe nearly two thirds, were Northern men also.

The House agreed to insert these resolutions in its journal; and from that day to this it has never been maintained or contended at the North, that Congress had any authority to regulate or interfere with the condition of slaves in the several States. No Northern gentleman, to my knowledge, has moved any such question in either House of Congress.

The fears of the South, whatever fears they might have entertained, were allayed and quieted by this early decision; and so remained till they were excited afresh, without cause, but for collateral and indirect purposes. When it became necessary, or was thought so, by some political persons, to find an unvarying ground for the exclusion of Northern men from confidence and from lead in the affairs of the republic, then, and not till then, the cry was raised, and the feeling industriously excited, that the influence of Northern men in the public counsels would endanger the relation of master and slave. For myself, I claim no other merit than that this gross and enormous injustice towards the whole North has not wrought upon me to change my opinions or my political conduct. I hope I am above violating my principles, even under the smart of injury and false imputations. Unjust suspicions and undeserved reproach, whatever pain I may experience from them, will not induce me, I trust, to overstep the limits of constitutional duty, or to encroach on the rights of others. The domestic slavery of the Southern States I leave where I find it,--in the hands of their own governments. It is their affair, not mine. Nor do I complain of the peculiar effect which the magnitude of that population has had in the distribution of power under this Federal government. We know, Sir, that the representation of the States in the other house is not equal. We know that great advantage in that respect is enjoyed by the slave-holding States; and we know, too, that the intended equivalent for that advantage, that is to say, the imposition of direct taxes in the same ratio, has become merely nominal, the habit of the government being almost invariably to collect its revenue from other sources and in other modes. Nevertheless, I do not complain; nor would I countenance any movement to alter this arrangement of representation. It is the original bargain, the compact; let it stand; let the advantage of it be fully enjoyed. The Union itself is too full of benefit to be hazarded in propositions for changing its original basis. I go for the Constitution as it is, and for the Union as it is. But I am resolved not to submit in silence to accusations, either against myself individually or against the North, wholly unfounded and unjust,--accusations which impute to us a disposition to evade the constitutional compact, and to extend the power of the government over the internal laws and domestic condition of the States. All such accusations, wherever and whenever made, all insinuations of the existence of any such purposes, I know and feel to be groundless and injurious. And we must confide in Southern gentlemen themselves; we must trust to those whose integrity of heart and magnanimity of feeling will lead them to a desire to maintain and disseminate truth, and who possess the means of its diffusion with the Southern public; we must leave it to them to disabuse that public of its prejudices. But in the mean time, for my own part, I shall continue to act justly, whether those towards whom justice is exercised receive it with candor or with contumely.

Having had occasion to recur to the Ordinance of 1787, in order to defend myself against the inferences which the honorable member has chosen to draw from my former observations on that subject, I am not willing now entirely to take leave of it without another remark. It need hardly be said, that that paper expresses just sentiments on the great subject of civil and religious liberty. Such sentiments were common, and abound in all our state papers of that day. But this Ordinance did that which was not so common, and which is not even now universal; that is, it set forth and declared it to be a high and binding duty of government itself to support schools and advance the means of education, on the plain reason that religion, morality, and knowledge are necessary to good government, and to the happiness of mankind. One observation further. The important provision incorporated into the Constitution of the United States, and into several of those of the States, and recently, as we have seen, adopted into the reformed constitution of Virginia, restraining legislative power in questions of private right, and from impairing the obligation of contracts, is first introduced and established, as far as I am informed, as matter of express written constitutional law, in this Ordinance of 1787. And I must add, also, in regard to the author of the Ordinance, who has not had the happiness to attract the gentleman's notice heretofore, nor to avoid his sarcasm now, that he was chairman of that select committee of the old Congress, whose report first expressed the strong sense of that body, that the old Confederation was not adequate to the exigencies of the country, and recommended to the States to send delegates to the convention which formed the present Constitution.

An attempt has been made to transfer from the North to the South the honor of this exclusion of slavery from the Northwestern Territory. The journal, without argument or comment, refutes such attempts. The cession by Virginia was made in March, 1784. On the 19th of April following, a committee, consisting of Messrs. Jefferson, Chase, and Howell, reported a plan for a temporary government of the territory, in which was this article: "That, after the year 1800, there shall be neither slavery nor involuntary servitude in any of the said States, otherwise than in punishment of crimes, whereof the party shall have been convicted." Mr. Spaight of North Carolina moved to strike out this paragraph. The question was put, according to the form then practised, "Shall these words stand as a part of the plan?" New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, seven States, voted in the affirmative; Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina, in the negative. North Carolina was divided. As the consent of nine States was necessary, the words could not stand, and were struck out accordingly. Mr. Jefferson voted for the clause, but was overruled by his colleagues.

In March of the next year (1785), Mr. King of Massachusetts, seconded by Mr. Ellery of Rhode Island, proposed the formerly rejected article, with this addition: "And that this regulation shall be an article of compact, and remain a fundamental principle of the constitutions between the thirteen original States, and each of the States described in the resolve." On this clause, which provided the adequate and thorough security, the eight Northern States at that time voted affirmatively, and the four Southern States negatively. The votes of nine States were not yet obtained, and thus the provision was again rejected by the Southern States. The perseverance of the North held out, and two years afterwards the object was attained. It is no derogation from the credit, whatever that may be, of drawing the Ordinance, that its principles had before been prepared and discussed, in the form of resolutions. If one should reason in that way, what would become of the distinguished honor of the author of the Declaration of Independence? There is not a sentiment in that paper which had not been voted and resolved in the assemblies, and other popular bodies in the country, over and over again.

But the honorable member has now found out that this gentleman, Mr. Dane, was a member of the Hartford Convention. However uninformed the honorable member may be of characters and occurrences at the North, it would seem that he has at his elbow, on this occasion, some high-minded and lofty spirit, some magnanimous and true-hearted monitor, possessing the means of local knowledge, and ready to supply the honorable member with every thing, down even to forgotten and moth-eaten two-penny pamphlets, which may be used to the disadvantage of his own country. But as to the Hartford Convention, Sir, allow me to say, that the proceedings of that body seem now to be less read and studied in New England than farther South. They appear to be looked to, not in New England, but elsewhere, for the purpose of seeing how far they may serve as a precedent. But they will not answer the purpose, they are quite too tame. The latitude in which they originated was too cold. Other conventions, of more recent existence, have gone a whole bar's length beyond it. The learned doctors of Colleton and Abbeville have pushed their commentaries on the Hartford collect so far, that the original text-writers are thrown entirely into the shade. I have nothing to do, Sir, with the Hartford Convention. Its journal, which the gentleman has quoted, I never read. So far as the honorable member may discover in its proceedings a spirit in any degree resembling that which was avowed and justified in those other conventions to which I have alluded, or so far as those proceedings can be shown to be disloyal to the Constitution, or tending to disunion, so far I shall be as ready as any one to bestow on them reprehension and censure.

Having dwelt long on this convention, and other occurrences of that day, in the hope, probably, (which will not be gratified,) that I should leave the course of this debate to follow him at length in those excursions, the honorable member returned, and attempted another object. He referred to a speech of mine in the other house, the same which I had occasion to allude to myself, the other day; and has quoted a passage or two from it, with a bold, though uneasy and laboring, air of confidence, as if he had detected in me an inconsistency. Judging from the gentleman's manner, a stranger to the course of the debate and to the point in discussion would have imagined, from so triumphant a tone, that the honorable member was about to overwhelm me with a manifest contradiction. Any one who heard him, and who had not heard what I had, in fact, previously said, must have thought me routed and discomfited, as the gentleman had promised. Sir, a breath blows all this triumph away. There is not the slightest difference in the purport of my remarks on the two occasions. What I said here on Wednesday is in exact accordance with the opinion expressed by me in the other house in 1825. Though the gentleman had the metaphysics of Hudibras, though he were able

"to sever and divide A hair 'twixt north and northwest side,"

he yet could not insert his metaphysical scissors between the fair reading of my remarks in 1825, and what I said here last week. There is not only no contradiction, no difference, but, in truth, too exact a similarity, both in thought and language, to be entirely in just taste. I had myself quoted the same speech; had recurred to it, and spoke with it open before me; and much of what I said was little more than a repetition from it. In order to make finishing work with this alleged contradiction, permit me to recur to the origin of this debate, and review its course. This seems expedient, and may be done as well now as at any time.

Well, then, its history is this. The honorable member from Connecticut moved a resolution, which constitutes the first branch of that which is now before us; that is to say, a resolution, instructing the committee on public lands to inquire into the expediency of limiting, for a certain period, the sales of the public lands, to such as have heretofore been offered for sale; and whether sundry offices connected with the sales of the lands might not be abolished without detriment to the public service. In the progress of the discussion which arose on this resolution, an honorable member from New Hampshire moved to amend the resolution, so as entirely to reverse its object; that is, to strike it all out, and insert a direction to the committee to inquire into the expediency of adopting measures to hasten the sales, and expend more rapidly the surveys, of the lands.

The honorable member from Maine[1] suggested that both those propositions might well enough go for consideration to the committee; and in this state of the question, the member from South Carolina addressed the Senate in his first speech. He rose, he said, to give us his own free thoughts on the public lands. I saw him rise with pleasure, and listened with expectation, though before he concluded I was filled with surprise. Certainly, I was never more surprised, than to find him following up, to the extent he did, the sentiments and opinions which the gentleman from Missouri had put forth, and which it is known he has long entertained.

I need not repeat at large the general topics of the honorable gentleman's speech. When he said yesterday that he did not attack the Eastern States, he certainly must have forgotten, not only particular remarks, but the whole drift and tenor of his speech; unless he means by not attacking, that he did not commence hostilities, but that another had preceded him in the attack. He, in the first place, disapproved of the whole course of the government, for forty years, in regard to its disposition of the public lands; and then, turning northward and eastward, and fancying he had found a cause for alleged narrowness and niggardliness in the "accursed policy of the tariff", to which he represented the people of New England as wedded, he went on for a full hour with remarks, the whole scope of which was to exhibit the results of this policy, in feelings and in measures unfavorable to the West. I thought his opinions unfounded and erroneous, as to the general course of the government, and ventured to reply to them.

The gentleman had remarked on the analogy of other cases, and quoted the conduct of European governments towards their own subjects settling on this continent, as in point, to show that we had been harsh and rigid in selling, when we should have given the public lands to settlers without price. I thought the honorable member had suffered his judgment to be betrayed by a false analogy; that he was struck with an appearance of resemblance where there was no real similitude. I think so still. The first settlers of North America were enterprising spirits, engaged in private adventure, or fleeing from tyranny at home. When arrived here, they were forgotten by the mother country, or remembered only to be oppressed. Carried away again by the appearance of analogy, or struck with the eloquence of the passage, the honorable member yesterday observed, that the conduct of government towards the Western emigrants, or my representation of it, brought to his mind a celebrated speech in the British Parliament. It was, Sir, the speech of Colonel Barre. On the question of the stamp act, or tea tax, I forget which, Colonel Barre had heard a member on the treasury bench argue, that the people of the United States, being British colonists, planted by the maternal care, nourished by the indulgence, and protected by the arms of England, would not grudge their mite to relieve the mother country from the heavy burden under which she groaned. The language of Colonel Barre, in reply to this, was: "They planted by your care? Your oppression planted them in America. They fled from your tyranny, and grew by your neglect of them. So soon as you began to care for them, you showed your care by sending persons to spy out their liberties, misrepresent their character, prey upon them, and eat out their substance."

And how does the honorable gentleman mean to maintain, that language like this is applicable to the conduct of the government of the United States towards the Western emigrants, or to any representation given by me of that conduct? Were the settlers in the West driven thither by our oppression? Have they flourished only by our neglect of them? Has the government done nothing but prey upon them, and eat out their substance? Sir, this fervid eloquence of the British speaker, just when and where it was uttered, and fit to remain an exercise for the schools, is not a little out of place, when it is brought thence to be applied here to the conduct of our own country towards her own citizens. From America to England, it may be true; from Americans to their own government, it would be strange language. Let us leave it, to be recited and declaimed by our boys against a foreign nation; not introduce it here, to recite and declaim ourselves against our own.

But I come to the point of the alleged contradiction. In my remarks on Wednesday, I contended that we could not give away gratuitously all the public lands; that we held them in trust; that the government had solemnly pledged itself to dispose of them as a common fund for the common benefit, and to sell and settle them as its discretion should dictate. Now, Sir, what contradiction does the gentleman find to this sentiment in the speech of 1825? He quotes me as having then said, that we ought not to hug these lands as a very great treasure. Very well, Sir, supposing me to be accurately reported in that expression, what is the contradiction? I have not now said, that we should hug these lands as a favorite source of pecuniary income. No such thing. It is not my view. What I have said, and what I do say, is, that they are a common fund, to be disposed of for the common benefit, to be sold at low prices for the accommodation of settlers, keeping the object of settling the lands as much in view as that of raising money from them. This I say now, and this I have always said. Is this hugging them as a favorite treasure? Is there no difference between hugging and hoarding this fund, on the one hand, as a great treasure, and, on the other, of disposing of it at low prices, placing the proceeds in the general treasury of the Union? My opinion is, that as much is to be made of the land as fairly and reasonably may be, selling it all the while at such rates as to give the fullest effect to settlement. This is not giving it all away to the States, as the gentleman would propose; nor is it hugging the fund closely and tenaciously, as a favorite treasure; but it is, in my judgment, a just and wise policy, perfectly according with all the various duties which rest on government. So much for my contradiction. And what is it? Where is the ground of the gentleman's triumph? What inconsistency in word or doctrine has he been able to detect? Sir, if this be a sample of that discomfiture with which the honorable gentleman threatened me, commend me to the word discomfiture for the rest of my life.

But, after all, this is not the point of the debate; and I must now bring the gentleman back to what is the point.

The real question between me and him is, Has the doctrine been advanced at the South or the East, that the population of the West should be retarded, or at least need not be hastened, on account of its effect to drain off the people from the Atlantic States? Is this doctrine, as has been alleged, of Eastern origin? That is the question. Has the gentleman found any thing by which he can make good his accusation? I submit to the Senate, that he has entirely failed; and, as far as this debate has shown, the only person who has advanced such sentiments is a gentleman from South Carolina, and a friend of the honorable member himself. The honorable gentleman has given no answer to this; there is none which can be given. The simple fact, while it requires no comment to enforce it, defies all argument to refute it. I could refer to the speeches of another Southern gentleman, in years before, of the same general character, and to the same effect, as that which has been quoted; but I will not consume the time of the Senate by the reading of them.

So then, Sir, New England is guiltless of the policy of retarding Western population, and of all envy and jealousy of the growth of the new States. Whatever there be of that policy in the country, no part of it is hers. If it has a local habitation, the honorable member has probably seen by this time where to look for it; and if it now has received a name, he has himself christened it.

We approach, at length, Sir, to a more important part of the honorable gentleman's observations. Since it does not accord with my views of justice and policy to give away the public lands altogether, as a mere matter of gratuity, I am asked by the honorable gentleman on what ground it is that I consent to vote them away in particular instances. How, he inquires, do I reconcile with these professed sentiments, my support of measures appropriating portions of the lands to particular roads, particular canals, particular rivers, and particular institutions of education in the West? This leads, Sir, to the real and wide difference in political opinion between the honorable gentleman and myself. On my part, I look upon all these objects as connected with the common good, fairly embraced in its object and its terms; he, on the contrary, deems them all, if good at all, only local good. This is our difference. The interrogatory which he proceeded to put at once explains this difference. "What interest," asks he, "has South Carolina in a canal in Ohio?" Sir, this very question is full of significance. It develops the gentleman's whole political system; and its answer expounds mine. Here we differ. I look upon a road over the Alleghanies, a canal round the falls of the Ohio, or a canal or railway from the Atlantic to the Western waters, as being an object large and extensive enough to be fairly said to be for the common benefit. The gentleman thinks otherwise, and this is the key to his construction of the powers of the government. He may well ask what interest has South Carolina in a canal in Ohio. On his system, it is true, she has no interest. On that system, Ohio and Carolina are different governments, and different countries; connected here, it is true, by some slight and ill-defined bond of union, but in all main respects separate and diverse. On that system, Carolina has no more interest in a canal in Ohio than in Mexico. The gentleman, therefore, only follows out his own principles; he does no more than arrive at the natural conclusions of his own doctrines; he only announces the true results of that creed which he has adopted himself, and would persuade others to adopt, when he thus declares that South Carolina has no interest in a public work in Ohio.

Sir, we narrow-minded people of New England do not reason thus. Our notion of things is entirely different. We look upon the States, not as separated, but as united. We love to dwell on that union, and on the mutual happiness which it has so much promoted, and the common renown which it has so greatly contributed to acquire. In our contemplation, Carolina and Ohio are parts of the same country; States, united under the same general government, having interests, common, associated, intermingled. In whatever is within the proper sphere of the constitutional power of this government, we look upon the States as one. We do not impose geographical limits to our patriotic feeling or regard; we do not follow rivers and mountains, and lines of latitude, to find boundaries, beyond which public improvements do not benefit us. We who come here, as agents and representatives of these narrow-minded and selfish men of New England, consider ourselves as bound to regard with an equal eye the good of the whole, in whatever is within our powers of legislation. Sir, if a railroad or canal, beginning in South Carolina and ending in South Carolina, appeared to me to be of national importance and national magnitude, believing, as I do, that the power of government extends to the encouragement of works of that description, if I were to stand up here and ask, What interest has Massachusetts in a railroad in South Carolina? I should not be willing to face my constituents. These same narrow-minded men would tell me, that they had sent me to act for the whole country, and that one who possessed too little comprehension, either of intellect or feeling, one who was not large enough, both in mind and in heart, to embrace the whole, was not fit to be intrusted with the interest of any part.

Sir, I do not desire to enlarge the powers of the government by unjustifiable construction, nor to exercise any not within a fair interpretation. But when it is believed that a power does exist, then it is, in my judgment, to be exercised for the general benefit of the whole. So far as respects the exercise of such a power, the States are one. It was the very object of the Constitution to create unity of interests to the extent of the powers of the general government. In war and peace we are one; in commerce, one; because the authority of the general government reaches to war and peace, and to the regulation of commerce. I have never seen any more difficulty in erecting light-houses on the lakes, than on the ocean; in improving the harbors of inland seas, than if they were within the ebb and flow of the tide; or in removing obstructions in the vast streams of the West, more than in any work to facilitate commerce on the Atlantic coast. If there be any power for one, there is power also for the other; and they are all and equally for the common good of the country.

There are other objects, apparently more local, or the benefit of which is less general, towards which, nevertheless, I have concurred with others, to give aid by donations of land. It is proposed to construct a road, in or through one of the new States, in which this government possesses large quantities of land. Have the United States no right, or, as a great and untaxed proprietor, are they under no obligation to contribute to an object thus calculated to promote the common good of all the proprietors, themselves included? And even with respect to education, which is the extreme case, let the question be considered. In the first place, as we have seen, it was made matter of compact with these States, that they should do their part to promote education. In the next place, our whole system of land laws proceeds on the idea that education is for the common good; because, in every division, a certain portion is uniformly reserved and appropriated for the use of schools. And, finally, have not these new States singularly strong claims, founded on the ground already stated, that the government is a great untaxed proprietor, in the ownership of the soil? It is a consideration of great importance, that probably there is in no part of the country, or of the world, so great call for the means of education, as in these new States, owing to the vast numbers of persons within those ages in which education and instruction are usually received, if received at all. This is the natural consequence of recency of settlement and rapid increase. The census of these States shows how great a proportion of the whole population occupies the classes between infancy and manhood. These are the wide fields, and here is the deep and quick soil for the seeds of knowledge and virtue; and this is the favored season, the very spring-time for sowing them. Let them be disseminated without stint. Let them be scattered with a bountiful hand, broadcast. Whatever the government can fairly do towards these objects, in my opinion, ought to be done.

These, Sir, are the grounds, succinctly stated, on which my votes for grants of lands for particular objects rest; while I maintain, at the same time, that it is all a common fund, for the common benefit. And reasons like these, I presume, have influenced the votes of other gentlemen from New England. Those who have a different view of the powers of the government, of course, come to different conclusions, on these, as on other questions. I observed, when speaking on this subject before, that if we looked to any measure, whether for a road, a canal, or any thing else, intended for the improvement of the West, it would be found that, if the New England ayes were struck out of the lists of votes, the Southern noes would always have rejected the measure. The truth of this has not been denied, and cannot be denied. In stating this, I thought it just to ascribe it to the constitutional scruples of the South, rather than to any other less favorable or less charitable cause. But no sooner had I done this, than the honorable gentleman asks if I reproach him and his friends with their constitutional scruples. Sir, I reproach nobody. I stated a fact, and gave the most respectful reason for it that occurred to me. The gentleman cannot deny the fact; he may, if he choose, disclaim the reason. It is not long since I had occasion, in presenting a petition from his own State, to account for its being intrusted to my hands, by saying, that the constitutional opinions of the gentleman and his worthy colleague prevented them from supporting it. Sir, did I state this as matter of reproach? Far from it. Did I attempt to find any other cause than an honest one for these scruples? Sir, I did not. It did not become me to doubt or to insinuate that the gentleman had either changed his sentiments, or that he had made up a set of constitutional opinions accommodated to any particular combination of political occurrences. Had I done so, I should have felt, that, while I was entitled to little credit in thus questioning other people's motives, I justified the whole world in suspecting my own. But how has the gentleman returned this respect for others' opinions? His own candor and justice, how have they been exhibited towards the motives of others, while he has been at so much pains to maintain, what nobody has disputed, the purity of his own? Why, Sir, he has asked when, and how, and why New England votes were found going for measures favorable to the West. He has demanded to be informed whether all this did not begin in 1825, and while the election of President was still pending.

Sir, to these questions retort would be justified; and it is both cogent and at hand. Nevertheless, I will answer the inquiry, not by retort, but by facts. I will tell the gentleman when, and how, and why New England has supported measures favorable to the West. I have already referred to the early history of the government, to the first acquisition of the lands, to the original laws for disposing of them, and for governing the territories where they lie; and have shown the influence of New England men and New England principles in all these leading measures. I should not be pardoned were I to go over that ground again. Coming to more recent times, and to measures of a less general character, I have endeavored to prove that every thing of this kind, designed for Western improvement, has depended on the votes of New England; all this is true beyond the power of contradiction. And now, Sir, there are two measures to which I will refer, not so ancient as to belong to the early history of the public lands, and not so recent as to be on this side of the period when the gentleman charitably imagines a new direction may have been given to New England feeling and New England votes. These measures, and the New England votes in support of them, may be taken as samples and specimens of all the rest.

In 1820 (observe, Mr. President, in 1820) the people of the West besought Congress for a reduction in the price of lands. In favor of that reduction, New England, with a delegation of forty members in the other house, gave thirty-three votes, and one only against it. The four Southern States, with more than fifty members, gave thirty-two votes for it, and seven against it. Again, in 1821, (observe again, Sir, the time,) the law passed for the relief of the purchasers of the public lands. This was a measure of vital importance to the West, and more especially to the Southwest. It authorized the relinquishment of contracts for lands which had been entered into at high prices, and a reduction in other cases of not less than thirty-seven and a half per cent on the purchase-money. Many millions of dollars, six or seven, I believe, probably much more, were relinquished by this law. On this bill, New England, with her forty members, gave more affirmative votes than the four Southern States, with their fifty-two or fifty-three members. These two are far the most important general measures respecting the public lands which have been adopted within the last twenty years. They took place in 1820 and 1821. That is the time when.

As to the manner how, the gentleman already sees that it was by voting in solid column for the required relief; and, lastly, as to the cause why, I tell the gentleman it was because the members from New England thought the measures just and salutary; because they entertained towards the West neither envy, hatred, nor malice; because they deemed it becoming them, as just and enlightened public men, to meet the exigency which had arisen in the West with the appropriate measure of relief; because they felt it due to their own characters, and the characters of their New England predecessors in this government, to act towards the new States in the spirit of a liberal, patronizing, magnanimous policy. So much, Sir, for the cause why; and I hope that by this time, Sir, the honorable gentleman is satisfied; if not, I do not know when, or how, or why he ever will be.

Having recurred to these two important measures, in answer to the gentleman's inquiries, I must now beg permission to go back to a period somewhat earlier, for the purpose of still further showing how much, or rather how little, reason there is for the gentleman's insinuation that political hopes or fears, or party associations, were the grounds of these New England votes. And after what has been said, I hope it may be forgiven me if I allude to some political opinions and votes of my own, of very little public importance certainly, but which, from the time at which they were given and expressed, may pass for good witnesses on this occasion.

This government, Mr. President, from its origin to the peace of 1815, had been too much engrossed with various other important concerns to be able to turn its thoughts inward, and look to the development of its vast internal resources. In the early part of President Washington's administration, it was fully occupied with completing its own organization, providing for the public debt, defending the frontiers, and maintaining domestic peace. Before the termination of that administration, the fires of the French Revolution blazed forth, as from a new-opened volcano, and the whole breadth of the ocean did not secure us from its effects. The smoke and the cinders reached us, though not the burning lava. Difficult and agitating questions, embarrassing to government and dividing public opinion, sprung out of the new state of our foreign relations, and were succeeded by others, and yet again by others, equally embarrassing and equally exciting division and discord, through the long series of twenty years, till they finally issued in the war with England. Down to the close of that war, no distinct, marked, and deliberate attention had been given, or could have been given, to the internal condition of the country, its capacities of improvement, or the constitutional power of the government in regard to objects connected with such improvement.

The peace, Mr. President, brought about an entirely new and a most interesting state of things; it opened to us other prospects and suggested other duties. We ourselves were changed, and the whole world was changed. The pacification of Europe, after June, 1815, assumed a firm and permanent aspect. The nations evidently manifested that they were disposed for peace. Some agitation of the waves might be expected, even after the storm had subsided; but the tendency was, strongly and rapidly, towards settled repose.

It so happened, Sir, that I was at that time a member of Congress, and, like others, naturally turned my thoughts to the contemplation of the recently altered condition of the country and of the world. It appeared plainly enough to me, as well as to wiser and more experienced men, that the policy of the government would naturally take a start in a new direction; because new directions would necessarily be given to the pursuits and occupations of the people. We had pushed our commerce far and fast, under the advantage of a neutral flag. But there were now no longer flags, either neutral or belligerent. The harvest of neutrality had been great, but we had gathered it all. With the peace of Europe, it was obvious there would spring up in her circle of nations a revived and invigorated spirit of trade, and a new activity in all the business and objects of civilized life. Hereafter, our commercial gains were to be earned only by success in a close and intense competition. Other nations would produce for themselves, and carry for themselves, and manufacture for themselves, to the full extent of their abilities. The crops of our plains would no longer sustain European armies, nor our ships longer supply those whom war had rendered unable to supply themselves. It was obvious, that, under these circumstances, the country would begin to survey itself, and to estimate its own capacity of improvement.

And this improvement,--how was it to be accomplished, and who was to accomplish it? We were ten or twelve millions of people, spread over almost half a world. We were more than twenty States, some stretching along the same seaboard, some along the same line of inland frontier, and others on opposite banks of the same vast rivers. Two considerations at once presented themselves with great force, in looking at this state of things. One was, that that great branch of improvement which consisted in furnishing new facilities of intercourse necessarily ran into different States in every leading instance, and would benefit the citizens of all such States. No one State, therefore, in such cases, would assume the whole expense, nor was the co-operation of several States to be expected. Take the instance of the Delaware breakwater. It will cost several millions of money. Would Pennsylvania alone ever have constructed it? Certainly never, while this Union lasts, because it is not for her sole benefit. Would Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware have united to accomplish it at their joint expense? Certainly not, for the same reason. It could not be done, therefore, but by the general government. The same may be said of the large inland undertakings, except that, in them, government, instead of bearing the whole expense, co-operates with others who bear a part. The other consideration is, that the United States have the means. They enjoy the revenues derived from commerce, and the States have no abundant and easy sources of public income. The custom-houses fill the general treasury, while the States have scanty resources, except by resort to heavy direct taxes.

Under this view of things, I thought it necessary to settle, at least for myself, some definite notions with respect to the powers of the government in regard to internal affairs. It may not savor too much of self-commendation to remark, that, with this object, I considered the Constitution, its judicial construction, its contemporaneous exposition, and the whole history of the legislation of Congress under it; and I arrived at the conclusion, that government had power to accomplish sundry objects, or aid in their accomplishment, which are now commonly spoken of as INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS. That conclusion, Sir, may have been right, or it may have been wrong. I am not about to argue the grounds of it at large. I say only, that it was adopted and acted on even so early as in 1816. Yes, Mr. President, I made up my opinion, and determined on my intended course of political conduct, on these subjects, in the Fourteenth Congress, in 1816. And now, Mr. President, I have further to say, that I made up these opinions, and entered on this course of political conduct, Teucro duce.[2] Yes, Sir, I pursued in all this a South Carolina track on the doctrines of internal improvement. South Carolina, as she was then represented in the other house, set forth in 1816 under a fresh and leading breeze, and I was among the followers. But if my leader sees new lights and turns a sharp corner, unless I see new lights also, I keep straight on in the same path. I repeat, that leading gentlemen from South Carolina were first and foremost in behalf of the doctrines of internal improvements, when those doctrines came first to be considered and acted upon in Congress. The debate on the bank question, on the tariff of 1816, and on the direct tax, will show who was who, and what was what, at that time.

The tariff of 1816, (one of the plain cases of oppression and usurpation, from which, if the government does not recede, individual States may justly secede from the government,) is, Sir, in truth, a South Carolina tariff, supported by South Carolina votes. But for those votes, it could not have passed in the form in which it did pass; whereas, if it had depended on Massachusetts votes, it would have been lost. Does not the honorable gentleman well know all this? There are certainly those who do, full well, know it all. I do not say this to reproach South Carolina. I only state the fact; and I think it will appear to be true, that among the earliest and boldest advocates of the tariff, as a measure of protection, and on the express ground of protection, were leading gentlemen of South Carolina in Congress. I did not then, and cannot now, understand their language in any other sense. While this tariff of 1816 was under discussion in the House of Representatives, an honorable gentleman from Georgia, now of this house,[3] moved to reduce the proposed duty on cotton. He failed, by four votes, South Carolina giving three votes (enough to have turned the scale) against his motion. The act, Sir, then passed, and received on its passage the support of a majority of the Representatives of South Carolina present and voting. This act is the first in the order of those now denounced as plain usurpations. We see it daily in the list, by the side of those of 1824 and 1828, as a case of manifest oppression, justifying disunion. I put it home to the honorable member from South Carolina, that his own State was not only "art and part" in this measure, but the causa causans. Without her aid, this seminal principle of mischief, this root of Upas, could not have been planted. I have already said, and it is true, that this act proceeded on the ground of protection. It interfered directly with existing interests of great value and amount. It cut up the Calcutta cotton trade by the roots; but it passed, nevertheless, and it passed on the principle of protecting manufactures, on the principle against free trade, on the principle opposed to that which lets us alone.

Such, Mr. President, were the opinions of important and leading gentlemen from South Carolina, on the subject of internal improvement, in 1816. I went out of Congress the next year, and, returning again in 1823, thought I found South Carolina where I had left her. I really supposed that all things remained as they were, and that the South Carolina doctrine of internal improvements would be defended by the same eloquent voices, and the same strong arms, as formerly. In the lapse of these six years, it is true, political associations had assumed a new aspect and new divisions. A strong party had arisen in the South hostile to the doctrine of internal improvements. Anti-consolidation was the flag under which this party fought; and its supporters inveighed against internal improvements, much after the manner in which the honorable gentleman has now inveighed against them, as part and parcel of the system of consolidation. Whether this party arose in South Carolina itself, or in the neighborhood, is more than I know. I think the latter. However that may have been, there were those found in South Carolina ready to make war upon it, and who did make intrepid war upon it. Names being regarded as things in such controversies, they bestowed on the anti-improvement gentlemen the appellation of Radicals. Yes, Sir, the appellation of Radicals, as a term of distinction applicable and applied to those who denied the liberal doctrines of internal improvement, originated, according to the best of my recollection, somewhere between North Carolina and Georgia. Well, Sir, these mischievous Radicals were to be put down, and the strong arm of South Carolina was stretched out to put them down. About this time I returned to Congress. The battle with the Radicals had been fought, and our South Carolina champions of the doctrines of internal improvement had nobly maintained their ground, and were understood to have achieved a victory. We looked upon them as conquerors. They had driven back the enemy with discomfiture, a thing, by the way, Sir, which is not always performed when it is promised. A gentleman to whom I have already referred in this debate had come into Congress, during my absence from it, from South Carolina, and had brought with him a high reputation for ability. He came from a school with which we had been acquainted, et noscitur a sociis. I hold in my hand, Sir, a printed speech of this distinguished gentleman,[4] "ON INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS," delivered about the period to which I now refer, and printed with a few introductory remarks upon consolidation; in which, Sir, I think he quite consolidated the arguments of his opponents, the Radicals, if to crush be to consolidate. I give you a short but significant quotation from these remarks. He is speaking of a pamphlet, then recently published, entitled "Consolidation"; and, having alluded to the question of renewing the charter of the former Bank of the United States, he says:--

"Moreover, in the early history of parties, and when Mr. Crawford advocated a renewal of the old charter, it was considered a Federal measure; which internal improvement never was, as this author erroneously states. This latter measure originated in the administration of Mr. Jefferson, with the appropriation for the Cumberland Road; and was first proposed, as a system, by Mr. Calhoun, and carried through the House of Representatives by a large majority of the Republicans, including almost every one of the leading men who carried us through the late war."

So, then, internal improvement is not one of the Federal heresies. One paragraph more, Sir:--

"The author in question, not content with denouncing as Federalists, General Jackson, Mr. Adams, Mr. Calhoun, and the majority of the South Carolina delegation in Congress, modestly extends the denunciation to Mr. Monroe and the whole Republican party. Here are his words: 'During the administration of Mr. Monroe much has passed which the Republican party would be glad to approve if they could!! But the principal feature, and that which has chiefly elicited these observations, is the renewal of the SYSTEM OF INTERNAL IMPROVEMENTS.' Now this measure was adopted by a vote of 115 to 86 of a Republican Congress, and sanctioned by a Republican President. Who, then, is this author, who assumes the high prerogative of denouncing, in the name of the Republican party, the Republican administration of the country? A denunciation including within its sweep Calhoun, Lowndes, and Cheves, men who will be regarded as the brightest ornaments of South Carolina, and the strongest pillars of the Republican party, as long as the late war shall be remembered, and talents and patriotism shall be regarded as the proper objects of the admiration and gratitude of a free people!!"

Such are the opinions, Sir, which were maintained by South Carolina gentlemen, in the House of Representatives, on the subject of internal improvements, when I took my seat there as a member from Massachusetts in 1823. But this is not all. We had a bill before us, and passed it in that house, entitled, "An Act to procure the necessary surveys, plans, and estimates upon the subject of roads and canals." It authorized the President to cause surveys and estimates to be made of the routes of such roads and canals as he might deem of national importance in a commercial or military point of view, or for the transportation of the mail, and appropriated thirty thousand dollars out of the treasury to defray the expense. This act, though preliminary in its nature, covered the whole ground. It took for granted the complete power of internal improvement, as far as any of its advocates had ever contended for it. Having passed the other house, the bill came up to the Senate, and was here considered and debated in April, 1824. The honorable member from South Carolina was a member of the Senate at that time. While the bill was under consideration here, a motion was made to add the following proviso: "Provided, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to affirm or admit a power in Congress, on their own authority, to make roads or canals within any of the States of the Union." The yeas and nays were taken on this proviso, and the honorable member voted in the negative! The proviso failed.

A motion was then made to add this proviso, viz.: "Provided, That the faith of the United States is hereby pledged, that no money shall ever be expended for roads or canals, except it shall be among the several States, and in the same proportion as direct taxes are laid and assessed by the provisions of the Constitution." The honorable member voted against this proviso also, and it failed. The bill was then put on its passage, and the honorable member voted for it, and it passed, and became a law.

Now, it strikes me, Sir, that there is no maintaining these votes, but upon the power of internal improvement, in its broadest sense. In truth, these bills for surveys and estimates have always been considered as test questions; they show who is for and who against internal improvement. This law itself went the whole length, and assumed the full and complete power. The gentleman's votes sustained that power, in every form in which the various propositions to amend presented it. He went for the entire and unrestrained authority, without consulting the States, and without agreeing to any proportionate distribution. And now suffer me to remind you, Mr. President, that it is this very same power, thus sanctioned, in every form, by the gentleman's own opinion, which is so plain and manifest a usurpation, that the State of South Carolina is supposed to be justified in refusing submission to any laws carrying the power into effect. Truly, Sir, is not this a little too hard? May we not crave some mercy, under favor and protection of the gentleman's own authority? Admitting that a road, or a canal, must be written down flat usurpation as was ever committed, may we find no mitigation in our respect for his place, and his vote, as one that knows the law?

The tariff, which South Carolina had an efficient hand in establishing, in 1816, and this asserted power of internal improvement, advanced by her in the same year, and, as we have seen, approved and sanctioned by her Representatives in 1824,--these two measures are the great grounds on which she is now thought to be justified in breaking up the Union, if she sees fit to break it up!

I may now safely say, I think, that we have had the authority of leading and distinguished gentlemen from South Carolina in support of the doctrine of internal improvement. I repeat, that, up to 1824, I for one followed South Carolina; but when that star, in its ascension, veered off in an unexpected direction, I relied on its light no longer.

Here the Vice-President said, "Does the chair understand the gentleman from Massachusetts to say that the person now occupying the chair of the Senate has changed his opinions on the subject of internal improvements?"

From nothing ever said to me, Sir, have I had reason to know of any change in the opinions of the person filling the chair of the Senate. If such change has taken place, I regret it. I speak generally of the State of South Carolina. Individuals we know there are who hold opinions favorable to the power. An application for its exercise, in behalf of a public work in South Carolina itself, is now pending, I believe, in the other house, presented by members from that State.

I have thus, Sir, perhaps not without some tediousness of detail, shown, if I am in error on the subject of internal improvement, how, and in what company, I fell into that error. If I am wrong, it is apparent who misled me.

I go to other remarks of the honorable member; and I have to complain of an entire misapprehension of what I said on the subject of the national debt, though I can hardly perceive how any one could misunderstand me. What I said was, not that I wished to put off the payment of the debt, but, on the contrary, that I had always voted for every measure for its reduction, as uniformly as the gentleman himself. He seems to claim the exclusive merit of a disposition to reduce the public charge. I do not allow it to him. As a debt, I was, I am for paying it, because it is a charge on our finances, and on the industry of the country. But I observed, that I thought I perceived a morbid fervor on that subject, an excessive anxiety to pay off the debt, not so much because it is a debt simply, as because, while it lasts, it furnishes one objection to disunion. It is, while it continues, a tie of common interest. I did not impute such motives to the honorable member himself, but that there is such a feeling in existence I have not a particle of doubt. The most I said was, that, if one effect of the debt was to strengthen our Union, that effect itself was not regretted by me, however much others might regret it. The gentleman has not seen how to reply to this, otherwise than by supposing me to have advanced the doctrine that a national debt is a national blessing. Others, I must hope, will find much less difficulty in understanding me. I distinctly and pointedly cautioned the honorable member not to understand me as expressing an opinion favorable to the continuance of the debt. I repeated this caution, and repeated it more than once; but it was thrown away.

On yet another point, I was still more unaccountably misunderstood. The gentleman had harangued against "consolidation." I told him, in reply, that there was one kind of consolidation to which I was attached, and that was the consolidation of our Union; that this was precisely that consolidation to which I feared others were not attached, and that such consolidation was the very end of the Constitution, the leading object, as they had informed us themselves, which its framers had kept in view. I turned to their communication,[5] and read their very words, "the consolidation of the Union," and expressed my devotion to this sort of consolidation. I said, in terms, that I wished not in the slightest degree to augment the powers of this government; that my object was to preserve, not to enlarge; and that by consolidating the Union I understood no more than the strengthening of the Union, and perpetuating it. Having been thus explicit, having thus read from the printed book the precise words which I adopted, as expressing my own sentiments, it passes comprehension how any man could understand me as contending for an extension of the powers of the government, or for consolidation in that odious sense in which it means an accumulation, in the federal government, of the powers properly belonging to the States.

I repeat, Sir, that, in adopting the sentiment of the framers of the Constitution, I read their language audibly, and word for word; and I pointed out the distinction, just as fully as I have now done, between the consolidation of the Union and that other obnoxious consolidation which I disclaimed. And yet the honorable member misunderstood me. The gentleman had said that he wished for no fixed revenue,--not a shilling. If by a word he could convert the Capitol into gold, he would not do it. Why all this fear of revenue? Why, Sir, because, as the gentleman told us, it tends to consolidation. Now this can mean neither more nor less than that a common revenue is a common interest, and that all common interests tend to preserve the union of the States. I confess I like that tendency; if the gentleman dislikes it, he is right in deprecating a shilling of fixed revenue. So much, Sir, for consolidation.

As well as I recollect the course of his remarks, the honorable gentleman next recurred to the subject of the tariff. He did not doubt the word must be of unpleasant sound to me, and proceeded, with an effort neither new nor attended with new success, to involve me and my votes in inconsistency and contradiction. I am happy the honorable gentleman has furnished me an opportunity of a timely remark or two on that subject. I was glad he approached it, for it is a question I enter upon without fear from anybody. The strenuous toil of the gentleman has been to raise an inconsistency between my dissent to the tariff in 1824, and my vote in 1828. It is labor lost. He pays undeserved compliment to my speech in 1824; but this is to raise me high, that my fall, as he would have it, in 1828, may be more signal. Sir, there was no fall. Between the ground I stood on in 1824 and that I took in 1828, there was not only no precipice, but no declivity. It was a change of position to meet new circumstances, but on the same level. A plain tale explains the whole matter. In 1816 I had not acquiesced in the tariff, then supported by South Carolina. To some parts of it, especially, I felt and expressed great repugnance. I held the same opinions in 1820, at the meeting in Faneuil Hall, to which the gentleman has alluded. I said then, and say now, that, as an original question, the authority of Congress to exercise the revenue power, with direct reference to the protection of manufactures, is a questionable authority, far more questionable, in my judgment, than the power of internal improvements. I must confess, Sir, that in one respect some impression has been made on my opinions lately. Mr. Madison's publication has put the power in a very strong light. He has placed it, I must acknowledge, upon grounds of construction and argument which seem impregnable. But even if the power were doubtful, on the face of the Constitution itself, it had been assumed and asserted in the first revenue law ever passed under that same Constitution and on this ground, as a matter settled by contemporaneous practice, I had refrained from expressing the opinion that the tariff laws transcended constitutional limits, as the gentleman supposes. What I did say at Faneuil Hall, as far as I now remember, was, that this was originally matter of doubtful construction. The gentleman himself, I suppose, thinks there is no doubt about it, and that the laws are plainly against the Constitution. Mr. Madison's letters, already referred to, contain, in my judgment, by far the most able exposition extant of this part of the Constitution. He has satisfied me, so far as the practice of the government had left it an open question.

With a great majority of the Representatives of Massachusetts, I voted against the tariff of 1824. My reasons were then given, and I will not now repeat them. But, notwithstanding our dissent, the great States of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky went for the bill, in almost unbroken column, and it passed. Congress and the President sanctioned it, and it became the law of the land. What, then, were we to do? Our only option was, either to fall in with this settled course of public policy, and accommodate ourselves to it as well as we could, or to embrace the South Carolina doctrine, and talk of nullifying the statute by State interference.

This last alternative did not suit our principles, and of course we adopted the former. In 1827, the subject came again before Congress, on a proposition to afford some relief to the branch of wool and woollens. We looked upon the system of protection as being fixed and settled. The law of 1824 remained. It had gone into full operation, and, in regard to some objects intended by it, perhaps most of them, had produced all its expected effects. No man proposed to repeal it; no man attempted to renew the general contest on its principle. But, owing to subsequent and unforeseen occurrences, the benefit intended by it to wool and woollen fabrics had not been realized. Events not known here when the law passed had taken place, which defeated its object in that particular respect. A measure was accordingly brought forward to meet this precise deficiency, to remedy this particular defect. It was limited to wool and woollens. Was ever any thing more reasonable? If the policy of the tariff laws had become established in principle, as the permanent policy of the government, should they not be revised and amended, and made equal, like other laws, as exigencies should arise, or justice require? Because we had doubted about adopting the system, were we to refuse to cure its manifest defects, after it had been adopted, and when no one attempted its repeal? And this, Sir, is the inconsistency so much bruited. I had voted against the tariff of 1824, but it passed; and in 1827 and 1828 I voted to amend it, in a point essential to the interest of my constituents. Where is the inconsistency? Could I do otherwise? Sir, does political consistency consist in always giving negative votes? Does it require of a public man to refuse to concur in amending laws, because they passed against his consent? Having voted against the tariff originally, does consistency demand that I should do all in my power to maintain an unequal tariff, burdensome to my own constituents in many respects, favorable in none? To consistency of that sort, I lay no claim. And there is another sort to which I lay as little, and that is, a kind of consistency by which persons feel themselves as much bound to oppose a proposition after it has become a law of the land as before.

The bill of 1827, limited, as I have said, to the single object in which the tariff of 1824 had manifestly failed in its effect, passed the House of Representatives, but was lost here. We had then the act of 1828. I need not recur to the history of a measure so recent. Its enemies spiced it with whatsoever they thought would render it distasteful; its friends took it, drugged as it was. Vast amounts of property, many millions, had been invested in manufactures, under the inducements of the act of 1824. Events called loudly, as I thought, for further regulation to secure the degree of protection intended by that act. I was disposed to vote for such regulation, and desired nothing more; but certainly was not to be bantered out of my purpose by a threatened augmentation of duty on molasses, put into the bill for the avowed purpose of making it obnoxious. The vote may have been right or wrong, wise or unwise; but it is little less than absurd to allege against it an inconsistency with opposition to the former law.

Sir, as to the general subject of the tariff, I have little now to say. Another opportunity may be presented. I remarked the other day, that this policy did not begin with us in New England; and yet, Sir, New England is charged with vehemence as being favorable, or charged with equal vehemence as being unfavorable, to the tariff policy, just as best suits the time, place, and occasion for making some charge against her. The credulity of the public has been put to its extreme capacity of false impression relative to her conduct in this particular. Through all the South, during the late contest, it was New England policy and a New England administration that were afflicting the country with a tariff beyond all endurance; while on the other side of the Alleghanies even the act of 1828 itself, the very sublimated essence of oppression, according to Southern opinions, was pronounced to be one of those blessings for which the West was indebted to the "generous South."

With large investments in manufacturing establishments, and many and various interests connected with and dependent on them, it is not to be expected that New England, any more than other portions of the country, will now consent to any measure destructive or highly dangerous. The duty of the government, at the present moment, would seem to be to preserve, not to destroy; to maintain the position which it has assumed; and, for one, I shall feel it an indispensable obligation to hold it steady, as far as in my power, to that degree of protection which it has undertaken to bestow. No more of the tariff.

Professing to be provoked by what he chose to consider a charge made by me against South Carolina, the honorable member, Mr. President, has taken up a new crusade against New England. Leaving altogether the subject of the public lands, in which his success, perhaps, had been neither distinguished nor satisfactory, and letting go, also, of the topic of the tariff, he sallied forth in a general assault on the opinions, politics, and parties of New England, as they have been exhibited in the last thirty years. This is natural. The "narrow policy" of the public lands had proved a legal settlement in South Carolina, and was not to be removed. The "accursed policy" of the tariff, also, had established the fact of its birth and parentage in the same State. No wonder, therefore, the gentleman wished to carry the war, as he expressed it, into the enemy's country. Prudently willing to quit these subjects, he was, doubtless, desirous of fastening on others, which could not be transferred south of Mason and Dixon's line. The politics of New England became his theme; and it was in this part of his speech, I think, that he menaced me with such sore discomfiture. Discomfiture! Why, Sir, when he attacks any thing which I maintain, and overthrows it, when he turns the right or left of any position which I take up, when he drives me from any ground I choose to occupy, he may then talk of discomfiture, but not till that distant day. What has he done? Has he maintained his own charges? Has he proved what he alleged? Has he sustained himself in his attack on the government, and on the history of the North, in the matter of the public lands? Has he disproved a fact, refuted a proposition, weakened an argument, maintained by me? Has he come within beat of drum of any position of mine? O, no; but he has "carried the war into the enemy's country"! Carried the war into the enemy's country! Yes, Sir, and what sort of a war has he made of it? Why, Sir, he has stretched a drag-net over the whole surface of perished pamphlets, indiscreet sermons, frothy paragraphs, and fuming popular addresses,--over whatever the pulpit in its moments of alarm, the press in its heats, and parties in their extravagance, have severally thrown off in times of general excitement and violence. He has thus swept together a mass of such things as, but that they are now old and cold, the public health would have required him rather to leave in their state of dispersion. For a good long hour or two, we had the unbroken pleasure of listening to the honorable member, while he recited with his usual grace and spirit, and with evident high gusto, speeches, pamphlets, addresses, and all the et caeteras of the political press, such as warm heads produce in warm times; and such as it would be "discomfiture" indeed for any one, whose taste did not delight in that sort of reading, to be obliged to peruse. This is his war. This it is to carry war into the enemy's country. It is in an invasion of this sort, that he flatters himself with the expectation of gaining laurels fit to adorn a Senator's brow!

Mr. President, I shall not, it will not, I trust, be expected that I should, either now or at any time, separate this farrago into parts, and answer and examine its components. I shall barely bestow upon it all a general remark or two. In the run of forty years, Sir, under this Constitution, we have experienced sundry successive violent party contests. Party arose, indeed, with the Constitution itself, and, in some form or other, has attended it through the greater part of its history. Whether any other constitution than the old Articles of Confederation was desirable, was itself a question on which parties divided; if a new constitution were framed, what powers should be given to it was another question; and when it had been formed, what was, in fact, the just extent of the powers actually conferred was a third. Parties, as we know, existed under the first administration, as distinctly marked as those which have manifested themselves at any subsequent period. The contest immediately preceding the political change in 1801, and that, again, which existed at the commencement of the late war, are other instances of party excitement, of something more than usual strength and intensity. In all these conflicts there was, no doubt, much of violence on both and all sides. It would be impossible, if one had a fancy for such employment, to adjust the relative quantum of violence between these contending parties. There was enough in each, as must always be expected in popular governments. With a great deal of popular and decorous discussion, there was mingled a great deal, also, of declamation, virulence, crimination, and abuse. In regard to any party, probably, at one of the leading epochs in the history of parties, enough may be found to make out another inflamed exhibition, not unlike that with which the honorable member has edified us. For myself, Sir, I shall not rake among the rubbish of bygone times, to see what I can find, or whether I cannot find something by which I can fix a blot on the escutcheon of any State, any party, or any part of the country. General Washington's administration was steadily and zealously maintained, as we all know, by New England. It was violently opposed elsewhere. We know in what quarter he had the most earnest, constant, and persevering support, in all his great and leading measures. We know where his private and personal character was held in the highest degree of attachment and veneration; and we know, too, where his measures were opposed, his services slighted, and his character vilified. We know, or we might know, if we turned to the journals, who expressed respect, gratitude, and regret, when he retired from the chief magistracy, and who refused to express either respect, gratitude, or regret. I shall not open those journals. Publications more abusive or scurrilous never saw the light, than were sent forth against Washington, and all his leading measures, from presses south of New England. But I shall not look them up. I employ no scavengers, no one is in attendance on me, furnishing such means of retaliation; and if there were, with an ass's load of them, with a bulk as huge as that which the gentleman himself has produced, I would not touch one of them. I see enough of the violence of our own times, to be no way anxious to rescue from forgetfulness the extravagances of times past.

Besides, what is all this to the present purpose? It has nothing to do with the public lands, in regard to which the attack was begun; and it has nothing to do with those sentiments and opinions which, I have thought, tend to disunion and all of which the honorable member seems to have adopted himself, and undertaken to defend. New England has, at times, so argues the gentleman, held opinions as dangerous as those which he now holds. Suppose this were so; why should he therefore abuse New England? If he finds himself countenanced by acts of hers, how is it that, while he relies on these acts, he covers, or seeks to cover, their authors with reproach? But, Sir, if, in the course of forty years, there have been undue effervescences of party in New England, has the same thing happened nowhere else? Party animosity and party outrage, not in New England, but elsewhere, denounced President Washington, not only as a Federalist, but as a Tory, a British agent, a man who, in his high office, sanctioned corruption. But does the honorable member suppose, if I had a tender here who should put such an effusion of wickedness and folly into my hand, that I would stand up and read it against the South? Parties ran into great heats again in 1799 and 1800. What was said, Sir, or rather what was not said, in those years, against John Adams, one of the committee that drafted the Declaration of Independence, and its admitted ablest defender on the floor of Congress? If the gentleman wishes to increase his stores of party abuse and frothy violence, if he has a determined proclivity to such pursuits, there are treasures of that sort south of the Potomac, much to his taste, yet untouched. I shall not touch them.

The parties which divided the country at the commencement of the late war were violent. But then there was violence on both sides, and violence in every State. Minorities and majorities were equally violent. There was no more violence against the war in New England, than in other States; nor any more appearance of violence, except that, owing to a dense population, greater facility of assembling, and more presses, there may have been more in quantity spoken and printed there than in some other places. In the article of sermons, too, New England is somewhat more abundant than South Carolina; and for that reason the chance of finding here and there an exceptionable one may be greater. I hope, too, there are more good ones. Opposition may have been more formidable in New England, as it embraced a larger portion of the whole population; but it was no more unrestrained in principle, or violent in manner. The minorities dealt quite as harshly with their own State governments as the majorities dealt with the administration here. There were presses on both sides, popular meetings on both sides, ay, and pulpits on both sides also. The gentleman's purveyors have only catered for him among the productions of one side. I certainly shall not supply the deficiency by furnishing samples of the other. I leave to him, and to them, the whole concern.

It is enough for me to say, that if, in any part of this their grateful occupation, if, in all their researches, they find any thing in the history of Massachusetts, or New England, or in the proceedings of any legislative or other public body, disloyal to the Union, speaking slightingly of its value, proposing to break it up, or recommending non-intercourse with neighboring States, on account of difference of political opinion, then, Sir, I give them all up to the honorable gentleman's unrestrained rebuke; expecting, however, that he will extend his buffetings in like manner to all similar proceedings, wherever else found.

The gentleman, Sir, has spoken at large of former parties, now no longer in being, by their received appellations, and has undertaken to instruct us, not only in the knowledge of their principles, but of their respective pedigrees also. He has ascended to their origin, and run out their genealogies. With most exemplary modesty, he speaks of the party to which he professes to have himself belonged, as the true Pure, the only honest, patriotic party, derived by regular descent, from father to son, from the time of the virtuous Romans! Spreading before us the family tree of political parties, he takes especial care to show himself snugly perched on a popular bough! He is wakeful to the expediency of adopting such rules of descent as shall bring him in, to the exclusion of others, as an heir to the inheritance of all public virtue, and all true political principle. His party and his opinions are sure to be orthodox; heterodoxy is confined to his opponents. He spoke, Sir, of the Federalists, and I thought I saw some eyes begin to open and stare a little, when he ventured on that ground. I expected he would draw his sketches rather lightly, when he looked on the circle round him, and especially if he should cast his thoughts to the high places out of the Senate. Nevertheless, he went back to Rome, ad annum urbis conditae, and found the fathers of the Federalists in the primeval aristocrats of that renowned city! He traced the flow of Federal blood down through successive ages and centuries, till he brought it into the veins of the American Tories, of whom, by the way, there were twenty in the Carolinas for one in Massachusetts. From the Tories he followed it to the Federalists; and, as the Federal party was broken up, and there was no possibility of transmitting it further on this side the Atlantic, he seems to have discovered that it has gone off collaterally, though against all the canons of descent, into the Ultras of France, and finally become extinguished, like exploded gas, among the adherents of Don Miguel! This, Sir, is an abstract of the gentleman's history of Federalism. I am not about to controvert it. It is not, at present, worth the pains of refutation; because, Sir, if at this day any one feels the sin of Federalism lying heavily on his conscience, he can easily procure remission. He may even obtain an indulgence, if he be desirous of repeating the same transgression. It is an affair of no difficulty to get into this same right line of patriotic descent. A man now-a-days is at liberty to choose his political parentage. He may elect his own father. Federalist or not, he may, if he choose, claim to belong to the favored stock, and his claim will be allowed. He may carry back his pretensions just as far as the honorable gentleman himself; nay, he may make himself out the honorable gentleman's cousin, and prove, satisfactorily, that he is descended from the same political great-grandfather. All this is allowable. We all know a process, Sir, by which the whole Essex Junto could, in one hour, be all washed white from their ancient Federalism, and come out, every one of them, original Democrats, dyed in the wool! Some of them have actually undergone the operation, and they say it is quite easy. The only inconvenience it occasions, as they tell us, is a slight tendency of the blood to the face, a soft suffusion, which, however, is very transient, since nothing is said by those whom they join calculated to deepen the red on the cheek, but a prudent silence is observed in regard to all the past. Indeed, Sir, some smiles of approbation have been bestowed, and some crumbs of comfort have fallen, not a thousand miles from the door of the Hartford Convention itself. And if the author of the Ordinance of 1787 possessed the other requisite qualifications, there is no knowing, notwithstanding his Federalism, to what heights of favor he might not yet attain.

Mr. President, in carrying his warfare, such as it is, into New England, the honorable gentleman all along professes to be acting on the defensive. He chooses to consider me as having assailed South Carolina, and insists that he comes forth only as her champion, and in her defence. Sir, I do not admit that I made any attack whatever on South Carolina. Nothing like it. The honorable member, in his first speech, expressed opinions, in regard to revenue and some other topics, which I heard both with pain and with surprise. I told the gentleman I was aware that such sentiments were entertained out of the government, but had not expected to find them advanced in it; that I knew there were persons in the South who speak of our Union with indifference or doubt, taking pains to magnify its evils, and to say nothing of its benefits; that the honorable member himself, I was sure, could never be one of these; and I regretted the expression of such opinions as he had avowed, because I thought their obvious tendency was to encourage feelings of disrespect to the Union, and to impair its strength. This, Sir, is the sum and substance of all I said on the subject. And this constitutes the attack which called on the chivalry of the gentleman, in his own opinion, to harry us with such a foray among the party pamphlets and party proceedings of Massachusetts! If he means that I spoke with dissatisfaction or disrespect of the ebullitions of individuals in South Carolina, it is true. But if he means that I assailed the character of the State, her honor, or patriotism, that I reflected on her history or her conduct, he has not the slightest ground for any such assumption. I did not even refer, I think, in my observations, to any collection of individuals. I said nothing of the recent conventions. I spoke in the most guarded and careful manner, and only expressed my regret for the publication of opinions, which I presumed the honorable member disapproved as much as myself. In this, it seems, I was mistaken. I do not remember that the gentleman has disclaimed any sentiment, or any opinion, of a supposed anti-union tendency, which on all or any of the recent occasions has been expressed. The whole drift of his speech has been rather to prove, that, in divers times and manners, sentiments equally liable to my objection have been avowed in New England. And one would suppose that his object, in this reference to Massachusetts, was to find a precedent to justify proceedings in the South, were it not for the reproach and contumely with which he labors, all along, to load these his own chosen precedents. By way of defending South Carolina from what he chooses to think an attack on her, he first quotes the example of Massachusetts, and then denounces that example in good set terms. This twofold purpose, not very consistent, one would think, with itself, was exhibited more than once in the course of his speech. He referred, for instance, to the Hartford Convention. Did he do this for authority, or for a topic of reproach? Apparently for both, for he told us that he should find no fault with the mere fact of holding such a convention, and considering and discussing such questions as he supposes were then and there discussed; but what rendered it obnoxious was its being held at the time, and under the circumstances of the country then existing. We were in a war, he said, and the country needed all our aid: the hand of government required to be strengthened, not weakened; and patriotism should have postponed such proceedings to another day. The thing itself, then, is a precedent; the time and manner of it only, a subject of censure.

Now, Sir, I go much further, on this point, than the honorable member. Supposing, as the gentleman seems to do, that the Hartford Convention assembled for any such purpose as breaking up the Union, because they thought unconstitutional laws had been passed, or to consult on that subject, or to calculate the value of the Union; supposing this to be their purpose, or any part of it, then I say the meeting itself was disloyal, and was obnoxious to censure, whether held in time of peace or time of war, or under whatever circumstances. The material question is the object. Is dissolution the object? If it be, external circumstances may make it a more or less aggravated case, but cannot affect the principle. I do not hold, therefore, Sir, that the Hartford Convention was pardonable, even to the extent of the gentleman's admission, if its objects were really such as have been imputed to it. Sir, there never was a time, under any degree of excitement, in which the Hartford Convention, or any other convention, could have maintained itself one moment in New England, if assembled for any such purpose as the gentleman says would have been an allowable purpose. To hold conventions to decide constitutional law! To try the binding validity of statutes by votes in a convention! Sir, the Hartford Convention, I presume, would not desire that the honorable gentleman should be their defender or advocate, if he puts their case upon such untenable and extravagant grounds.

Then, Sir, the gentleman has no fault to find with these recently promulgated South Carolina opinions. And certainly he need have none; for his own sentiments, as now advanced, and advanced on reflection, as far as I have been able to comprehend them, go the full length of all these opinions. I propose, Sir, to say something on these, and to consider how far they are just and constitutional. Before doing that, however, let me observe that the eulogium pronounced by the honorable gentleman on the character of the State of South Carolina, for her Revolutionary and other merits, meets my hearty concurrence. I shall not acknowledge that the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished talent, or distinguished character, South Carolina has produced. I claim part of the honor, I partake in the pride, of her great names. I claim them for countrymen, one and all, the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the Sumpters, the Marions, Americans all, whose fame is no more to be hemmed in by State lines, than their talents and patriotism were capable of being circumscribed within the same narrow limits. In their day and generation, they served and honored the country, and the whole country; and their renown is of the treasures of the whole country. Him whose honored name the gentleman himself bears,--does he esteem me less capable of gratitude for his patriotism, or sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had first opened upon the light of Massachusetts, instead of South Carolina? Sir, does he suppose it in his power to exhibit a Carolina name so bright as to produce envy in my bosom? No, Sir, increased gratification and delight, rather. I thank God, that, if I am gifted with little of the spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet none, as I trust, of that other spirit, which would drag angels down. When I shall be found, Sir, in my place here in the Senate, or elsewhere, to sneer at public merit, because it happens to spring up beyond the little limits of my own State or neighborhood; when I refuse, for any such cause or for any cause, the homage due to American talent, to elevated patriotism, to sincere devotion to liberty and the country; or, if I see an uncommon endowment of Heaven, if I see extraordinary capacity and virtue, in any son of the South, and if, moved by local prejudice or gangrened by State jealousy, I get up here to abate the tithe of a hair from his just character and just fame, may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!

Sir, let me recur to pleasing recollections; let me indulge in refreshing remembrance of the past; let me remind you that, in early times, no States cherished greater harmony, both of principle and feeling, than Massachusetts and South Carolina. Would to God that harmony might again return. Shoulder to shoulder they went through the Revolution, hand in hand they stood round the administration of Washington, and felt his own great arm lean on them for support. Unkind feeling, if it exist, alienation, and distrust are the growth, unnatural to such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, the seeds of which that same great arm never scattered.

Mr. President, I shall enter on no encomium upon Massachusetts; she needs none. There she is. Behold her, and judge for yourselves. There is her history; the world knows it by heart. The past, at least, is secure. There is Boston, and Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill; and there they will remain for ever. The bones of her sons, falling in the great struggle for Independence, now lie mingled with the soil of every State from New England to Georgia; and there they will lie for ever. And, Sir, where American Liberty raised its first voice, and where its youth was nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, in the strength of its manhood and full of its original spirit. If discord and disunion shall wound it, if party strife and blind ambition shall hawk at and tear it, if folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary and necessary restraint, shall succeed in separating it from that Union, by which alone its existence is made sure, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was rocked; it will stretch forth its arm with whatever of vigor it may still retain over the friends who gather round it; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, amidst the proudest monuments of its own glory, and on the very spot of its origin.

There yet remains to be performed, Mr. President, by far the most grave and important duty, which I feel to be devolved on me by this occasion. It is to state, and to defend, what I conceive to be the true principles of the Constitution under which we are here assembled. I might well have desired that so weighty a task should have fallen into other and abler hands. I could have wished that it should have been executed by those whose character and experience give weight and influence to their opinions, such as cannot possibly belong to mine. But, Sir, I have met the occasion, not sought it; and I shall proceed to state my own sentiments, without challenging for them any particular regard, with studied plainness, and as much precision as possible.

I understand the honorable gentleman from South Carolina to maintain, that it is a right of the State legislatures to interfere, whenever, in their judgment, this government transcends its constitutional limits, and to arrest the operation of its laws.

I understand him to maintain this right, as a right existing under the Constitution, not as a right to overthrow it on the ground of extreme necessity, such as would justify violent revolution.

I understand him to maintain an authority, on the part of the States, thus to interfere, for the purpose of correcting the exercise of power by the general government, of checking it, and of compelling it to conform to their opinion of the extent of its powers.

I understand him to maintain, that the ultimate power of judging of the constitutional extent of its own authority is not lodged exclusively in the general government, or any branch of it; but that, on the contrary, the States may lawfully decide for themselves, and each State for itself, whether, in a given case, the act of the general government transcends its power.

I understand him to insist, that, if the exigency of the case, in the opinion of any State government, require it, such State government may, by its own sovereign authority, annul an act of the general government which it deems plainly and palpably unconstitutional.

This is the sum of what I understand from him to be the South Carolina doctrine, and the doctrine which he maintains. I propose to consider it, and compare it with the Constitution. Allow me to say, as a preliminary remark, that I call this the South Carolina doctrine only because the gentleman himself has so denominated it. I do not feel at liberty to say that South Carolina, as a State, has ever advanced these sentiments. I hope she has not, and never may. That a great majority of her people are opposed to the tariff laws, is doubtless true. That a majority, somewhat less than that just mentioned, conscientiously believe these laws unconstitutional, may probably also be true. But that any majority holds to the right of direct State interference at State discretion, the right of nullifying acts of Congress by acts of State legislation, is more than I know, and what I shall be slow to believe.

That there are individuals besides the honorable gentleman who do maintain these opinions, is quite certain. I recollect the recent expression of a sentiment, which circumstances attending its utterance and publication justify us in supposing was not unpremeditated. "The sovereignty of the State,--never to be controlled, construed, or decided on, but by her own feelings of honorable justice."

Mr. Hayne here rose and said, that, for the purpose of being clearly understood he would state that his proposition was in the words of the Virginia resolution, as follows:--

"That this assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it views the powers of the federal government as resulting from the compact to which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the instrument constituting that compact, as no farther valid than they are authorized by the grants enumerated in that compact; and that, in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers not granted by the said compact, the States who are parties thereto have the right, and are in duty bound, to interpose, for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them."

Mr. Webster resumed:--#/

I am quite aware, Mr. President, of the existence of the resolution which the gentleman read, and has now repeated, and that he relies on it as his authority. I know the source, too, from which it is understood to have proceeded. I need not say that I have much respect for the constitutional opinions of Mr. Madison; they would weigh greatly with me always. But before the authority of his opinion be vouched for the gentleman's proposition, it will be proper to consider what is the fair interpretation of that resolution, to which Mr. Madison is understood to have given his sanction. As the gentleman construes it, it is an authority for him. Possibly he may not have adopted the right construction. That resolution declares, that, in the case of the dangerous exercise of powers not granted by the general government, the States may interpose to arrest the progress of the evil. But how interpose, and what does this declaration purport? Does it mean no more than that there may be extreme cases, in which the people, in any mode of assembling, may resist usurpation, and relieve themselves from a tyrannical government? No one will deny this. Such resistance is not only acknowledged to be just in America, but in England also Blackstone admits as much, in the theory, and practice, too, of the English constitution. We, Sir, who oppose the Carolina doctrine, do not deny that the people may, if they choose, throw off any government when it becomes oppressive and intolerable, and erect a better in its stead. We all know that civil institutions are established for the public benefit, and that when they cease to answer the ends of their existence they may be changed. But I do not understand the doctrine now contended for to be that, which, for the sake of distinction, we may call the right of revolution. I understand the gentleman to maintain, that, without revolution, without civil commotion, without rebellion, a remedy for supposed abuse and transgression of the powers of the general government lies in a direct appeal to the interference of the State governments.

Mr. Hayne here rose and said: He did not contend for the mere right of revolution, but for the right of constitutional resistance. What he maintained was, that in case of a plain, palpable violation of the Constitution by the general government, a State may interpose; and that this interposition is constitutional.

Mr. Webster resumed:--#/

So, Sir, I understood the gentleman, and am happy to find that I did not misunderstand him. What he contends for is, that it is constitutional to interrupt the administration of the Constitution itself, in the hands of those who are chosen and sworn to administer it, by the direct interference, in form of law, of the States, in virtue of their sovereign capacity. The inherent right in the people to reform their government I do not deny; and they have another right, and that is, to resist unconstitutional laws, without overturning the government. It is no doctrine of mine that unconstitutional laws bind the people. The great question is, Whose prerogative is it to decide on the constitutionality or unconstitutionality of the laws? On that, the main debate hinges. The proposition, that, in case of a supposed violation of the Constitution by Congress, the States have a constitutional right to interfere and annul the law of Congress, is the proposition of the gentleman. I do not admit it. If the gentleman had intended no more than to assert the right of revolution for justifiable cause, he would have said only what all agree to. But I cannot conceive that there can be a middle course, between submission to the laws, when regularly pronounced constitutional, on the one hand, and open resistance, which is revolution or rebellion, on the other. I say, the right of a State to annul a law of Congress cannot be maintained, but on the ground of the inalienable right of man to resist oppression; that is to say, upon the ground of revolution. I admit that there is an ultimate violent remedy, above the Constitution and in defiance of the Constitution, which may be resorted to when a revolution is to be justified. But I do not admit, that, under the Constitution and in conformity with it, there is any mode in which a State government, as a member of the Union, can interfere and stop the progress of the general government, by force of her own laws, under any circumstances whatever.

This leads us to inquire into the origin of this government and the source of its power. Whose agent is it? Is it the creature of the State legislatures, or the creature of the people? If the government of the United States be the agent of the State governments, then they may control it, provided they can agree in the manner of controlling it; if it be the agent of the people, then the people alone can control it, restrain it, modify, or reform it. It is observable enough, that the doctrine for which the honorable gentleman contends leads him to the necessity of maintaining, not only that this general government is the creature of the States, but that it is the creature of each of the States severally, so that each may assert the power for itself of determining whether it acts within the limits of its authority. It is the servant of four-and-twenty masters, of different wills and different purposes, and yet bound to obey all. This absurdity (for it seems no less) arises from a misconception as to the origin of this government and its true character. It is, Sir, the people's Constitution, the people's government, made for the people, made by the people, and answerable to the people. The people of the United States have declared that this Constitution shall be the supreme law. We must either admit the proposition, or dispute their authority. The States are, unquestionably, sovereign, so far as their sovereignty is not affected by this supreme law. But the State legislatures, as political bodies, however sovereign, are yet not sovereign over the people. So far as the people have given power to the general government, so far the grant is unquestionably good, and the government holds of the people, and not of the State governments. We are all agents of the same supreme power, the people. The general government and the State governments derive their authority from the same source. Neither can, in relation to the other, be called primary, though one is definite and restricted, and the other general and residuary. The national government possesses those powers which it can be shown the people have conferred on it, and no more. All the rest belongs to the State governments, or to the people themselves. So far as the people have restrained State sovereignty, by the expression of their will, in the Constitution of the United States, so far, it must be admitted, State sovereignty is effectually controlled. I do not contend that it is, or ought to be, controlled farther. The sentiment to which I have referred propounds that State sovereignty is only to be controlled by its own "feeling of justice"; that is to say, it is not to be controlled at all, for one who is to follow his own feelings is under no legal control. Now, however men may think this ought to be, the fact is, that the people of the United States have chosen to impose control on State sovereignties. There are those, doubtless, who wish they had been left without restraint; but the Constitution has ordered the matter differently. To make war, for instance, is an exercise of sovereignty; but the Constitution declares that no State shall make war. To coin money is another exercise of sovereign power; but no State is at liberty to coin money. Again, the Constitution says that no sovereign State shall be so sovereign as to make a treaty. These prohibitions, it must be confessed, are a control on the State sovereignty of South Carolina, as well as of the other States, which does not arise "from her own feelings of honorable justice." The opinion referred to, therefore, is in defiance of the plainest provisions of the Constitution.

There are other proceedings of public bodies which have already been alluded to, and to which I refer again for the purpose of ascertaining more fully what is the length and breadth of that doctrine, denominated the Carolina doctrine, which the honorable member has now stood up on this floor to maintain. In one of them I find it resolved, that "the tariff of 1828, and every other tariff designed to promote one branch of industry at the expense of others, is contrary to the meaning and intention of the federal compact; and such a dangerous, palpable, and deliberate usurpation of power, by a determined majority, wielding the general government beyond the limits of its delegated powers, as calls upon the States which compose the suffering minority, in their sovereign capacity, to exercise the powers which, as sovereigns, necessarily devolve upon them, when their compact is violated."

Observe, Sir, that this resolution holds the tariff of 1828, and every other tariff designed to promote one branch of industry at the expense of another, to be such a dangerous, palpable, and deliberate usurpation of power, as calls upon the States, in their sovereign capacity, to interfere by their own authority. This denunciation, Mr. President, you will please to observe, includes our old tariff of 1816, as well as all others; because that was established to promote the interest of the manufacturers of cotton, to the manifest and admitted injury of the Calcutta cotton trade. Observe, again, that all the qualifications are here rehearsed and charged upon the tariff, which are necessary to bring the case within the gentleman's proposition. The tariff is a usurpation; it is a dangerous usurpation; it is a palpable usurpation; it is a deliberate usurpation. It is such a usurpation, therefore, as calls upon the States to exercise their right of interference. Here is a case, then, within the gentleman's principles, and all his qualifications of his principles. It is a case for action. The Constitution is plainly, dangerously, palpably, and deliberately violated; and the States must interpose their own authority to arrest the law. Let us suppose the State of South Carolina to express this same opinion, by the voice of her legislature. That would be very imposing; but what then? Is the voice of one State conclusive? It so happens that, at the very moment when South Carolina resolves that the tariff laws are unconstitutional, Pennsylvania and Kentucky resolve exactly the reverse. They hold those laws to be both highly proper and strictly constitutional. And now, Sir, how does the honorable member propose to deal with this case? How does he relieve us from this difficulty, upon any principle of his? His construction gets us into it; how does he propose to get us out?

In Carolina, the tariff is a palpable, deliberate usurpation; Carolina, therefore, may nullify it, and refuse to pay the duties. In Pennsylvania, it is both clearly constitutional and highly expedient; and there the duties are to be paid. And yet we live under a government of uniform laws, and under a Constitution too, which contains an express provision, as it happens, that all duties shall be equal in all the States. Does not this approach absurdity?

If there be no power to settle such questions, independent of either of the States, is not the whole Union a rope of sand? Are we not thrown back again, precisely, upon the old Confederation?

It is too plain to be argued. Four-and-twenty interpreters of constitutional law, each with a power to decide for itself, and none with authority to bind anybody else, and this constitutional law the only bond of their union! What is such a state of things but a mere connection during pleasure, or, to use the phraseology of the times, during feeling? And that feeling, too, not the feeling of the people, who established the Constitution, but the feeling of the State governments.

In another of the South Carolina addresses, having premised that the crisis requires "all the concentrated energy of passion," an attitude of open resistance to the laws of the Union is advised. Open resistance to the laws, then, is the constitutional remedy, the conservative power of the State, which the South Carolina doctrines teach for the redress of political evils, real or imaginary. And its authors further say, that, appealing with confidence to the Constitution itself, to justify their opinions, they cannot consent to try their accuracy by the courts of justice. In one sense, indeed, Sir, this is assuming an attitude of open resistance in favor of liberty. But what sort of liberty? The liberty of establishing their own opinions, in defiance of the opinions of all others; the liberty of judging and of deciding exclusively themselves, in a matter in which others have as much right to judge and decide as they; the liberty of placing their own opinions above the judgment of all others, above the laws, and above the Constitution. This is their liberty, and this is the fair result of the proposition contended for by the honorable gentleman. Or, it may be more properly said, it is identical with it, rather than a result from it.

In the same publication we find the following: "Previously to our Revolution, when the arm of oppression was stretched over New England, where did our Northern brethren meet with a braver sympathy than that which sprung from the bosoms of Carolinians? We had no extortion, no oppression, no collision with the king's ministers, no navigation interests springing up, in envious rivalry of England."

This seems extraordinary language. South Carolina no collision with the king's ministers in 1775! No extortion! No oppression! But, Sir, it is also most significant language. Does any man doubt the purpose for which it was penned? Can anyone fail to see that it was designed to raise in the reader's mind the question, whether, at this time,--that is to say, in 1828,--South Carolina has any collision with the king's ministers, any oppression, or extortion, to fear from England? whether, in short, England is not as naturally the friend of South Carolina as New England, with her navigation interests springing up in envious rivalry of England?

Is it not strange, Sir, that an intelligent man in South Carolina, in 1828, should thus labor to prove that, in 1775, there was no hostility, no cause of war, between South Carolina and England? That she had no occasion, in reference to her own interest, or from a regard to her own welfare, to take up arms in the Revolutionary contest? Can any one account for the expression of such strange sentiments, and their circulation through the State, otherwise than by supposing the object to be what I have already intimated, to raise the question, if they had no "collision" (mark the expression) with the ministers of King George the Third, in 1775, what collision have they, in 1828, with the ministers of King George the Fourth? What is there now, in the existing state of things, to separate Carolina from Old, more, or rather, than from New England?

Resolutions, Sir, have been recently passed by the legislature of South Carolina. I need not refer to them; they go no farther than the honorable gentleman himself has gone, and I hope not so far. I content myself, therefore, with debating the matter with him.

And now, Sir, what I have first to say on this subject is, that at no time, and under no circumstances, has New England, or any State in New England, or any respectable body of persons in New England, or any public man of standing in New England, put forth such a doctrine as this Carolina doctrine.

The gentleman has found no case, he can find none, to support his own opinions by New England authority. New England has studied the Constitution in other schools, and under other teachers. She looks upon it with other regards, and deems more highly and reverently both of its just authority and its utility and excellence. The history of her legislative proceedings may be traced. The ephemeral effusions of temporary bodies, called together by the excitement of the occasion, may be hunted up; they have been hunted up. The opinions and votes of her public men, in and out of Congress, may be explored. It will all be in vain. The Carolina doctrine can derive from her neither countenance nor support. She rejects it now; she always did reject it; and till she loses her senses, she always will reject it. The honorable member has referred to expressions on the subject of the embargo law, made in this place, by an honorable and venerable gentleman,[6] now favoring us with his presence. He quotes that distinguished Senator as saying, that, in his judgment, the embargo law was unconstitutional, and that therefore, in his opinion, the people were not bound to obey it. That, Sir, is perfectly constitutional language. An unconstitutional law is not binding; but then it does not rest with a resolution or a law of a State legislature to decide whether an act of Congress be or be not constitutional. An unconstitutional act of Congress would not bind the people of this District, although they have no legislature to interfere in their behalf; and, on the other hand, a constitutional law of Congress does bind the citizens of every State, although all their legislatures should undertake to annul it by act or resolution. The venerable Connecticut Senator is a constitutional lawyer, of sound principles and enlarged knowledge; a statesman practised and experienced, bred in the company of Washington, and holding just views upon the nature of our governments. He believed the embargo unconstitutional, and so did others; but what then? Who did he suppose was to decide that question? The State legislatures? Certainly not. No such sentiment ever escaped his lips.

Let us follow up, Sir, this New England opposition to the embargo laws; let us trace it, till we discern the principle which controlled and governed New England throughout the whole course of that opposition. We shall then see what similarity there is between the New England school of constitutional opinions, and this modern Carolina school. The gentleman, I think, read a petition from some single individual addressed to the legislature of Massachusetts, asserting the Carolina doctrine; that is, the right of State interference to arrest the laws of the Union. The fate of that petition shows the sentiment of the legislature. It met no favor. The opinions of Massachusetts were very different. They had been expressed in 1798, in answer to the resolutions of Virginia, and she did not depart from them, nor bend them to the times. Misgoverned, wronged, oppressed, as she felt herself to be, she still held fast her integrity to the Union. The gentleman may find in her proceedings much evidence of dissatisfaction with the measures of government, and great and deep dislike to the embargo; all this makes the case so much the stronger for her; for, notwithstanding all this dissatisfaction and dislike, she still claimed no right to sever the bonds of the Union. There was heat, and there was anger in her political feeling. Be it so; but neither her heat nor her anger betrayed her into infidelity to the government. The gentleman labors to prove that she disliked the embargo as much as South Carolina dislikes the tariff, and expressed her dislike as strongly. Be it so; but did she propose the Carolina remedy? did she threaten to interfere, by State authority, to annul the laws of the Union? That is the question for the gentleman's consideration.

No doubt, Sir, a great majority of the people of New England conscientiously believed the embargo law of 1807 unconstitutional; as conscientiously, certainly, as the people of South Carolina hold that opinion of the tariff. They reasoned thus: Congress has power to regulate commerce; but here is a law, they said, stopping all commerce, and stopping it indefinitely. The law is perpetual; that is, it is not limited in point of time, and must of course continue until it shall be repealed by some other law. It is as perpetual, therefore, as the law against treason or murder. Now, is this regulating commerce, or destroying it? Is it guiding, controlling, giving the rule to commerce, as a subsisting thing or is it putting an end to it altogether? Nothing is more certain, than that a majority in New England deemed this law a violation of the Constitution. The very case required by the gentleman to justify State interference had then arisen. Massachusetts believed this law to be "a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of a power not granted by the Constitution." Deliberate it was, for it was long continued; palpable she thought it, as no words in the Constitution gave the power, and only a construction, in her opinion most violent, raised it; dangerous it was, since it threatened utter ruin to her most important interests. Here, then, was a Carolina case. How did Massachusetts deal with it? It was, as she thought, a plain, manifest, palpable violation of the Constitution, and it brought ruin to her doors. Thousands of families, and hundreds of thousands of individuals, were beggared by it. While she saw and felt all this, she saw and felt also, that, as a measure of national policy, it was perfectly futile; that the country was no way benefited by that which caused so much individual distress; that it was efficient only for the production of evil, and all that evil inflicted on ourselves. In such a case, under such circumstances, how did Massachusetts demean herself? Sir, she remonstrated, she memorialized, she addressed herself to the general government, not exactly "with the concentrated energy of passion," but with her own strong sense, and the energy of sober conviction. But she did not interpose the arm of her own power to arrest the law, and break the embargo. Far from it. Her principles bound her to two things; and she followed her principles, lead where they might. First, to submit to every constitutional law of Congress, and secondly, if the constitutional validity of the law be doubted, to refer that question to the decision of the proper tribunals. The first principle is vain and ineffectual without the second. A majority of us in New England believed the embargo law unconstitutional; but the great question was, and always will be in such cases, Who is to decide this? Who is to judge between the people and the government? And, Sir, it is quite plain, that the Constitution of the United States confers on the government itself, to be exercised by its appropriate department, and under its own responsibility to the people, this power of deciding ultimately and conclusively upon the just extent of its own authority. If this had not been done, we should not have advanced a single step beyond the old Confederation.

Being fully of opinion that the embargo law was unconstitutional, the people of New England were yet equally clear in the opinion, (it was a matter they did doubt upon,) that the question, after all, must be decided by the judicial tribunals of the United States. Before those tribunals, therefore, they brought the question. Under the provisions of the law, they had given bonds to millions in amount, and which were alleged to be forfeited. They suffered the bonds to be sued, and thus raised the question. In the old-fashioned way of settling disputes, they went to law. The case came to hearing and solemn argument; and he who espoused their cause, and stood up for them against the validity of the embargo act, was none other than that great man, of whom the gentleman has made honorable mention, Samuel Dexter. He was then, Sir, in the fulness of his knowledge, and the maturity of his strength. He had retired from long and distinguished public service here, to the renewed pursuit of professional duties, carrying with him all that enlargement and expansion, all the new strength and force, which an acquaintance with the more general subjects discussed in the national councils is capable of adding to professional attainment, in a mind of true greatness and comprehension. He was a lawyer, and he was also a statesman. He had studied the Constitution, when he filled public station, that he might defend it; he had examined its principles that he might maintain them. More than all men, or at least as much as any man, he was attached to the general government and to the union of the States. His feelings and opinions all ran in that direction. A question of constitutional law, too, was, of all subjects, that one which was best suited to his talents and learning. Aloof from technicality, and unfettered by artificial rule, such a question gave opportunity for that deep and clear analysis, that mighty grasp of principle, which so much distinguished his higher efforts. His very statement was argument; his inference seemed demonstration. The earnestness of his own conviction wrought conviction in others. One was convinced, and believed, and assented, because it was gratifying, delightful, to think, and feel, and believe, in unison with an intellect of such evident superiority.

Mr. Dexter, Sir, such as I have described him, argued the New England cause. He put into his effort his whole heart, as well as all the powers of his understanding; for he had avowed, in the most public manner, his entire concurrence with his neighbors on the point in dispute. He argued the cause; it was lost, and New England submitted. The established tribunals pronounced the law constitutional, and New England acquiesced. Now, Sir, is not this the exact opposite of the doctrine of the gentleman from South Carolina? According to him, instead of referring to the judicial tribunals, we should have broken up the embargo by laws of our own; we should have repealed it, quoad New England; for we had a strong, palpable, and oppressive case. Sir, we believed the embargo unconstitutional; but still that was matter of opinion, and who was to decide it? We thought it a clear case; but, nevertheless, we did not take the law into our own hands, because we did not wish to bring about a revolution, nor to break up the Union; for I maintain, that between submission to the decision of the constituted tribunals, and revolution, or disunion, there is no middle ground; there is no ambiguous condition, half allegiance and half rebellion. And, Sir, how futile, how very futile it is, to admit the right of State interference, and then attempt to save it from the character of unlawful resistance, by adding terms of qualification to the causes and occasions, leaving all these qualifications, like the case itself, in the discretion of the State governments. It must be a clear case, it is said, a deliberate case, a palpable case, a dangerous case. But then the State is still left at liberty to decide for herself what is clear, what is deliberate, what is palpable, what is dangerous. Do adjectives and epithets avail any thing?

Sir, the human mind is so constituted, that the merits of both sides of a controversy appear very clear, and very palpable, to those who respectively espouse them; and both sides usually grow clearer as the controversy advances. South Carolina sees unconstitutionality in the tariff; she sees oppression there also, and she sees danger. Pennsylvania, with a vision not less sharp, looks at the same tariff, and sees no such thing in it; she sees it all constitutional, all useful, all safe. The faith of South Carolina is strengthened by opposition, and she now not only sees, but resolves, that the tariff is palpably unconstitutional, oppressive, and dangerous; but Pennsylvania, not to be behind her neighbors, and equally willing to strengthen her own faith by a confident asseveration, resolves also, and gives to every warm affirmative of South Carolina, a plain, downright, Pennsylvania negative. South Carolina, to show the strength and unity of her opinion, brings her assembly to a unanimity, within seven voices; Pennsylvania, not to be outdone in this respect any more than in others, reduces her dissentient fraction to a single vote. Now, Sir, again, I ask the gentleman, What is to be done? Are these States both right? Is he bound to consider them both right? If not, which is in the wrong? or rather, which has the best right to decide? And if he, and if I, are not to know what the Constitution means, and what it is, till those two State legislatures, and the twenty-two others, shall agree in its construction, what have we sworn to, when we have sworn to maintain it? I was forcibly struck, Sir, with one reflection, as the gentleman went on in his speech. He quoted Mr. Madison's resolutions, to prove that a State may interfere, in a case of deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of a power not granted. The honorable member supposes the tariff law to be such an exercise of power; and that consequently a case has arisen in which the State may, if it see fit, interfere by its own law. Now it so happens, nevertheless, that Mr. Madison deems this same tariff law quite constitutional. Instead of a clear and palpable violation, it is, in his judgment, no violation at all. So that, while they use his authority for a hypothetical case, they reject it in the very case before them. All this, Sir, shows the inherent futility, I had almost used a stronger word, of conceding this power of interference to the State, and then attempting to secure it from abuse by imposing qualifications of which the States themselves are to judge. One of two things is true; either the laws of the Union are beyond the discretion and beyond the control of the States; or else we have no constitution of general government, and are thrust back again to the days of the Confederation.

Let me here say, Sir, that if the gentleman's doctrine had been received and acted upon in New England, in the times of the embargo and non-intercourse, we should probably not now have been here. The government would very likely have gone to pieces, and crumbled into dust. No stronger case can ever arise than existed under those laws; no States can ever entertain a clearer conviction than the New England States then entertained; and if they had been under the influence of that heresy of opinion, as I must call it, which the honorable member espouses, this Union would, in all probability, have been scattered to the four winds. I ask the gentleman, therefore, to apply his principles to that case; I ask him to come forth and declare, whether, in his opinion, the New England States would have been justified in interfering to break up the embargo system under the conscientious opinions which they held upon it? Had they a right to annul that law? Does he admit or deny? If what is thought palpably unconstitutional in South Carolina justifies that State in arresting the progress of the law, tell me whether that which was thought palpably unconstitutional also in Massachusetts would have justified her in doing the same thing. Sir, I deny the whole doctrine. It has not a foot of ground in the Constitution to stand on. No public man of reputation ever advanced it in Massachusetts in the warmest times, or could maintain himself upon it there at any time.

I wish now, Sir, to make a remark upon the Virginia resolutions of 1798. I cannot undertake to say how these resolutions were understood by those who passed them. Their language is not a little indefinite. In the case of the exercise by Congress of a dangerous power not granted to them, the resolutions assert the right, on the part of the State, to interfere and arrest the progress of the evil. This is susceptible of more than one interpretation. It may mean no more than that the States may interfere by complaint and remonstrance, or by proposing to the people an alteration of the Federal Constitution. This would all be quite unobjectionable. Or it may be that no more is meant than to assert the general right of revolution, as against all governments, in cases of intolerable oppression. This no one doubts, and this, in my opinion, is all that he who framed the resolutions could have meant by it; for I shall not readily believe that he was ever of opinion that a State, under the Constitution and in conformity with it, could, upon the ground of her own opinion of its unconstitutionality, however clear and palpable she might think the case, annul a law of Congress, so far as it should operate on herself by her own legislative power.

I must now beg to ask, Sir, Whence is this supposed right of the States derived? Where do they find the power to interfere with the laws of the Union? Sir, the opinion which the honorable gentleman maintains is a notion founded in a total misapprehension, in my judgment, of the origin of this government, and of the foundation on which it stands. I hold it to be a popular government, erected by the people; those who administer it, responsible to the people; and itself capable of being amended and modified, just as the people may choose it should be. It is as popular, just as truly emanating from the people, as the State governments. It is created for one purpose; the State governments for another. It has its own powers; they have theirs. There is no more authority with them to arrest the operation of a law of Congress, than with Congress to arrest the operation of their laws. We are here to administer a Constitution emanating immediately from the people, and trusted by them to our administration. It is not the creature of the State governments. It is of no moment to the argument, that certain acts of the State legislatures are necessary to fill our seats in this body. That is not one of their original State powers, a part of the sovereignty of the State. It is a duty which the people, by the Constitution itself, have imposed on the State legislatures; and which they might have left to be performed elsewhere, if they had seen fit. So they have left the choice of President with electors; but all this does not affect the proposition that this whole government, President, Senate, and House of Representatives, is a popular government. It leaves it still all its popular character. The governor of a State (in some of the States) is chosen, not directly by the people, but by those who are chosen by the people, for the purpose of performing, among other duties, that of electing a governor. Is the government of the State, on that account, not a popular government? This government, Sir, is the independent offspring of the popular will. It is not the creature of State legislatures; nay, more, if the whole truth must be told, the people brought it into existence, established it, and have hitherto supported it, for the very purpose, amongst others, of imposing certain salutary restraints on State sovereignties. The States cannot now make war; they cannot contract alliances; they cannot make, each for itself, separate regulations of commerce; they cannot lay imposts; they cannot coin money. If this Constitution, Sir, be the creature of State legislatures, it must be admitted that it has obtained a strange control over the volitions of its creators.

The people, then, Sir, erected this government. They gave it a Constitution, and in that Constitution they have enumerated the powers which they bestow on it. They have made it a limited government. They have defined its authority. They have restrained it to the exercise of such powers as are granted; and all others, they declare, are reserved to the States or the people. But, Sir, they have not stopped here. If they had, they would have accomplished but half their work. No definition can be so clear, as to avoid possibility of doubt; no limitation so precise as to exclude all uncertainty. Who, then, shall construe this grant of the people? Who shall interpret their will, where it may be supposed they have left it doubtful? With whom do they repose this ultimate right of deciding on the powers of the government? Sir, they have settled all this in the fullest manner. They have left it with the government itself, in its appropriate branches. Sir, the very chief end, the main design, for which the whole Constitution was framed and adopted, was to establish a government that should not be obliged to act through State agency, or depend on State opinion and State discretion. The people had had quite enough of that kind of government under the Confederation. Under that system, the legal action, the application of law to individuals, belonged exclusively to the States. Congress could only recommend; their acts were not of binding force, till the States had adopted and sanctioned them. Are we in that condition still? Are we yet at the mercy of State discretion and State construction? Sir, if we are, then vain will be our attempt to maintain the Constitution under which we sit.

But, Sir, the people have wisely provided, in the Constitution itself, a proper, suitable mode and tribunal for settling questions of constitutional law. There are in the Constitution grants of powers to Congress, and restrictions on these powers. There are, also, prohibitions on the States. Some authority must, therefore, necessarily exist, having the ultimate jurisdiction to fix and ascertain the interpretation of these grants, restrictions, and prohibitions. The Constitution has itself pointed out, ordained, and established that authority. How has it accomplished this great and essential end? By declaring, Sir, that "the Constitution, and the laws of the United States made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land, any thing in the constitution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding."

This, Sir, was the first great step. By this the supremacy of the Constitution and laws of the United States is declared. The people so will it. No State law is to be valid which comes in conflict with the Constitution, or any law of the United States passed in pursuance of it. But who shall decide this question of interference? To whom lies the last appeal? This, Sir, the Constitution itself decides also, by declaring, "that the judicial power shall extend to all cases arising under the Constitution and laws of the United States." These two provisions cover the whole ground. They are, in truth, the keystone of the arch! With these it is a government; without them it is a confederation. In pursuance of these clear and express provisions, Congress established, at its very first session, in the judicial act, a mode for carrying them into full effect, and for bringing all questions of constitutional power to the final decision of the Supreme Court. It then, Sir, became a government. It then had the means of self-protection; and but for this, it would, in all probability, have been now among things which are past. Having constituted the government, and declared its powers, the people have further said, that, since somebody must decide on the extent of these powers, the government shall itself decide; subject, always, like other popular governments, to its responsibility to the people. And now, Sir, I repeat, how is it that a State legislature acquires any power to interfere? Who, or what, gives them the right to say to the people, "We, who are your agents and servants for one purpose, will undertake to decide, that your other agents and servants, appointed by you for another purpose, have transcended the authority you gave them!" The reply would be, I think, not impertinent, "Who made you a judge over another's servants? To their own masters they stand or fall."

Sir, I deny this power of State legislatures altogether. It cannot stand the test of examination. Gentlemen may say, that, in an extreme case, a State government might protect the people from intolerable oppression. Sir, in such a case, the people might protect themselves, without the aid of the State governments. Such a case warrants revolution. It must make, when it comes, a law for itself. A nullifying act of a State legislature cannot alter the case, nor make resistance any more lawful. In maintaining these sentiments, Sir, I am but asserting the rights of the people. I state what they have declared, and insist on their right to declare it. They have chosen to repose this power in the general government, and I think it my duty to support it, like other constitutional powers.

For myself, Sir, I do not admit the competency of South Carolina, or any other State, to prescribe my constitutional duty; or to settle, between me and the people, the validity of laws of Congress for which I have voted. I decline her umpirage. I have not sworn to support the Constitution according to her construction of its clauses. I have not stipulated, by my oath of office or otherwise, to come under any responsibility, except to the people, and those whom they have appointed to pass upon the question, whether laws, supported by my votes, conform to the Constitution of the country. And, Sir, if we look to the general nature of the case, could any thing have been more preposterous, than to make a government for the whole Union, and yet leave its powers subject, not to one interpretation, but to thirteen or twenty-four interpretations? Instead of one tribunal, established by all, responsible to all, with power to decide for all, shall constitutional questions be left to four-and-twenty popular bodies, each at liberty to decide for itself, and none bound to respect the decisions of others,--and each at liberty, too, to give a new construction on every new election of its own members? Would any thing, with such a principle in it, or rather with such a destitution of all principle, be fit to be called a government? No, Sir. It should not be denominated a Constitution. It should be called, rather, a collection of topics for everlasting controversy; heads of debate for a disputatious people. It would not be a government. It would not be adequate to any practical good, or fit for any country to live under.

To avoid all possibility of being misunderstood, allow me to repeat again, in the fullest manner, that I claim no powers for the government by forced or unfair construction. I admit that it is a government of strictly limited powers; of enumerated, specified, and particularized powers; and that whatsoever is not granted, is withheld. But notwithstanding all this, and however the grant of powers may be expressed, its limit and extent may yet, in some cases, admit of doubt; and the general government would be good for nothing, it would be incapable of long existing, if some mode had not been provided in which those doubts, as they should arise, might be peaceably, but authoritatively, solved.

And now, Mr. President, let me run the honorable gentleman's doctrine a little into its practical application. Let us look at his probable modus operandi. If a thing can be done, an ingenious man can tell how it is to be done, and I wish to be informed how this State interference is to be put in practice, without violence, bloodshed, and rebellion. We will take the existing case of the tariff law. South Carolina is said to have made up her opinion upon it. If we do not repeal it, (as we probably shall not,) she will then apply to the case the remedy of her doctrine. She will, we must suppose, pass a law of her legislature, declaring the several acts of Congress usually called the tariff laws null and void, so far as they respect South Carolina, or the citizens thereof. So far, all is a paper transaction, and easy enough. But the collector at Charleston is collecting the duties imposed by these tariff laws. He, therefore, must be stopped. The collector will seize the goods if the tariff duties are not paid. The State authorities will undertake their rescue, the marshal, with his posse, will come to the collector's aid, and here the contest begins. The militia of the State will be called out to sustain the nullifying act. They will march, Sir, under a very gallant leader; for I believe the honorable member himself commands the militia of that part of the State. He will raise the NULLIFYING ACT on his standard, and spread it out as his banner! It will have a preamble, setting forth that the tariff laws are palpable, deliberate, and dangerous violations of the Constitution! He will proceed, with this banner flying, to the custom-house in Charleston,

"All the while Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds."

Arrived at the custom-house, he will tell the collector that he must collect no more duties under any of the tariff laws. This he will be somewhat puzzled to say, by the way, with a grave countenance, considering what hand South Carolina herself had in that of 1816. But, Sir, the collector would not, probably, desist, at his bidding. He would show him the law of Congress, the treasury instruction, and his own oath of office. He would say, he should perform his duty, come what come might.

Here would ensue a pause; for they say that a certain stillness precedes the tempest. The trumpeter would hold his breath awhile, and before all this military array should fall on the custom-house, collector, clerks, and all, it is very probable some of those composing it would request of their gallant commander-in-chief to be informed a little upon the point of law; for they have, doubtless, a just respect for his opinions as a lawyer, as well as for his bravery as a soldier. They know he has read Blackstone and the Constitution, as well as Turenne and Vauban. They would ask him, therefore, something concerning their rights in this matter. They would inquire, whether it was not somewhat dangerous to resist a law of the United States. What would be the nature of their offence, they would wish to learn, if they, by military force and array, resisted the execution in Carolina of a law of the United States, and it should turn out, after all, that the law was constitutional? He would answer, of course, Treason. No lawyer could give any other answer. John Fries, he would tell them, had learned that, some years ago. How, then, they would ask, do you propose to defend us? We are not afraid of bullets, but treason has a way of taking people off that we do not much relish. How do you propose to defend us? "Look at my floating banner," he would reply; "see there the nullifying law!" Is it your opinion, gallant commander, they would then say, that, if we should be indicted for treason, that same floating banner of yours would make a good plea in bar? "South Carolina is a sovereign State," he would reply. That is true; but would the judge admit our plea? "These tariff laws," he would repeat, "are unconstitutional, palpably, deliberately, dangerously." That may all be so; but if the tribunal should not happen to be of that opinion, shall we swing for it? We are ready to die for our country, but it is rather an awkward business, this dying without touching the ground! After all, that is a sort of hemp tax worse than any part of the tariff.

Mr. President, the honorable gentleman would be in a dilemma, like that of another great general. He would have a knot before him which he could not untie. He must cut it with his sword. He must say to his followers, "Defend yourselves with your bayonets"; and this is war,--civil war.

Direct collision, therefore, between force and force, is the unavoidable result of that remedy for the revision of unconstitutional laws which the gentleman contends for. It must happen in the very first case to which it is applied. Is not this the plain result? To resist by force the execution of a law, generally, is treason. Can the courts of the United States take notice of the indulgence of a State to commit treason? The common saying, that a State cannot commit treason herself, is nothing to the purpose. Can she authorize others to do it? If John Fries had produced an act of Pennsylvania, annulling the law of Congress, would it have helped his case? Talk about it as we will, these doctrines go the length of revolution. They are incompatible with any peaceable administration of the government. They lead directly to disunion and civil commotion; and therefore it is, that at their commencement, when they are first found to be maintained by respectable men, and in a tangible form, I enter my public protest against them all.

The honorable gentleman argues, that, if this government be the sole judge of the extent of its own powers, whether that right of judging be in Congress or the Supreme Court, it equally subverts State sovereignty. This the gentleman sees, or thinks he sees, although he cannot perceive how the right of judging, in this matter, if left to the exercise of State legislatures, has any tendency to subvert the government of the Union. The gentleman's opinion may be, that the right ought not to have been lodged with the general government; he may like better such a constitution as we should have under the right of State interference; but I ask him to meet me on the plain matter of fact. I ask him to meet me on the Constitution itself. I ask him if the power is not found there, clearly and visibly found there?

But, Sir, what is this danger, and what are the grounds of it? Let it be remembered, that the Constitution of the United States is not unalterable. It is to continue in its present form no longer than the people who established it shall choose to continue it. If they shall become convinced that they have made an injudicious or inexpedient partition and distribution of power between the State governments and the general government, they can alter that distribution at will.

If any thing be found in the national Constitution, either by original provision or subsequent interpretation, which ought not to be in it, the people know how to get rid of it. If any construction, unacceptable to them, be established, so as to become practically a part of the Constitution, they will amend it, at their own sovereign pleasure. But while the people choose to maintain it as it is, while they are satisfied with it, and refuse to change it, who has given, or who can give, to the State legislatures a right to alter it, either by interference, construction, or otherwise? Gentlemen do not seem to recollect that the people have any power to do any thing for themselves. They imagine there is no safety for them, any longer than they are under the close guardianship of the State legislatures. Sir, the people have not trusted their safety, in regard to the general Constitution, to these hands. They have required other security, and taken other bonds. They have chosen to trust themselves, first, to the plain words of the instrument, and to such construction as the government themselves, in doubtful cases, should put on their own powers, under their oaths of office, and subject to their responsibility to them; just as the people of a State trust their own State governments with a similar power. Secondly, they have reposed their trust in the efficacy of frequent elections, and in their own power to remove their own servants and agents whenever they see cause. Thirdly, they have reposed trust in the judicial power, which, in order that it might be trustworthy, they have made as respectable, as disinterested, and as independent as was practicable. Fourthly, they have seen fit to rely, in case of necessity, or high expediency, on their known and admitted power to alter or amend the Constitution, peaceably and quietly, whenever experience shall point out defects or imperfections. And, finally, the people of the United States have at no time, in no way, directly or indirectly, authorized any State legislature to construe or interpret their high instrument of government; much less, to interfere, by their own power, to arrest its course and operation.

If, Sir, the people in these respects had done otherwise than they have done, their Constitution could neither have been preserved, nor would it have been worth preserving. And if its plain provisions shall now be disregarded, and these new doctrines interpolated in it, it will become as feeble and helpless a being as its enemies, whether early or more recent, could possibly desire. It will exist in every State but as a poor dependent on State permission. It must borrow leave to be; and will be, no longer than State pleasure, or State discretion, sees fit to grant the indulgence, and to prolong its poor existence.

But, Sir, although there are fears, there are hopes also. The people have preserved this, their own chosen Constitution, for forty years, and have seen their happiness, prosperity, and renown grow with its growth, and strengthen with its strength. They are now, generally, strongly attached to it. Overthrown by direct assault, it cannot be; evaded, undermined, NULLIFIED, it will not be, if we and those who shall succeed us here, as agents and representatives of the people, shall conscientiously and vigilantly discharge the two great branches of our public trust, faithfully to preserve, and wisely to administer it.

Mr. President, I have thus stated the reasons of my dissent to the doctrines which have been advanced and maintained. I am conscious of having detained you and the Senate much too long. I was drawn into the debate with no previous deliberation, such as is suited to the discussion of so grave and important a subject. But it is a subject of which my heart is full, and I have not been willing to suppress the utterance of its spontaneous sentiments. I cannot, even now, persuade myself to relinquish it, without expressing once more my deep conviction, that, since it respects nothing less than the Union of the States, it is of most vital and essential importance to the public happiness. I profess, Sir, in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily in view the prosperity and honor of the whole country, and the preservation of our Federal Union. It is to that Union we owe our safety at home, and our consideration and dignity abroad. It is to that Union that we are chiefly indebted for whatever makes us most proud of our country. That Union we reached only by the discipline of our virtues in the severe school of adversity. It had its origin in the necessities of disordered finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its benign influences, these great interests immediately awoke, as from the dead, and sprang forth with newness of life. Every year of its duration has teemed with fresh proofs of its utility and its blessings; and although our territory has stretched out wider and wider, and our population spread farther and farther, they have not outrun its protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a copious fountain of national, social, and personal happiness.

I have not allowed myself, Sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of disunion, to see whether, with my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the abyss below; nor could I regard him as a safe counsellor in the affairs of this government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how the Union may be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition of the people when it should be broken up and destroyed. While the Union lasts, we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant that, in my day, at least, that curtain may not rise! God grant that on my vision never may be opened what lies behind! When my eyes shall be turned to behold for the last time the sun in heaven, may I not see him shining on the broken and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, discordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the gorgeous ensign of the republic, now known and honored throughout the earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted, nor a single star obscured, bearing for its motto, no such miserable interrogatory as "What is all this worth?" nor those other words of delusion and folly, "Liberty first and Union afterwards"; but everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in every wind under the whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart,--Liberty and Union, now and for ever, one and inseparable!

Mr. Hayne having rejoined to Mr. Webster, especially on the constitutional question, Mr. Webster rose, and, in conclusion, said:--#/

A few words, Mr. President, on this constitutional argument, which the honorable gentleman has labored to reconstruct.

His argument consists of two propositions and an inference. His propositions are,--

1. That the Constitution is a compact between the States.

2. That a compact between two, with authority reserved to one to interpret its terms, would be a surrender to that one of all power whatever.

3. Therefore, (such is his inference,) the general government does not possess the authority to construe its own powers.

Now, Sir, who does not see, without the aid of exposition or detection, the utter confusion of ideas involved in this so elaborate and systematic argument.

The Constitution, it is said, is a compact between States; the States, then, and the States only, are parties to the compact. How comes the general government itself a party? Upon the honorable gentleman's hypothesis, the general government is the result of the compact, the creature of the compact, not one of the parties to it. Yet the argument, as the gentleman has now stated it, makes the government itself one of its own creators. It makes it a party to that compact to which it owes its own existence.

For the purpose of erecting the Constitution on the basis of a compact, the gentleman considers the States as parties to that compact; but as soon as his compact is made, then he chooses to consider the general government, which is the offspring of that compact, not its offspring, but one of its parties; and so, being a party, without the power of judging on the terms of compact. Pray, Sir, in what school is such reasoning as this taught?

If the whole of the gentleman's main proposition were conceded to him,--that is to say, if I admit, for the sake of the argument, that the Constitution is a compact between States,--the inferences which he draws from that proposition are warranted by no just reasoning. If the Constitution be a compact between States, still that Constitution, or that compact, has established a government, with certain powers; and whether it be one of those powers, that it shall construe and interpret for itself the terms of the compact, in doubtful cases, is a question which can only be decided by looking to the compact, and inquiring what provisions it contains on this point. Without any inconsistency with natural reason, the government even thus created might be trusted with this power of construction. The extent of its powers, therefore, must still be sought for in the instrument itself.

If the old Confederation had contained a clause, declaring that resolutions of the Congress should be the supreme law of the land, any State law or constitution to the contrary notwithstanding, and that a committee of Congress, or any other body created by it, should possess judicial powers, extending to all cases arising under resolutions of Congress, then the power of ultimate decision would have been vested in Congress under the Confederation, although that Confederation was a compact between States; and for this plain reason,--that it would have been competent to the States, who alone were parties to the compact, to agree who should decide in cases of dispute arising on the construction of the compact.

For the same reason, Sir, if I were now to concede to the gentleman his principal proposition, namely, that the Constitution is a compact between States, the question would still be, What provision is made, in this compact, to settle points of disputed construction, or contested power, that shall come into controversy? And this question would still be answered, and conclusively answered, by the Constitution itself.

While the gentleman is contending against construction, he himself is setting up the most loose and dangerous construction. The Constitution declares, that the laws of Congress passed in pursuance of the Constitution shall be the supreme law of the land. No construction is necessary here. It declares, also, with equal plainness and precision, that the judicial power of the United States shall extend to every case arising under the laws of Congress. This needs no construction. Here is a law, then, which is declared to be supreme; and here is a power established, which is to interpret that law. Now, Sir, how has the gentleman met this? Suppose the Constitution to be a compact, yet here are its terms; and how does the gentleman get rid of them? He cannot argue the seal off the bond, nor the words out of the instrument. Here they are; what answer does he give to them? None in the world, Sir, except, that the effect of this would be to place the States in a condition of inferiority; and that it results from the very nature of things, there being no superior, that the parties must be their own judges! Thus closely and cogently does the honorable gentleman reason on the words of the Constitution. The gentleman says, if there be such a power of final decision in the general government, he asks for the grant of that power. Well, Sir, I show him the grant. I turn him to the very words. I show him that the laws of Congress are made supreme; and that the judicial power extends, by express words, to the interpretation of these laws. Instead of answering this, he retreats into the general reflection, that it must result from the nature of things, that the States, being parties, must judge for themselves.

I have admitted, that, if the Constitution were to be considered as the creature of the State governments, it might be modified, interpreted, or construed according to their pleasure. But, even in that case, it would be necessary that they should agree. One alone could not interpret it conclusively; one alone could not construe it; one alone could not modify it. Yet the gentleman's doctrine is, that Carolina alone may construe and interpret that compact which equally binds all, and gives equal rights to all.

So, then, Sir, even supposing the Constitution to be a compact between the States, the gentleman's doctrine, nevertheless, is not maintainable; because, first, the general government is not a party to that compact, but a government established by it, and vested by it with the powers of trying and deciding doubtful questions; and secondly, because, if the Constitution be regarded as a compact, not one State only, but all the States, are parties to that compact, and one can have no right to fix upon it her own peculiar construction.

So much, Sir, for the argument, even if the premises of the gentleman were granted, or could be proved. But, Sir, the gentleman has failed to maintain his leading proposition. He has not shown, it cannot be shown, that the Constitution is a compact between State governments. The Constitution itself, in its very front, refutes that idea; it declares that it is ordained and established by the people of the United States. So far from saying that it is established by the governments of the several States, it does not even say that it is established by the people of the several States; but it pronounces that it is established by the people of the United States, in the aggregate. The gentleman says, it must mean no more than the people of the several States. Doubtless, the people of the several States, taken collectively, constitute the people of the United States; but it is in this, their collective capacity, it is as all the people of the United States, that they establish the Constitution. So they declare; and words cannot be plainer than the words used.

When the gentleman says the Constitution is a compact between the States, he uses language exactly applicable to the old Confederation. He speaks as if he were in Congress before 1789. He describes fully that old state of things then existing. The Confederation was, in strictness, a compact; the States, as States, were parties to it. We had no other general government. But that was found insufficient, and inadequate to the public exigencies. The people were not satisfied with it, and undertook to establish a better. They undertook to form a general government, which should stand on a new basis; not a confederacy, not a league, not a compact between States, but a Constitution; a popular government, founded in popular election, directly responsible to the people themselves, and divided into branches with prescribed limits of power, and prescribed duties. They ordained such a government, they gave it the name of a Constitution, and therein they established a distribution of powers between this, their general government, and their several State governments. When they shall become dissatisfied with this distribution, they can alter it. Their own power over their own instrument remains. But until they shall alter it, it must stand as their will, and is equally binding on the general government and on the States.

The gentleman, Sir, finds analogy where I see none. He likens it to the case of a treaty, in which, there being no common superior, each party must interpret for itself, under its own obligation of good faith. But this is not a treaty, but a constitution of government, with powers to execute itself, and fulfil its duties.

I admit, Sir, that this government is a government of checks and balances; that is, the House of Representatives is a check on the Senate, and the Senate is a check on the House, and the President a check on both. But I cannot comprehend him, or, if I do, I totally differ from him, when he applies the notion of checks and balances to the interference of different governments. He argues, that, if we transgress our constitutional limits, each State, as a State, has a right to check us. Does he admit the converse of the proposition, that we have a right to check the States? The gentleman's doctrines would give us a strange jumble of authorities and powers, instead of governments of separate and defined powers. It is the part of wisdom, I think, to avoid this; and to keep the general government and the State government each in its proper sphere, avoiding as carefully as possible every kind of interference.

Finally, Sir, the honorable gentleman says, that the States will only interfere, by their power, to preserve the Constitution. They will not destroy it, they will not impair it; they will only save, they will only preserve, they will only strengthen it! Ah! Sir, this is but the old story. All regulated governments, all free governments, have been broken by similar disinterested and well-disposed interference. It is the common pretence. But I take leave of the subject.

[Footnote 1: Mr. Sprague.]

[Footnote 2: Mr. Calhoun, when this speech was made, was President of the Senate, and Vice-President of the United States.]

[Footnote 3: Mr. Forsyth.]

[Footnote 4: Mr. McDuffie.]

[Footnote 5: The letter of the Federal Convention to the Congress of the Confederation transmitting the plan of the Constitution.]

[Footnote 6: Mr. Hillhouse, of Connecticut.]

THE CONSTITUTION NOT A COMPACT BETWEEN SOVEREIGN STATES.

A SPEECH DELIVERED IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES, ON THE 16TH OF FEBRUARY, 1833, IN REPLY TO MR. CALHOUN'S SPEECH ON THE BILL "FURTHER TO PROVIDE FOR THE COLLECTION OF DUTIES ON IMPORTS."

[On the 21st of January, 1833, Mr. Wilkins, chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the Senate, introduced the bill further to provide for the collection of duties. On the 22d day of the same month, Mr. Calhoun submitted the following resolutions:--

"Resolved, That the people of the several States composing these United States are united as parties to a constitutional compact, to which the people of each State acceded as a separate govereign community, each binding itself by its own particular ratification; and that the union, of which the said compact is the bond, is a union between the States ratifying the same.

"Resolved, That the people of the several States thus united by the constitutional compact, in forming that instrument, and in creating a general government to carry into effect the objects for which they were formed, delegated to that government, for that purpose, certain definite powers, to be exercised jointly, reserving, at the same time, each State to itself, the residuary mass of powers, to be exercised by its own separate government; and that whenever the general government assumes the exercise of powers not delegated by the compact, its acts are unauthorized, and are of no effect; and that the same government is not made the final judge of the powers delegated to it, since that would make its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its powers; but that, as in all other cases of compact among sovereign parties, without any common judge, each has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of the infraction as of the mode and measure of redress.

"Resolved, That the assertions, that the people of these United States, taken collectively as individuals, are now, or ever have been, united on the principle of the social compact, and, as such, are now formed into one nation or people, or that they have ever been so united in any one stage of their political existence; that the people of the several States composing the Union have not, as members thereof, retained their sovereignty; that the allegiance of their citizens has been transferred to the general government; that they have parted with the right of punishing treason through their respective State governments; and that they have not the right of judging in the last resort as to the extent of the powers reserved, and of consequence of those delegated,--are not only without foundation in truth, but are contrary to the most certain and plain historical facts, and the clearest deductions of reason; and that all exercise of power on the part of the general government, or any of its departments, claiming authority from such erroneous assumptions, must of necessity be unconstitutional,--must tend, directly and inevitably, to subvert the sovereignty of the States, to destroy the federal character of the Union, and to rear on its ruins a consolidated government, without constitutional check or limitation, and which must necessarily terminate in the loss of liberty itself."

On Saturday, the 16th of February, Mr. Calhoun spoke in opposition to the bill, and in support of these resolutions. He was followed by Mr. Webster in this speech.]

Mr. President,--The gentleman from South Carolina has admonished us to be mindful of the opinions of those who shall come after us. We must take our chance, Sir, as to the light in which posterity will regard us. I do not decline its judgment, nor withhold myself from its scrutiny. Feeling that I am performing my public duty with singleness of heart and to the best of my ability, I fearlessly trust myself to the country, now and hereafter, and leave both my motives and my character to its decision.

The gentleman has terminated his speech in a tone of threat and defiance towards this bill, even should it become a law of the land, altogether unusual in the halls of Congress. But I shall not suffer myself to be excited into warmth by his denunciation of the measure which I support. Among the feelings which at this moment fill my breast, not the least is that of regret at the position in which the gentleman has placed himself. Sir, he does himself no justice. The cause which he has espoused finds no basis in the Constitution, no succor from public sympathy, no cheering from a patriotic community. He has no foothold on which to stand while he might display the powers of his acknowledged talents. Every thing beneath his feet is hollow and treacherous. He is like a strong man struggling in a morass: every effort to extricate himself only sinks him deeper and deeper. And I fear the resemblance may be carried still farther; I fear that no friend can safely come to his relief, that no one can approach near enough to hold out a helping hand, without danger of going down himself, also, into the bottomless depths of this Serbonian bog.

The honorable gentleman has declared, that on the decision of the question now in debate may depend the cause of liberty itself. I am of the same opinion; but then, Sir, the liberty which I think is staked on the contest is not political liberty, in any general and undefined character, but our own well-understood and long-enjoyed American liberty.

Sir, I love Liberty no less ardently than the gentleman himself, in whatever form she may have appeared in the progress of human history. As exhibited in the master states of antiquity, as breaking out again from amidst the darkness of the Middle Ages, and beaming on the formation of new communities in modern Europe, she has, always and everywhere, charms for me. Yet, Sir, it is our own liberty, guarded by constitutions and secured by union, it is that liberty which is our paternal inheritance, it is our established, dear-bought, peculiar American liberty, to which I am chiefly devoted, and the cause of which I now mean, to the utmost of my power, to maintain and defend.

Mr. President, if I considered the constitutional question now before us as doubtful as it is important, and if I supposed that its decision, either in the Senate or by the country, was likely to be in any degree influenced by the manner in which I might now discuss it, this would be to me a moment of deep solicitude. Such a moment has once existed. There has been a time, when, rising in this place, on the same question, I felt, I must confess, that something for good or evil to the Constitution of the country might depend on an effort of mine. But circumstances are changed. Since that day, Sir, the public opinion has become awakened to this great question; it has grasped it; it has reasoned upon it, as becomes an intelligent and patriotic community, and has settled it, or now seems in the progress of settling it, by an authority which none can disobey, the authority of the people themselves.

I shall not, Mr. President, follow the gentleman, step by step, through the course of his speech. Much of what he has said he has deemed necessary to the just explanation and defence of his own political character and conduct. On this I shall offer no comment. Much, too, has consisted of philosophical remark upon the general nature of political liberty, and the history of free institutions; and upon other topics, so general in their nature as to possess, in my opinion, only a remote bearing on the immediate subject of this debate.

But the gentleman's speech made some days ago, upon introducing his resolutions, those resolutions themselves, and parts of the speech now just concluded, may, I presume, be justly regarded as containing the whole South Carolina doctrine. That doctrine it is my purpose now to examine, and to compare it with the Constitution of the United States. I shall not consent, Sir, to make any new constitution, or to establish another form of government. I will not undertake to say what a constitution for these United States ought to be. That question the people have decided for themselves; and I shall take the instrument as they have established it, and shall endeavor to maintain it, in its plain sense and meaning, against opinions and notions which, in my judgment, threaten its subversion.

The resolutions introduced by the gentleman were apparently drawn up with care, and brought forward upon deliberation. I shall not be in danger, therefore, of misunderstanding him, or those who agree with him, if I proceed at once to these resolutions, and consider them as an authentic statement of those opinions upon the great constitutional question by which the recent proceedings in South Carolina are attempted to be justified.

These resolutions are three in number.

The third seems intended to enumerate, and to deny, the several opinions expressed in the President's proclamation, respecting the nature and powers of this government. Of this third resolution, I purpose, at present, to take no particular notice.

The first two resolutions of the honorable member affirm these propositions, viz.:--

1. That the political system under which we live, and under which Congress is now assembled, is a compact, to which the people of the several States, as separate and sovereign communities, are the parties.

2. That these sovereign parties have a right to judge, each for itself, of any alleged violation of the Constitution by Congress; and, in case of such violation, to choose, each for itself, its own mode and measure of redress.

It is true, Sir, that the honorable member calls this a "constitutional" compact; but still he affirms it to be a compact between sovereign States. What precise meaning, then, does he attach to the term constitutional? When applied to compacts between sovereign States, the term constitutional affixes to the word compact no definite idea. Were we to hear of a constitutional league or treaty between England and France, or a constitutional convention between Austria and Russia, we should not understand what could be intended by such a league, such a treaty, or such a convention. In these connections, the word is void of all meaning; and yet, Sir, it is easy, quite easy, to see why the honorable gentleman has used it in these resolutions. He cannot open the book, and look upon our written frame of government, without seeing that it is called a constitution. This may well be appalling to him. It threatens his whole doctrine of compact, and its darling derivatives, nullification and secession, with instant confutation. Because, if he admits our instrument of government to be a constitution, then, for that very reason, it is not a compact between sovereigns; a constitution of government and a compact between sovereign powers being things essentially unlike in their very natures, and incapable of ever being the same. Yet the word constitution is on the very front of the instrument. He cannot overlook it. He seeks, therefore, to compromise the matter, and to sink all the substantial sense of the word, while he retains a resemblance of its sound. He introduces a new word of his own, viz. compact, as importing the principal idea, and designed to play the principal part, and degrades constitution into an insignificant, idle epithet, attached to compact. The whole then stands as a "constitutional compact"! And in this way he hopes to pass off a plausible gloss, as satisfying the words of the instrument. But he will find himself disappointed. Sir, I must say to the honorable gentleman, that, in our American political grammar, CONSTITUTION is a noun substantive; it imports a distinct and clear idea of itself; and it is not to lose its importance and dignity, it is not to be turned into a poor, ambiguous, senseless, unmeaning adjective, for the purpose of accommodating any new set of political notions. Sir, we reject his new rules of syntax altogether. We will not give up our forms of political speech to the grammarians of the school of nullification. By the Constitution, we mean, not a "constitutional compact," but, simply and directly, the Constitution, the fundamental law; and if there be one word in the language which the people of the United States understand, this is that word. We know no more of a constitutional compact between sovereign powers, than we know of a constitutional indenture of copartnership, a constitutional deed of conveyance, or a constitutional bill of exchange. But we know what the Constitution is; we know what the plainly written fundamental law is; we know what the bond of our Union and the security of our liberties is; and we mean to maintain and to defend it, in its plain sense and unsophisticated meaning.

The sense of the gentleman's proposition, therefore, is not at all affected, one way or the other, by the use of this word. That proposition still is, that our system of government is but a compact between the people of separate and sovereign States.

Was it Mirabeau, Mr. President, or some other master of the human passions, who has told us that words are things? They are indeed things, and things of mighty influence, not only in addresses to the passions and high-wrought feelings of mankind, but in the discussion of legal and political questions also; because a just conclusion is often avoided, or a false one reached, by the adroit substitution of one phrase, or one word, for another. Of this we have, I think, another example in the resolutions before us.

The first resolution declares that the people of the several States "acceded" to the Constitution, or to the constitutional compact, as it is called. This word "accede," not found either in the Constitution itself, or in the ratification of it by any one of the States, has been chosen for use here, doubtless, not without a well-considered purpose.

The natural converse of accession is secession; and, therefore, when it is stated that the people of the States acceded to the Union, it may be more plausibly argued that they may secede from it. If, in adopting the Constitution, 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. But the term is wholly out of place. Accession, as a word applied to political associations, implies coming into a league, treaty, or confederacy, by one hitherto a stranger to it; and secession implies departing from such league or confederacy. The people of the United States have used no such form of expression in establishing the present government. They do not say that they accede to a league, but they declare that they ordain and establish a Constitution, Such are the very words of the instrument itself; and in all the States, without an exception, the language used by their conventions was, that they "ratified the Constitution"; some of them employing the additional words "assented to" and "adopted," but all of them "ratifying."

There is more importance than may, at first sight, appear, in the introduction of this new word, by the honorable mover of these resolutions. Its adoption and use are indispensable to maintain those premises from which his main conclusion is to be afterwards drawn. But before showing that, allow me to remark, that this phraseology tends to keep out of sight the just view of a previous political history, as well as to suggest wrong ideas as to what was actually done when the present Constitution was agreed to. In 1789, and before this Constitution was adopted, the United States had already been in a union, more or less close, for fifteen years. At least as far back as the meeting of the first Congress, in 1774, they had been in some measure, and for some national purposes, united together. Before the Confederation of 1781, they had declared independence jointly, and had carried on the war jointly, both by sea and land; and this not as separate States, but as one people. When, therefore, they formed that Confederation, and adopted its articles as articles of perpetual union, they did not come together for the first time; and therefore they did not speak of the States as acceding to the Confederation, although it was a league, and nothing but a league, and rested on nothing but plighted faith for its performance. Yet, even then, the States were not strangers to each other; there was a bond of union already subsisting between them; they were associated, united States; and the object of the Confederation was to make a stronger and better bond of union. Their representatives deliberated together on these proposed Articles of Confederation, and, being authorized by their respective States, finally "ratified and confirmed" them. Inasmuch as they were already in union, they did not speak of acceding to the new Articles of Confederation, but of ratifying and confirming them; and this language was not used inadvertently, because, in the same instrument, accession is used in its proper sense, when applied to Canada, which was altogether a stranger to the existing union. "Canada," says the eleventh article, "acceding to this Confederation, and joining in the measures of the United States, shall be admitted into the Union."

Having thus used the terms ratify and confirm, even in regard to the old Confederation, it would have been strange indeed, if the people of the United States, after its formation, and when they came to establish the present Constitution, had spoken of the States, or the people of the States, as acceding to this Constitution. Such language would have been ill-suited to the occasion. It would have implied an existing separation or disunion among the States, such as never has existed since 1774. No such language, therefore, was used. The language actually employed is, adopt, ratify, ordain, establish.

Therefore, Sir, since any State, before she can prove her right to dissolve the Union, must show her authority to undo what has been done, no State is at liberty to secede, on the ground that she and other States have done nothing but accede. She must show that she has a right to reverse what has been ordained, to unsettle and overthrow what has been established, to reject what the people have adopted, and to break up what they have ratified; because these are the terms which express the transactions which have actually taken place. In other words, she must show her right to make a revolution.

If, Mr. President, in drawing these resolutions, the honorable member had confined himself to the use of constitutional language, there would have been a wide and awful hiatus between his premises and his conclusion. Leaving out the two words compact and accession, which are not constitutional modes of expression, and stating the matter precisely as the truth is, his first resolution would have affirmed that the people of the several States ratified this Constitution, or form of government. These are the very words of South Carolina herself, in her act of ratification. Let, then, his first resolution tell the exact truth; let it state the fact precisely as it exists; let it say that the people of the several States ratified a constitution, or form of government, and then, Sir, what will become of his inference in his second resolution, which is in these words, viz. "that, as in all other cases of compact among sovereign parties, each has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of the infraction as of the mode and measure of redress"? It is obvious, is it not, Sir? that this conclusion requires for its support quite other premises; it requires premises which speak of accession and of compact between sovereign powers; and, without such premises, it is altogether unmeaning.

Mr. President, if the honorable member will truly state what the people did in forming this Constitution, and then state what they must do if they would now undo what they then did, he will unavoidably state a case of revolution. Let us see if it be not so. He must state, in the first place, that the people of the several States adopted and ratified this Constitution, or form of government; and, in the next place, he must state that they have a right to undo this; that is to say, that they have a right to discard the form of government which they have adopted, and to break up the Constitution which they have ratified. Now, Sir, this is neither more nor less than saying that they have a right to make a revolution. To reject an established government, to break up a political constitution, is revolution.

I deny that any man can state accurately what was done by the people, in establishing the present Constitution, and then state accurately what the people, or any part of them, must now do to get rid of its obligations, without stating an undeniable case of the overthrow of government. I admit, of course, that the people may, if they choose, overthrow the government. But, then, that is revolution. The doctrine now contended for is, that, by nullification, or secession, the obligations and authority of the government may be set aside or rejected, without revolution. But that is what I deny; and what I say is, that no man can state the case with historical accuracy, and in constitutional language, without showing that the honorable gentleman's right, as asserted in his conclusion, is a revolutionary right merely; that it does not and cannot exist under the Constitution, or agreeably to the Constitution, but can come into existence only when the Constitution is overthrown. This is the reason, Sir, which makes it necessary to abandon the use of constitutional language for a new vocabulary, and to substitute, in the place of plain historical facts, a series of assumptions. 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.

Sir, I intend to hold the gentleman to the written record. In the discussion of a constitutional question, I intend to impose upon him the restraints of constitutional language. The people have ordained a Constitution; can they reject it without revolution? They have established a form of government; can they overthrow it without revolution? These are the true questions.

Allow me now, Mr. President, to inquire further into the extent of the propositions contained in the resolutions, and their necessary consequences.

Where sovereign communities are parties, there is no essential difference between a compact, a confederation, and a league. They all equally rest on the plighted faith of the sovereign party. A league, or confederacy, is but a subsisting or continuing treaty.

The gentleman's resolutions, then, affirm, in effect, that these twenty-four United States are held together only by a subsisting treaty, resting for its fulfilment and continuance on no inherent power of its own, but on the plighted faith of each State; or, in other words, that our Union is but a league; and, as a consequence from this proposition, they further affirm that, as sovereigns are subject to no superior power, the States must judge, each for itself, of any alleged violation of the league; and if such violation be supposed to have occurred, each may adopt any mode or measure of redress which it shall think proper.

Other consequences naturally follow, too, from the main proposition. If a league between sovereign powers have no limitation as to the time of its duration, and contain nothing making it perpetual, it subsists only during the good pleasure of the parties, although no violation be complained of. If, in the opinion of either party, it be violated, such party may say that he will no longer fulfil its obligations on his part, but will consider the whole league or compact at an end, although it might be one of its stipulations that it should be perpetual. Upon this principle, the Congress of the United States, in 1798, declared null and void the treaty of alliance between the United States and France, though it professed to be a perpetual alliance.

If the violation of the league be accompanied with serious injuries, the suffering party, being sole judge of his own mode and measure of redress, has a right to indemnify himself by reprisals on the offending members of the league; and reprisals, if the circumstances of the case require it, may be followed by direct, avowed, and public war.

The necessary import of the resolution, therefore, is, that the United States are connected only by a league; that it is in the good pleasure of every State to decide how long she will choose to remain a member of this league; that any State may determine the extent of her own obligations under it, and accept or reject what shall be decided by the whole; that she may also determine whether her rights have been violated, what is the extent of the injury done her, and what mode and measure of redress her wrongs may make it fit and expedient for her to adopt. The result of the whole is, that any State may secede at pleasure; that any State may resist a law which she herself may choose to say exceeds the power of Congress; and that, as a sovereign power, she may redress her own grievances, by her own arm, at her own discretion. She may make reprisals; she may cruise against the property of other members of the league; she may authorize captures, and make open war.

If, Sir, this be our political condition, it is time the people of the United States understood it. Let us look for a moment to the practical consequences of these opinions. One State, holding an embargo law unconstitutional, may declare her opinion, and withdraw from the Union. She secedes. Another, forming and expressing the same judgment on a law laying duties on imports, may withdraw also. She secedes. And as, in her opinion, money has been taken out of the pockets of her citizens illegally, under pretence of this law, and as she has power to redress their wrongs, she may demand satisfaction: and, if refused, she may take it with a strong hand. The gentleman has himself pronounced the collection of duties, under existing laws, to be nothing but robbery. Robbers, of course, may be rightfully dispossessed of the fruits of their flagitious crimes; and therefore, reprisals, impositions on the commerce of other States, foreign alliances against them, or open war, are all modes of redress justly open to the discretion and choice of South Carolina; for she is to judge of her own rights, and to seek satisfaction for her own wrongs, in her own way.

But, Sir, a third State is of opinion, not only that these laws of imposts are constitutional, but that it is the absolute duty of Congress to pass and to maintain such laws; and that, by omitting to pass and maintain them, its constitutional obligations would be grossly disregarded. She herself relinquished the power of protection, she might allege, and allege truly, and gave it up to Congress, on the faith that Congress would exercise it. If Congress now refuse to exercise it, Congress does, as she may insist, break the condition of the grant, and thus manifestly violate the Constitution; and for this violation of the Constitution, she may threaten to secede also. Virginia may secede, and hold the fortresses in the Chesapeake. The Western States may secede, and take to their own use the public lands. Louisiana may secede, if she choose, form a foreign alliance, and hold the mouth of the Mississippi. If one State may secede, ten may do so, twenty may do so, twenty-three may do so. Sir, as these secessions go on, one after another, what is to constitute the United States? Whose will be the army? Whose the navy? Who will pay the debts? Who fulfil the public treaties? Who perform the constitutional guaranties? Who govern this District and the Territories? Who retain the public property?

Mr. President, every man must see that these are all questions which can arise only after a revolution. They presuppose the breaking up of the government. While the Constitution lasts, they are repressed; they spring up to annoy and startle us only from its grave.

The Constitution does not provide for events which must be preceded by its own destruction. SECESSION, therefore, since it must bring these consequences with it, is REVOLUTIONARY, and NULLIFICATION is equally REVOLUTIONARY. What is revolution? Why, Sir, that is revolution which overturns, or controls, or successfully resists, the existing public authority; that which arrests the exercise of the supreme power; that which introduces a new paramount authority into the rule of the State. Now, Sir, this is the precise object of nullification. It attempts to supersede the supreme legislative authority. It arrests the arm of the executive magistrate. It interrupts the exercise of the accustomed judicial power. Under the name of an ordinance, it declares null and void, within the State, all the revenue laws of the United States. Is not this revolutionary? Sir, so soon as this ordinance shall be carried into effect, a revolution will have commenced in South Carolina. She will have thrown off the authority to which her citizens have heretofore been subject. She will have declared her own opinions and her own will to be above the laws and above the power of those who are intrusted with their administration. If she makes good these declarations, she is revolutionized. As to her, it is as distinctly a change of the supreme power as the American Revolution of 1776. That revolution did not subvert government in all its forms. It did not subvert local laws and municipal administrations. It only threw off the dominion of a power claiming to be superior, and to have a right, in many important respects, to exercise legislative authority. Thinking this authority to have been usurped or abused, the American Colonies, now the United States, bade it defiance, and freed themselves from it by means of a revolution. But that revolution left them with their own municipal laws still, and the forms of local government. If Carolina now shall effectually resist the laws of Congress; if she shall be her own judge, take her remedy into her own hands, obey the laws of the Union when she pleases and disobey them when she pleases, she will relieve herself from a paramount power as distinctly as the American Colonies did the same thing in 1776. In other words, she will achieve, as to herself, a revolution.

But, Sir, while practical nullification in South Carolina would be, as to herself, actual and distinct revolution, its necessary tendency must also be to spread revolution, and to break up the Constitution, as to all the other States. It strikes a deadly blow at the vital principle of the whole Union. To allow State resistance to the laws of Congress to be rightful and proper, to admit nullification in some States, and yet not expect to see a dismemberment of the entire government, appears to me the wildest illusion, and the most extravagant folly. The gentleman seems not conscious of the direction or the rapidity of his own course. The current of his opinions sweeps him along, he knows not whither. To begin with nullification, with the avowed intent, nevertheless, not to proceed to secession, dismemberment, and general revolution, is as if one were to take the plunge of Niagara, and cry out that he would stop half-way down. In the one case, as in the other, the rash adventurer must go to the bottom of the dark abyss below, were it not that that abyss has no discovered bottom.

Nullification, if successful, arrests the power of the law, absolves citizens from their duty, subverts the foundation both of protection and obedience, dispenses with oaths and obligations of allegiance, and elevates another authority to supreme command. Is not this revolution? And it raises to supreme command four-and-twenty distinct powers, each professing to be under a general government, and yet each setting its laws at defiance at pleasure. Is not this anarchy, as well as revolution? Sir, the Constitution of the United States was received as a whole, and for the whole country. If it cannot stand altogether, it cannot stand in parts; and if the laws cannot be executed everywhere, they cannot long be executed anywhere. The gentleman very well knows that all duties and imposts must be uniform throughout the country. He knows that we cannot have one rule or one law for South Carolina, and another for other States. He must see, therefore, and does see, and every man sees, that the only alternative is a repeal of the laws throughout the whole Union, or their execution in Carolina as well as elsewhere. And this repeal is demanded because a single State interposes her veto, and threatens resistance! The result of the gentleman's opinion, or rather the very text of his doctrine, is, that no act of Congress can bind all the States, the constitutionality of which is not admitted by all; or, in other words, that no single State is bound, against its own dissent, by a law of imposts. This is precisely the evil experienced under the old Confederation, and for remedy of which this Constitution was adopted. The leading object in establishing this government, an object forced on the country by the condition of the times and the absolute necessity of the law, was to give to Congress power to lay and collect imposts without the consent of particular States. The Revolutionary debt remained unpaid; the national treasury was bankrupt; the country was destitute of credit; Congress issued its requisitions on the States, and the States neglected them; there was no power of coercion but war, Congress could not lay imposts, or other taxes, by its own authority; the whole general government, therefore, was little more than a name. The Articles of Confederation, as to purposes of revenue and finance, were nearly a dead letter. The country sought to escape from this condition, at once feeble and disgraceful, by constituting a government which should have power, of itself, to lay duties and taxes, and to pay the public debt, and provide for the general welfare; and to lay these duties and taxes in all the States, without asking the consent of the State governments. This was the very power on which the new Constitution was to depend for all its ability to do good; and without it, it can be no government, now or at any time. Yet, Sir, it is precisely against this power, so absolutely indispensable to the very being of the government, that South Carolina directs her ordinance. She attacks the government in its authority to raise revenue, the very main-spring of the whole system; and if she succeed, every movement of that system must inevitably cease. It is of no avail that she declares that she does not resist the law as a revenue law, but as a law for protecting manufactures. It is a revenue law; it is the very law by force of which the revenue is collected; if it be arrested in any State, the revenue ceases in that State; it is, in a word, the sole reliance of the government for the means of maintaining itself and performing its duties.

Mr. President, the alleged right of a State to decide constitutional questions for herself necessarily leads to force, because other States must have the same right, and because different States will decide differently; and when these questions arise between States, if there be no superior power, they can be decided only by the law of force. On entering into the Union, the people of each State gave up a part of their own power to make laws for themselves, in consideration, that, as to common objects, they should have a part in making laws for other States. In other words, the people of all the States agreed to create a common government, to be conducted by common counsels. Pennsylvania, for example, yielded the right of laying imposts in her own ports, in consideration that the new government, in which she was to have a share, should possess the power of laying imposts on all the States. If South Carolina now refuses to submit to this power, she breaks the condition on which other States entered into the Union. She partakes of the common counsels, and therein assists to bind others, while she refuses to be bound herself. It makes no difference in the case, whether she does all this without reason or pretext, or whether she sets up as a reason, that, in her judgment, the acts complained of are unconstitutional. In the judgment of other States, they are not so. It is nothing to them that she offers some reason or some apology for her conduct, if it be one which they do not admit. It is not to be expected that any State will violate her duty without some plausible pretext. That would be too rash a defiance of the opinion of mankind. But if it be a pretext which lies in her own breast, if it be no more than an opinion which she says she has formed, how can other States be satisfied with this? How can they allow her to be judge of her own obligations? Or, if she may judge of her obligations, may they not judge of their rights also? May not the twenty-three entertain an opinion as well as the twenty-fourth? And if it be their right, in their own opinion, as expressed in the common council, to enforce the law against her, how is she to say that her right and her opinion are to be every thing, and their right and their opinion nothing?

Mr. President, if we are to receive the Constitution as the text, and then to lay down in its margin the contradictory commentaries which have been, and which maybe, made by different States, the whole page would be a polyglot indeed. It would speak with as many tongues as the builders of Babel, and in dialects as much confused, and mutually as unintelligible. The very instance now before us presents a practical illustration. The law of the last session is declared unconstitutional in South Carolina, and obedience to it is refused. In other States, it is admitted to be strictly constitutional. You walk over the limit of its authority, therefore, when you pass a State line. On one side it is law, on the other side a nullity; and yet it is passed by a common government, having the same authority in all the States.

Such, Sir, are the inevitable results of this doctrine. Beginning with the original error, that the Constitution of the United States is nothing but a compact between sovereign States; asserting, in the next step, that each State has a right to be its own sole judge of the extent of its own obligations, and consequently of the constitutionality of laws of Congress; and, in the next, that it may oppose whatever it sees fit to declare unconstitutional, and that it decides for itself on the mode and measure of redress,--the argument arrives at once at the conclusion, that what a State dissents from, it may nullify; what it opposes, it may oppose by force; what it decides for itself, it may execute by its own power; and that, in short, it is itself supreme over the legislation of Congress, and supreme over the decisions of the national judicature; supreme over the constitution of the country, supreme over the supreme law of the land. However it seeks to protect itself against these plain inferences, by saying that an unconstitutional law is no law, and that it only opposes such laws as are unconstitutional, yet this does not in the slightest degree vary the result; since it insists on deciding this question for itself; and, in opposition to reason and argument, in opposition to practice and experience, in opposition to the judgment of others, having an equal right to judge, it says, only, "Such is my opinion, and my opinion shall be my law, and I will support it by my own strong hand. I denounce the law; I declare it unconstitutional; that is enough; it shall not be executed. Men in arms are ready to resist its execution. An attempt to enforce it shall cover the land with blood. Elsewhere it may be binding; but here it is trampled underfoot."

This, Sir, is practical nullification.

And now, Sir, against all these theories and opinions, I maintain,--

1. That the Constitution of the United States is not a league, confederacy, or compact between the people of the several States in their sovereign capacities; but a government proper, founded on the adoption of the people, and creating direct relations between itself and individuals.

2. That no State authority has power to dissolve these relations; that nothing can dissolve them but revolution; and that, consequently, there can be no such thing as secession without revolution.

3. That there is a supreme law, consisting of the Constitution of the United States, and acts of Congress passed in pursuance of it, and treaties; and that, in cases not capable of assuming the character of a suit in law or equity, Congress must judge of, and finally interpret, this supreme law so often as it has occasion to pass acts of legislation; and in cases capable of assuming, and actually assuming, the character of a suit, the Supreme Court of the United States is the final interpreter.

4. That an attempt by a State to abrogate, annul, or nullify an act of Congress, or to arrest its operation within her limits, on the ground that, in her opinion, such law is unconstitutional, is a direct usurpation on the just powers of the general government, and on the equal rights of other States; a plain violation of the Constitution, and a proceeding essentially revolutionary in its character and tendency.

Whether the Constitution be a compact between States in their sovereign capacities, is a question which must be mainly argued from what is contained in the instrument itself. We all agree that it is an instrument which has been in some way clothed with power. We all admit that it speaks with authority. The first question then is, What does it say of itself? What does it purport to be? Does it style itself a league, confederacy, or compact between sovereign States? It is to be remembered, Sir, that the Constitution began to speak only after its adoption. Until it was ratified by nine States, it was but a proposal, the mere draught of an instrument. It was like a deed drawn, but not executed. The Convention had framed it; sent it to Congress, then sitting under the Confederation; Congress had transmitted it to the State legislatures; and by these last it was laid before conventions of the people in the several States. All this while it was inoperative paper. It had received no stamp of authority, no sanction; it spoke no language. But when ratified by the people in their respective conventions, then it had a voice, and spoke authentically. Every word in it had then received the sanction of the popular will, and was to be received as the expression of that will. What the Constitution says of itself, therefore, is as conclusive as what it says on any other point. Does it call itself a "compact"? Certainly not. It uses the word compact but once, and that is when it declares that the States shall enter into no compact. Does it call itself a "league," a "confederacy," a "subsisting treaty between the States"? Certainly not. There is not a particle of such language in all its pages. But it declares itself a CONSTITUTION. What is a constitution? Certainly not a league, compact, or confederacy, but a fundamental law. That fundamental regulation which determines the manner in which the public authority is to be executed, is what forms the constitution of a state. Those primary rules which concern the body itself, and the very being of the political society, the form of government, and the manner in which power is to be exercised,--all, in a word, which form together the constitution of a state,--these are the fundamental laws. This, Sir, is the language of the public writers. But do we need to be informed, in this country, what a constitution is? Is it not an idea perfectly familiar, definite, and well settled? We are at no loss to understand what is meant by the constitution of one of the States; and the Constitution of the United States speaks of itself as being an instrument of the same nature. It says this Constitution shall be the law of the land, any thing in any State constitution to the contrary notwithstanding. And it speaks of itself, too, in plain contradistinction from a confederation; for it says that all debts contracted, and all engagements entered into, by the United States, shall be as valid under this Constitution as under the Confederation. It does not say, as valid under this compact, or this league, or this confederation, as under the former confederation, but as valid under this Constitution.

This, then, Sir, is declared to be a constitution. A constitution is the fundamental law of the state; and this is expressly declared to be the supreme law. It is as if the people had said, "We prescribe this fundamental law," or "this supreme law," for they do say that they establish this Constitution, and that it shall be the supreme law. They say that they ordain and establish it. Now, Sir, what is the common application of these words? We do not speak of ordaining leagues and compacts. If this was intended to be a compact or league, and the States to be parties to it, why was it not so said? Why is there found no one expression in the whole instrument indicating such intent? The old Confederation was expressly called a league, and into this league it was declared that the States, as States, severally entered. Why was not similar language used in the Constitution, if a similar intention had existed? Why was it not said, "the States enter into this new league," "the States form this new confederation," or "the States agree to this new compact"? Or why was it not said, in the language of the gentleman's resolution, that the people of the several States acceded to this compact in their sovereign capacities? What reason is there for supposing that the framers of the Constitution rejected expressions appropriate to their own meaning, and adopted others wholly at war with that meaning?

Again, Sir, the Constitution speaks of that political system which is established as "the government of the United States." Is it not doing strange violence to language to call a league or a compact between sovereign powers a government? The government of a state is that organization in which the political power resides. It is the political being created by the constitution or fundamental law. The broad and clear difference between a government and a league or compact is, that a government is a body politic; it has a will of its own; and it possesses powers and faculties to execute its own purposes. Every compact looks to some power to enforce its stipulations. Even in a compact between sovereign communities, there always exists this ultimate reference to a power to insure its execution; although, in such case, this power is but the force of one party against the force of another; that is to say, the power of war. But a government executes its decisions by its own supreme authority. Its use of force in compelling obedience to its own enactments is not war. It contemplates no opposing party having a right of resistance. It rests on its own power to enforce its own will; and when it ceases to possess this power, it is no longer a government.

Mr. President, I concur so generally in the very able speech of the gentleman from Virginia near me,[1] that it is not without diffidence and regret that I venture to differ with him on any point. His opinions, Sir, are redolent of the doctrines of a very distinguished school, for which I have the highest regard, of whose doctrines I can say, what I can also say of the gentleman's speech, that, while I concur in the results, I must be permitted to hesitate about some of the premises. I do not agree that the Constitution is a compact between States in their sovereign capacities. I do not agree, that, in strictness of language, it is a compact at all. But I do agree that it is founded on consent or agreement, or on compact, if the gentleman prefers that word, and means no more by it than voluntary consent or agreement. The Constitution, Sir, is not a contract, but the result of a contract; meaning by contract no more than assent. Founded on consent, it is a government proper. Adopted by the agreement of the people of the United States, when adopted, it has become a Constitution. The people have agreed to make a Constitution; but when made, that Constitution becomes what its name imports. It is no longer a mere agreement. Our laws, Sir, have their foundation in the agreement or consent of the two houses of Congress. We say, habitually, that one house proposes a bill, and the other agrees to it; but the result of this agreement is not a compact, but a law. The law, the statute, is not the agreement, but something created by the agreement; and something which, when created, has a new character, and acts by its own authority. So the Constitution of the United States, founded in or on the consent of the people, may be said to rest on compact or consent; but it is not itself the compact, but its result. When the people agree to erect a government, and actually erect it, the thing is done, and the agreement is at an end. The compact is executed, and the end designed by it attained. Henceforth, the fruit of the agreement exists, but the agreement itself is merged in its own accomplishment; since there can be no longer a subsisting agreement or compact to form a constitution or government, after that constitution or government has been actually formed and established.

It appears to me, Mr. President, that the plainest account of the establishment of this government presents the most just and philosophical view of its foundation. The people of the several States had their separate State governments; and between the States there also existed a Confederation. With this condition of things the people were not satisfied, as the Confederation had been found not to fulfil its intended objects. It was proposed, therefore, to erect a new, common government, which should possess certain definite powers, such as regarded the prosperity of the people of all the States, and to be formed upon the general model of American constitutions. This proposal was assented to, and an instrument was presented to the people of the several States for their consideration. They approved it, and agreed to adopt it, as a Constitution. They executed that agreement; they adopted the Constitution as a Constitution, and henceforth it must stand as a Constitution until it shall be altogether destroyed. Now, Sir, is not this the truth of the whole matter? And is not all that we have heard of compact between sovereign States the mere effect of a theoretical and artificial mode of reasoning upon the subject? a mode of reasoning which disregards plain facts for the sake of hypothesis?

Mr. President, the nature of sovereignty or sovereign power has been extensively discussed by gentlemen on this occasion, as it generally is when the origin of our government is debated. But I confess myself not entirely satisfied with arguments and illustrations drawn from that topic. The sovereignty of government is an idea belonging to the other side of the Atlantic. No such thing is known in North America. Our governments are all limited. In Europe, sovereignty is of feudal origin, and imports no more than the state of the sovereign. It comprises his rights, duties, exemptions, prerogatives, and powers. But with us, all power is with the people. They alone are sovereign; and they erect what governments they please, and confer on them such powers as they please. None of these governments is sovereign, in the European sense of the word, all being restrained by written constitutions. It seems to me, therefore, that we only perplex ourselves when we attempt to explain the relations existing between the general government and the several State governments, according to those ideas of sovereignty which prevail under systems essentially different from our own.

But, Sir, to return to the Constitution itself; let me inquire what it relies upon for its own continuance and support. I hear it often suggested, that the States, by refusing to appoint Senators and Electors, might bring this government to an end. Perhaps that is true; but the same may be said of the State governments themselves. Suppose the legislature of a State, having the power to appoint the governor and the judges, should omit that duty, would not the State government remain unorganized? No doubt, all elective governments may be broken up by a general abandonment, on the part of those intrusted with political powers, of their appropriate duties. But one popular government has, in this respect, as much security as another. The maintenance of this Constitution does not depend on the plighted faith of the States, as States, to support it; and this again shows that it is not a league. It relies on individual duty and obligation.

The Constitution of the United States creates direct relations between this government and individuals. This government may punish individuals for treason, and all other crimes in the code, when committed against the United States. It has power, also, to tax individuals, in any mode, and to any extent; and it possesses the further power of demanding from individuals military service. Nothing, certainly, can more clearly distinguish a government from a confederation of states than the possession of these powers. No closer relations can exist between individuals and any government.

On the other hand, the government owes high and solemn duties to every citizen of the country. It is bound to protect him in his most important rights and interests. It makes war for his protection, and no other government in the country can make war. It makes peace for his protection, and no other government can make peace. It maintains armies and navies for his defence and security, and no other government is allowed to maintain them. He goes abroad beneath its flag, and carries over all the earth a rational character imparted to him by this government, and which no other government can impart. In whatever relates to war, to peace, to commerce, he knows no other government. All these, Sir, are connections as dear and as sacred as can bind individuals to any government on earth. It is not, therefore, a compact between States, but a government proper, operating directly upon individuals, yielding to them protection on the one hand, and demanding from them obedience on the other.

There is no language in the whole Constitution applicable to a confederation of States. If the States be parties, as States, what are their rights, and what their respective covenants and stipulations? And where are their rights, covenants, and stipulations expressed? The States engage for nothing, they promise nothing. In the Articles of Confederation, they did make promises, and did enter into engagements, and did plight the faith of each State for their fulfilment; but in the Constitution there is nothing of that kind. The reason is, that, in the Constitution, it is the people who speak, and not the States. The people ordain the Constitution, and therein address themselves to the States, and to the legislatures of the States, in the language of injunction and prohibition. The Constitution utters its behests in the name and by authority of the people, and it does not exact from States any plighted public faith to maintain it. On the contrary, it makes its own preservation depend on individual duty and individual obligation. Sir, the States cannot omit to appoint Senators and Electors. It is not a matter resting in State discretion or State pleasure. The Constitution has taken better care of its own preservation. It lays its hand on individual conscience and individual duty. It incapacitates any man to sit in the legislature of a State, who shall not first have taken his solemn oath to support the Constitution of the United States. From the obligation of this oath, no State power can discharge him. All the members of all the State legislatures are as religiously bound to support the Constitution of the United States as they are to support their own State constitution. Nay, Sir, they are as solemnly sworn to support it as we ourselves are, who are members of Congress.

No member of a State legislature can refuse to proceed, at the proper time, to elect Senators to Congress, or to provide for the choice of Electors of President and Vice-President, any more than the members of this Senate can refuse, when the appointed day arrives, to meet the members of the other house, to count the votes for those officers, and ascertain who are chosen. In both cases, the duty binds, and with equal strength, the conscience of the individual member, and it is imposed on all by an oath in the same words. Let it then never be said, Sir, that it is a matter of discretion with the States whether they will continue the government, or break it up by refusing to appoint Senators and to elect Electors. They have no discretion in the matter. The members of their legislatures cannot avoid doing either, so often as the time arrives, without a direct violation of their duty and their oaths; such a violation as would break up any other government.

Looking still further to the provisions of the Constitution itself, in order to learn its true character, we find its great apparent purpose to be, to unite the people of all the States under one general government, for certain definite objects, and, to the extent of this union, to restrain the separate authority of the States. Congress only can declare war; therefore, when one State is at war with a foreign nation, all must be at war. The President and the Senate only can make peace; when peace is made for one State, therefore, it must be made for all.

Can any thing be conceived more preposterous, than that any State should have power to nullify the proceedings of the general government respecting peace and war? When war is declared by a law of Congress, can a single State nullify that law, and remain at peace? And yet she may nullify that law as well as any other. If the President and Senate make peace, may one State, nevertheless, continue the war? And yet, if she can nullify a law, she may quite as well nullify a treaty.

The truth is, Mr. President, and no ingenuity of argument, no subtilty of distinction can evade it, that, as to certain purposes, the people of the United States are one people. They are one in making war, and one in making peace; they are one in regulating commerce, and one in laying duties of imposts. The very end and purpose of the Constitution was, to make them one people in these particulars; and it has effectually accomplished its object. All this is apparent on the face of the Constitution itself. I have already said, Sir, that to obtain a power of direct legislation over the people, especially in regard to imposts, was always prominent as a reason for getting rid of the Confederation, and forming a new Constitution. Among innumerable proofs of this, before the assembling of the Convention, allow me to refer only to the report of the committee of the old Congress, July, 1785.

But, Sir, let us go to the actual formation of the Constitution; let us open the journal of the Convention itself, and we shall see that the very first resolution which the Convention adopted was, "THAT A NATIONAL GOVERNMENT OUGHT TO BE ESTABLISHED, CONSISTING OF A SUPREME LEGISLATURE, JUDICIARY, AND EXECUTIVE."

This itself completely negatives all idea of league, and compact, and confederation. Terms could not be chosen more fit to express an intention to establish a national government, and to banish for ever all notion of a compact between sovereign States.

This resolution was adopted on the 30th of May, 1787. Afterwards, the style was altered, and, instead of being called a national government, it was called the government of the United States; but the substance of this resolution was retained, and was at tha head of that list of resolutions which was afterwards sent to the committee who were to frame the instrument.

It is true, there were gentlemen in the Convention, who were for retaining the Confederation, and amending its Articles; but the majority was against this, and was for a national government. Mr. Patterson's propositions, which were for continuing the Articles of Confederation with additional powers, were submitted to the Convention on the 15th of June, and referred to the committee of the whole. The resolutions forming the basis of a national government, which had once been agreed to in the committee of the whole, and reported, were recommitted to the same committee, on the same day. The Convention, then, in committee of the whole, on the 19th of June, had both these plans before them; that is to say, the plan of a confederacy, or compact, between States, and the plan of a national government. Both these plans were considered and debated, and the committee reported, "That they do not agree to the propositions offered by the honorable Mr. Patterson, but that they again submit the resolutions formerly reported." If, Sir, any historical fact in the world be plain and undeniable, it is that the Convention deliberated on the expediency of continuing the Confederation, with some amendments, and rejected that scheme, and adopted the plan of a national government, with a legislature, an executive, and a judiciary of its own. They were asked to preserve the league; they rejected the proposition. They were asked to continue the existing compact between States; they rejected it. They rejected compact, league, and confederation, and set themselves about framing the constitution of a national government; and they accomplished what they undertook.

If men will open their eyes fairly to the lights of history, it is impossible to be deceived on this point. The great object was to supersede the Confederation by a regular government; because, under the Confederation, Congress had power only to make requisitions on States; and if States declined compliance, as they did, there was no remedy but war against such delinquent States. It would seem, from Mr. Jefferson's correspondence, in 1786 and 1787, that he was of opinion that even this remedy ought to be tried. "There will be no money in the treasury," said he, "till the confederacy shows its teeth"; and he suggests that a single frigate would soon levy, on the commerce of a delinquent State, the deficiency of its contribution. But this would be war; and it was evident that a confederacy could not long hold together, which should be at war with its members. The Constitution was adopted to avoid this necessity. It was adopted that there might be a government which should act directly on individuals, without borrowing aid from the State governments. This is clear as light itself on the very face of the provisions of the Constitution, and its whole history tends to the same conclusion. Its framers gave this very reason for their work in the most distinct terms. Allow me to quote but one or two proofs, out of hundreds. That State, so small in territory, but so distinguished for learning and talent, Connecticut, had sent to the general Convention, among other members, Samuel Johnston and Oliver Ellsworth. The Constitution having been framed, it was submitted to a convention of the people of Connecticut for ratification on the part of that State; and Mr. Johnston and Mr. Ellsworth were also members of this convention. On the first day of the debates, being called on to explain the reasons which led the Convention at Philadelphia to recommend such a Constitution, after showing the insufficiency of the existing confederacy, inasmuch as it applied to States, as States, Mr. Johnston proceeded to say:--

"The Convention saw this imperfection in attempting to legislate for States in their political capacity, that the coercion of law can he exercised by nothing but a military force. They have, therefore, gone upon entirely new ground. They have formed one new nation out of the individual States. The Constitution vests in the general legislature a power to make laws in matters of national concern; to appoint judges to decide upon these laws; and to appoint officers to carry them into execution. This excludes the idea of an armed force. The power which is to enforce these laws is to be a legal power, vested in proper magistrates. The force which is to be employed is the energy of law; and this force is to operate only upon individuals who fail in their duty to their country. This is the peculiar glory of the Constitution, that it depends upon the mild and equal energy of the magistracy for the execution of the laws."

In the further course of the debate, Mr. Ellsworth said:--

"In republics it is a fundamental principle, that the majority govern, and that the minority comply with the general voice. How contrary, then, to republican principles, how humiliating, is our present situation! A single State can rise up, and put a veto upon the most important public measures. We have seen this actually take place; a single State has controlled the general voice of the Union; a minority, a very small minority, has governed us. So far is this from being consistent with republican principles, that it is, in effect, the worst species of monarchy.

"Hence we see how necessary for the Union is a coercive principle. No man pretends the contrary. We all see and feel this necessity. The only question is, Shall it be a coercion of law, or a coercion of arms? There is no other possible alternative. Where will those who oppose a coercion of law come out? Where will they end? A necessary consequence of their principles is a war of the States one against another. I am for coercion by law; that coercion which acts only upon delinquent individuals. This Constitution does not attempt to coerce sovereign bodies, States, in their political capacity. No coercion is applicable to such bodies, but that of an armed force. If we should attempt to execute the laws of the Union by sending an armed force against a delinquent State, it would involve the good and bad, the innocent and guilty, in the same calamity. But this legal coercion singles out the guilty individual, and punishes him for breaking the laws of the Union."

Indeed, Sir, if we look to all contemporary history, to the numbers of the Federalist, to the debates in the conventions, to the publications of friends and foes, they all agree, that a change had been made from a confederacy of States to a different system; they all agree, that the Convention had formed a Constitution for a national government. With this result some were satisfied, and some were dissatisfied; but all admitted that the thing had been done. In none of these various productions and publications did any one intimate that the new Constitution was but another compact between States in their sovereign capacities. I do not find such an opinion advanced in a single instance. Everywhere, the people were told that the old Confederation was to be abandoned, and a new system to be tried; that a proper government was proposed, to be founded in the name of the people, and to have a regular organization of its own. Everywhere, the people were told that it was to be a government with direct powers to make laws over individuals, and to lay taxes and imposts without the consent of the States. Everywhere, it was understood to be a popular Constitution. It came to the people for their adoption, and was to rest on the same deep foundation as the State constitutions themselves. Its most distinguished advocates, who had been themselves members of the Convention, declared that the very object of submitting the Constitution to the people was, to preclude the possibility of its being regarded as a mere compact. "However gross a heresy," say the writers of the Federalist, "it may be to maintain that a party to a compact has a right to revoke that compact, the doctrine itself has had respectable advocates. The possibility of a question of this nature proves the necessity of laying the foundations of our national government deeper than in the mere sanction of delegated authority. The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE."

Such is the language, Sir, addressed to the people, while they yet had the Constitution under consideration. The powers conferred on the new government were perfectly well understood to be conferred, not by any State, or the people of any State, but by the people of the United States. Virginia is more explicit, perhaps, in this particular, than any other State. Her convention, assembled to ratify the Constitution, "in the name and behalf of the people of Virginia, declare and make known, that the powers granted under the Constitution, being derived from the people of the United States, may be resumed by them whenever the same shall be perverted to their injury or oppression."

Is this language which describes the formation of a compact between States? or language describing the grant of powers to a new government, by the whole people of the United States?

Among all the other ratifications, there is not one which speaks of the Constitution as a compact between States. Those of Massachusetts and New Hampshire express the transaction, in my opinion, with sufficient accuracy. They recognize the Divine goodness "in affording THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES an opportunity of entering into an explicit and solemn compact with each other, by assenting to and ratifying a new Constitution." You will observe, Sir, that it is the PEOPLE, and not the States, who have entered into this compact; and it is the PEOPLE of all the United States. These conventions, by this form of expression, meant merely to say, that the people of the United States had, by the blessing of Providence, enjoyed the opportunity of establishing a new Constitution, founded in the consent of the people. This consent of the people has been called, by European writers, the social compact; and, in conformity to this common mode of expression, these conventions speak of that assent, on which the new Constitution was to rest, as an explicit and solemn compact, not which the States had entered into with each other, but which the people of the United States had entered into.

Finally, Sir, how can any man get over the words of the Constitution itself?--"WE, THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES, DO ORDAIN AND ESTABLISH THIS CONSTITUTION." These words must cease to be a part of the Constitution, they must be obliterated from the parchment on which they are written, before any human ingenuity or human argument can remove the popular basis on which that Constitution rests, and turn the instrument into a mere compact between sovereign States.

The second proposition, Sir, which I propose to maintain, is, that no State authority can dissolve the relations subsisting between the government of the United States and individuals; that nothing can dissolve these relations but revolution; and that, therefore, there can be no such thing as secession without revolution. All this follows, as it seems to me, as a just consequence, if it be first proved that the Constitution of the United States is a government proper, owing protection to individuals, and entitled to their obedience.

The people, Sir, in every State, live under two governments. They owe obedience to both. These governments, though distinct, are not adverse. Each has its separate sphere, and its peculiar powers and duties. It is not a contest between two sovereigns for the same power, like the wars of the rival houses in England; nor is it a dispute between a government de facto and a government de jure. It is the case of a division of powers between two governments, made by the people, to whom both are responsible. Neither can dispense with the duty which individuals owe to the other; neither can call itself master of the other: the people are masters of both. This division of power, it is true, is in a great measure unknown in Europe. It is the peculiar system of America; and, though new and singular, it is not incomprehensible. The State constitutions are established by the people of the States. This Constitution is established by the people of all the States. How, then, can a State secede? How can a State undo what the whole people have done? How can she absolve her citizens from their obedience to the laws of the United States? How can she annul their obligations and oaths? How can the members of her legislature renounce their own oaths? Sir, secession, as a revolutionary right, is intelligible; as a right to be proclaimed in the midst of civil commotions, and asserted at the head of armies, I can understand it. But as a practical right, existing under the Constitution, and in conformity with its provisions, it seems to me to be nothing but a plain absurdity; for it supposes resistance to government, under the authority of government itself; it supposes dismemberment, without violating the principles of union; it supposes opposition to law, without crime; it supposes the violation of oaths, without responsibility; it supposes the total overthrow of government, without revolution.

The Constitution, Sir, regards itself as perpetual and immortal. It seeks to establish a union among the people of the States, which shall last through all time. Or, if the common fate of things human must be expected at some period to happen to it, yet that catastrophe is not anticipated.

The instrument contains ample provisions for its amendment, at all times; none for its abandonment, at any time. It declares that new States may come into the Union, but it does not declare that old States may go out. The Union is not a temporaly partnership of States. It is the association of the people, under a constitution of government, uniting their power, joining together their highest interests, cementing their present enjoyments, and blending, in one indivisible mass, all their hopes for the future. Whatsoever is steadfast in just political principles; whatsoever is permanent in the structure of human society; whatsoever there is which can derive an enduring character from being founded on deep-laid principles of constitutional liberty and on the broad foundations of the public will,--all these unite to entitle this instrument to be regarded as a permanent constitution of government.

In the next place, Mr. President, I contend that there is a supreme law of the land, consisting of the Constitution, acts of Congress passed in pursuance of it, and the public treaties. This will not be denied, because such are the very words of the Constitution. But I contend, further, that it rightfully belongs to Congress, and to the courts of the United States, to settle the construction of this supreme law, in doubtful cases. This is denied; and here arises the great practical question, Who is to construe finally the Constitution of the United States? We all agree that the Constitution is the supreme law; but who shall interpret that law? In our system of the division of powers between different governments, controversies will necessarily sometimes arise, respecting the extent of the powers of each. Who shall decide these controversies? Does it rest with the general government, in all or any of its departments, to exercise the office of final interpreter? Or may each of the States, as well as the general government, claim this right of ultimate decision? The practical result of this whole debate turns on this point. The gentleman contends that each State may judge for itself of any alleged violation of the Constitution, and may finally decide for itself, and may execute its own decisions by its own power. All the recent proceedings in South Carolina are founded on this claim of right. Her convention has pronounced the revenue laws of the United States unconstitutional; and this decision she does not allow any authority of the United States to overrule or reverse. Of course she rejects the authority of Congress, because the very object of the ordinance is to reverse the decision of Congress; and she rejects, too, the authority of the courts of the United States, because she expressly prohibits all appeal to those courts. It is in order to sustain this asserted right of being her own judge, that she pronounces the Constitution of the United States to be but a compact, to which she is a party, and a sovereign party. If this be established, then the inference is supposed to follow, that, being sovereign, there is no power to control her decision; and her own judgment on her own compact is, and must be, conclusive.

I have already endeavored, Sir, to point out the practical consequences of this doctrine, and to show how utterly inconsistent it is with all ideas of regular government, and how soon its adoption would involve the whole country in revolution and absolute anarchy. I hope it is easy now to show, Sir, that a doctrine bringing such consequences with it is not well founded; that it has nothing to stand on but theory and assumption; and that it is refuted by plain and express constitutional provisions. I think the government of the United States does possess, in its appropriate departments, the authority of final decision on questions of disputed power. I think it possesses this authority, both by necessary implication and by express grant.

It will not be denied, Sir, that this authority naturally belongs to all governments. They all exercise it from necessity, and as a consequence of the exercise of other powers. The State governments themselves possess it, except in that class of questions which may arise between them and the general government, and in regard to which they have surrendered it, as well by the nature of the case as by clear constitutional provisions. In other and ordinary cases, whether a particular law be in conformity to the constitution of the State is a question which the State legislature or the State judiciary must determine. We all know that these questions arise daily in the State governments, and are decided by those governments; and I know no government which does not exercise a similar power.

Upon general principles, then, the government of the United States possesses this authority; and this would hardly be denied were it not that there are other governments. But since there are State governments, and since these, like other governments, ordinarily construe their own powers, if the government of the United States construes its own powers also, which construction is to prevail in the case of opposite constructions? And again, as in the case now actually before us, the State governments may undertake, not only to construe their own powers, but to decide directly on the extent of the powers of Congress. Congress has passed a law as being within its just powers; South Carolina denies that this law is within its just powers, and insists that she has the right so to decide this point, and that her decision is final. How are these questions to be settled?

In my opinion, Sir, even if the Constitution of the United States had made no express provision for such cases, it would yet be difficult to maintain, that, in a Constitution existing over four-and-twenty States, with equal authority over all, one could claim a right of construing it for the whole. This would seem a manifest impropriety; indeed, an absurdity. If the Constitution is a government existing over all the States, though with limited powers, it necessarily follows, that, to the extent of those powers, it must be supreme. If it be not superior to the authority of a particular State, it is not a national government. But as it is a government, as it has a legislative power of its own, and a judicial power coextensive with the legislative, the inference is irresistible that this government, thus created by the whole and for the whole, must have an authority superior to that of the particular government of any one part. Congress is the legislature of all the people of the United States; the judiciary of the general government is the judiciary of all the people of the United States. To hold, therefore, that this legislature and this judiciary are subordinate in authority to the legislature and judiciary of a single State, is doing violence to all common sense, and overturning all established principles. Congress must judge of the extent of its own powers so often as it is called on to exercise them, or it cannot act at all; and it must also act independent of State control, or it cannot act at all.

The right of State interposition strikes at the very foundation of the legislative power of Congress. It possesses no effective legislative power, if such right of State interposition exists; because it can pass no law not subject to abrogation. It cannot make laws for the Union, if any part of the Union may pronounce its enactments void and of no effect. Its forms of legislation would be an idle ceremony, if, after all, any one of four-and-twenty States might bid defiance to its authority. Without express provision in the Constitution, therefore, Sir, this whole question is necessarily decided by those provisions which create a legislative power and a judicial power. If these exist in a government intended for the whole, the inevitable consequence is, that the laws of this legislative power and the decisions of this judicial power must be binding on and over the whole. No man can form the conception of a government existing over four-and-twenty States, with a regular legislative and judicial power, and of the existence at the same time of an authority, residing elsewhere, to resist, at pleasure or discretion, the enactments and the decisions of such a government. I maintain, therefore, Sir, that, from the nature of the case, and as an inference wholly unavoidable, the acts of Congress and the decisions of the national courts must be of higher authority than State laws and State decisions. If this be not so, there is, there can be, no general government.

But, Mr. President, the Constitution has not left this cardinal point without full and explicit provisions. First, as to the authority of Congress. Having enumerated the specific powers conferred on Congress, the Constitution adds, as a distinct and substantive clause, the following, viz.: "To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof." If this means any thing, it means that Congress may judge of the true extent and just interpretation of the specific powers granted to it, and may judge also of what is necessary and proper for executing those powers. If Congress is to judge of what is necessary for the execution of its powers, it must, of necessity, judge of the extent and interpretation of those powers.

And in regard, Sir, to the judiciary, the Constitution is still more express and emphatic. It declares that the judicial power shall extend to all cases in law or equity arising under the Constitution, laws of the United States, and treaties; that there shall be one Supreme Court, and that this Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction of all these cases, subject to such exceptions as Congress may make. It is impossible to escape from the generality of these words. If a case arises under the Constitution, that is, if a case arises depending on the construction of the Constitution, the judicial power of the United States extends to it. It reaches the case, the question; it attaches the power of the national judicature to the case itself, in whatever court it may arise or exist; and in this case the Supreme Court has appellate jurisdiction over all courts whatever. No language could provide with more effect and precision than is here done, for subjecting constitutional questions to the ultimate decision of the Supreme Court. And, Sir, this is exactly what the Convention found it necessary to provide for, and intended to provide for. It is, too, exactly what the people were universally told was done when they adopted the Constitution. One of the first resolutions adopted by the Convention was in these words, viz.: "That the jurisdiction of the national judiciary shall extend to cases which respect the collection of the national revenue, and questions which involve the national peace and harmony." Now, Sir, this either had no sensible meaning at all, or else it meant that the jurisdiction of the national judiciary should extend to these questions, with a paramount authority. It is not to be supposed that the Convention intended that the power of the national judiciary should extend to these questions, and that the power of the judicatures of the States should also extend to them, with equal power of final decision. This would be to defeat the whole object of the provision. There were thirteen judicatures already in existence. The evil complained of, or the danger to be guarded against, was contradiction and repugnance in the decisions of these judicatures. If the framers of the Constitution meant to create a fourteenth, and yet not to give it power to revise and control the decisions of the existing thirteen, then they only intended to augment the existing evil and the apprehended danger by increasing still further the chances of discordant judgments. Why, Sir, has it become a settled axiom in politics that every government must have a judicial power coextensive with its legislative power? Certainly, there is only this reason, namely, that the laws may receive a uniform interpretation and a uniform execution. This object cannot be otherwise attained. A statute is what it is judicially interpreted to be; and if it be construed one way in New Hampshire, and another way in Georgia, there is no uniform law. One supreme court, with appellate and final jurisdiction, is the natural and only adequate means, in any government, to secure this uniformity. The Convention saw all this clearly; and the resolution which I have quoted, never afterwards rescinded, passed through various modifications, till it finally received the form which the article now bears in the Constitution.

It is undeniably true, then, that the framers of the Constitution intended to create a national judicial power, which should be paramount on national subjects. And after the Constitution was framed, and while the whole country was engaged in discussing its merits, one of its most distinguished advocates, Mr. Madison, told the people that it was true, that, in controversies relating to the boundary between the two jurisdictions, the tribunal which is ultimately to decide is to be established under the general government. Mr. Martin, who had been a member of the Convention, asserted the same thing to the legislature of Maryland, and urged it as a reason for rejecting the Constitution. Mr. Pinckney, himself also a leading member of the Convention, declared it to the people of South Carolina. Everywhere it was admitted, by friends and foes, that this power was in the Constitution. By some it was thought dangerous, by most it was thought necessary; but by all it was agreed to be a power actually contained in the instrument. The Convention saw the absolute necessity of some control in the national government over State laws. Different modes of establishing this control were suggested and considered. At one time, it was proposed that the laws of the States should, from time to time, be laid before Congress, and that Congress should possess a negative over them. But this was thought inexpedient and inadmissible; and in its place, and expressly as a substitute for it, the existing provision was introduced; that is to say, a provision by which the federal courts should have authority to overrule such State laws as might be in manifest contravention of the Constitution. The writers of the Federalist, in explaining the Constitution, while it was yet pending before the people, and still unadopted, give this account of the matter in terms, and assign this reason for the article as it now stands. By this provision Congress escaped the necessity of any revision of State laws, left the whole sphere of State legislation quite untouched, and yet obtained a security against any infringement of the constitutional power of the general government. Indeed, Sir, allow me to ask again, if the national judiciary was not to exercise a power of revision on constitutional questions over the judicatures of the States, why was any national judicature erected at all? Can any man give a sensible reason for having a judicial power in this government, unless it be for the sake of maintaining a uniformity of decision on questions arising under the Constitution and laws of Congress, and insuring its execution? And does not this very idea of uniformity necessarily imply that the construction given by the national courts is to be the prevailing construction? How else, Sir, is it possible that uniformity can be preserved?

Gentlemen appear to me, Sir, to look at but one side of the question. They regard only the supposed danger of trusting a government with the interpretation of its own powers. But will they view the question in its other aspect? Will they show us how it is possible for a government to get along with four-and-twenty interpreters of its laws and powers? Gentlemen argue, too, as if, in these cases, the State would be always right, and the general government always wrong. But suppose the reverse,--suppose the State wrong (and, since they differ, some of them must be wrong),--are the most important and essential operations of the government to be embarrassed and arrested, because one State holds the contrary opinion? Mr. President, every argument which refers the constitutionality of acts of Congress to State decision appeals from the majority to the minority; it appeals from the common interest to a particular interest; from the counsels of all to the counsel of one; and endeavors to supersede the judgment of the whole by the judgment of a part.

I think it is clear. Sir, that the Constitution, by express provision, by definite and unequivocal words, as well as by necessary implication, has constituted the Supreme Court of the United States the appellate tribunal in all cases of a constitutional nature which assume the shape of a suit, in law or equity. And I think I cannot do better than to leave this part of the subject by reading the remarks made upon it in the convention of Connecticut, by Mr. Ellsworth; a gentleman, Sir, who has left behind him, on the records of the government of his country, proofs of the clearest intelligence and of the deepest sagacity, as well as of the utmost purity and integrity of character. "This Constitution," says he, "defines the extent of the powers of the general government. If the general legislature should, at any time, overleap their limits, the judicial department is a constitutional check. If the United States go beyond their powers, if they make a law which the Constitution does not authorize, it is void; and the judiciary power, the national judges, who, to secure their impartiality, are to be made independent, will declare it to be void. On the other hand, if the States go beyond their limits, if they make a law which is a usurpation upon the general government, the law is void; and upright, independent judges will declare it to be so." Nor did this remain merely matter of private opinion. In the very first session of the first Congress, with all these well-known objects, both of the Convention and the people, full and fresh in his mind, Mr. Ellsworth, as is generally understood, reported the bill for the organization of the judicial department, and in that bill made provision for the exercise of this appellate power of the Supreme Court, in all the proper cases, in whatsoever court arising; and this appellate power has now been exercised for more than forty years, without interruption, and without doubt.

As to the cases, Sir, which do not come before the courts, those political questions which terminate with the enactments of Congress, it is of necessity that these should be ultimately decided by Congress itself. Like other legislatures, it must be trusted with this power. The members of Congress are chosen by the people, and they are answerable to the people; like other public agents, they are bound by oath to support the Constitution. These are the securities that they will not violate their duty, nor transcend their powers. They are the same securities that prevail in other popular governments; nor is it easy to see how grants of power can be more safely guarded, without rendering them nugatory. If the case cannot come before the courts, and if Congress be not trusted with its decision, who shall decide it? The gentleman says, each State is to decide it for herself. If so, then, as I have already urged, what is law in one State is not law in another. Or, if the resistance of one State compels an entire repeal of the law, then a minority, and that a small one, governs the whole country.

Sir, those who espouse the doctrines of nullification reject, as it seems to me, the first great principle of all republican liberty; that is, that the majority must govern. In matters of common concern, the judgment of a majority must stand as the judgment of the whole. This is a law imposed on us by the absolute necessity of the case; and if we do not act upon it, there is no possibility of maintaining any government but despotism. We hear loud and repeated denunciations against what is called majority government. It is declared, with much warmth, that a majority government cannot be maintained in the United States. What, then, do gentlemen wish? Do they wish to establish a minority government? Do they wish to subject the will of the many to the will of the few? The honorable gentleman from South Carolina has spoken of absolute majorities and majorities concurrent; language wholly unknown to our Constitution, and to which it is not easy to affix definite ideas. As far as I understand it, it would teach us that the absolute majority may be found in Congress, but the majority concurrent must be looked for in the States; that is to say, Sir, stripping the matter of this novelty of phrase, that the dissent of one or more States, as States, renders void the decision of a majority of Congress, so far as that State is concerned. And so this doctrine, running but a short career, like other dogmas of the day, terminates in nullification.

If this vehement invective against majorities meant no more than that, in the construction of government, it is wise to provide checks and balances, so that there should be various limitations on the power of the mere majority, it would only mean what the Constitution of the United States has already abundantly provided. It is full of such checks and balances. In its very organization, it adopts a broad and most effective principle in restraint of the power of mere majorities. A majority of the people elects the House of Representatives, but it does not elect the Senate. The Senate is elected by the States, each State having, in this respect, an equal power. No law, therefore, can pass, without the assent of the representatives of the people, and a majority of the representatives of the States also. A majority of the representatives of the people must concur, and a majority of the States must concur, in every act of Congress; and the President is elected on a plan compounded of both these principles. But having composed one house of representatives chosen by the people in each State, according to their numbers, and the other of an equal number of members from every State, whether larger or smaller, the Constitution gives to majorities in these houses thus constituted the full and entire power of passing laws, subject always to the constitutional restrictions and to the approval of the President. To subject them to any other power is clear usurpation. The majority of one house may be controlled by the majority of the other; and both may be restrained by the President's negative. These are checks and balances provided by the Constitution, existing in the government itself, and wisely intended to secure deliberation and caution in legislative proceedings. But to resist the will of the majority in both houses, thus constitutionally exercised, to insist on the lawfulness of interposition by an extraneous power; to claim the right of defeating the will of Congress, by setting up against it the will of a single State,--is neither more nor less, as it strikes me, than a plain attempt to overthrow the government. The constituted authorities of the United States are no longer a government, if they be not masters of their own will; they are no longer a government, if an external power may arrest their proceedings; they are no longer a government, if acts passed by both houses, and approved by the President, may be nullified by State vetoes or State ordinances. Does any one suppose it could make any difference, as to the binding authority of an act of Congress, and of the duty of a State to respect it, whether it passed by a mere majority of both houses, or by three fourths of each, or the unanimous vote of each? Within the limits and restrictions of the Constitution, the government of the United States, like all other populpr governments, acts by majorities. It can act no otherwise. Whoever, therefore, denounces the government of majorities, denounces the government of his own country, and denounces all free governments. And whoever would restrain these majorities, while acting within their constitutional limits, by an external power, whatever he may intend, asserts principles which, if adopted, can lead to nothing else than the destruction of the government itself.

Does not the gentleman perceive, Sir, how his argument against majorities might here be retorted upon him? Does he not see how cogently he might be asked, whether it be the character of nullification to practise what it preaches? Look to South Carolina, at the present moment. How far are the rights of minorities there respected? I confess, Sir, I have not known, in peaceable times, the power of the majority carried with a higher hand, or upheld with more relentless disregard of the rights, feelings and principles of the minority;--a minority embracing, as the gentleman himself will admit, a large portion of the worth and respectability of the State;--a minority comprehending in its numbers men who have been associated with him, and with us, in these halls of legislation; men who have served their country at home and honored it abroad; men who would cheerfully lay down their lives for their native State, in any cause which they could regard as the cause of honor and duty; men above fear, and above reproach, whose deepest grief and distress spring from the conviction, that the present proceedings of the State must ultimately reflect discredit upon her. How is this minority, how are these men, regarded? They are enthralled and disfranchised by ordinances and acts of legislation; subjected to tests and oaths, incompatible, as they conscientiously think, with oaths already taken, and obligations already assumed; they are proscribed and denounced as recreants to duty and patriotism, and slaves to a foreign power. Both the spirit which pursues them, and the positive measures which emanate from that spirit, are harsh and proscriptive beyond all precedent within my knowledge, except in periods of professed revolution.

It is not, Sir, one would think, for those who approve these proceedings to complain of the power of majorities.

Mr. President, all popular governments rest on two principles, or two assumptions:--

First, That there is so far a common interest among those over whom the government extends, as that it may provide for the defence, protection, and good government of the whole, without injustice or oppression to parts; and

Secondly, That the representatives of the people, and especially the people themselves, are secure against general corruption, and may be trusted, therefore, with the exercise of power.

Whoever argues against these principles argues against the practicability of all free governments. And whoever admits these, must admit, or cannot deny, that power is as safe in the hands of Congress as in those of other representative bodies. Congress is not irresponsible. Its members are agents of the people, elected by them, answerable to them, and liable to be displaced or superseded, at their pleasure; and they possess as fair a claim to the confidence of the people, while they continue to deserve it, as any other public political agents.

If, then, Sir, the manifest intention of the Convention, and the contemporary admission of both friends and foes, prove any thing; if the plain text of the instrument itself, as well as the necessary implication from other provisions, prove any thing; if the early legislation of Congress, the course of judicial decisions, acquiesced in by all the States for forty years, prove any thing,--then it is proved that there is a supreme law, and a final interpreter.

My fourth and last proposition, Mr. President, was, that any attempt by a State to abrogate or nullify acts of Congress is a usurpation on the powers of the general government and on the equal rights of other States, a violation of the Constitution, and a proceeding essentially revolutionary. This is undoubtedly true, if the preceding propositions be regarded as proved. If the government of the United States be trusted with the duty, in any department, of declaring the extent of its own powers, then a State ordinance, or act of legislation, authorizing resistance to an act of Congress, on the alleged ground of its unconstitutionally, is manifestly a usurpation upon its powers. If the States have equal rights in matters concerning the whole, then for one State to set up her judgment against the judgment of the rest, and to insist on executing that judgment by force, is also a manifest usurpation on the rights of other States. If the Constitution of the United States be a government proper, with authority to pass laws, and to give them a uniform interpretation and execution, then the interposition of a State, to enforce her own construction, and to resist, as to herself, that law which binds the other States, is a violation of the Constitution.

If that be revolutionary which arrests the legislative, executive, and judicial power of government, dispenses with existing oaths and obligations of obedience, and elevates another power to supreme dominion, then nullification is revolutionary. Or if that be revolutionary the natural tendency and practical effect of which are to break the Union into fragments, to sever all connection among the people of the respective States, and to prostrate this general government in the dust, then nullification is revolutionary.

Nullification, Sir, is as distinctly revolutionary as secession; but I cannot say that the revolution which it seeks is one of so respectable a character. Secession would, it is true, abandon the Constitution altogether; but then it would profess to abandon it. Whatever other inconsistencies it might run into, one, at least, it would avoid. It would not belong to a government, while it rejected its authority. It would not repel the burden, and continue to enjoy the benefits. It would not aid in passing laws which others are to obey, and yet reject their authority as to itself. It would not undertake to reconcile obedience to public authority with an asserted right of command over that same authority. It would not be in the government, and above the government, at the same time. But though secession may be a more respectable mode of attaining the object than nullification, it is not more truly revolutionary. Each, and both, resist the constitutional authorities; each, and both, would sever the Union and subvert the government.

Mr. President, having detained the Senate so long already, I will not now examine at length the ordinance and laws of South Carolina. These papers are well drawn for their purpose. Their authors understood their own objects. They are called a peaceable remedy, and we have been told that South Carolina, after all, intends nothing but a lawsuit. A very few words, Sir, will show the nature of this peaceable remedy, and of the lawsuit which South Carolina contemplates.

In the first place, the ordinance declares the law of last July, and all other laws of the United States laying duties, to be absolutely null and void, and makes it unlawful for the constituted authorities of the United States to enforce the payment of such duties. It is therefore, Sir, an indictable offence, at this moment, in South Carolina, for any person to be concerned in collecting revenue under the laws of the United States. It being declared, by what is considered a fundamental law of the State, unlawful to collect these duties, an indictment lies, of course, against any one concerned in such collection; and he is, on general principles, liable to be punished by fine and imprisonment. The terms, it is true, are, that it is unlawful "to enforce the payment of duties"; but every custom-house officer enforces payment while he detains the goods in order to obtain such payment. The ordinance, therefore, reaches everybody concerned in the collection of the duties.

This is the first step in the prosecution of the peaceable remedy. The second is more decisive. By the act commonly called the replevin law, any person whose goods are seized or detained by the collector for the payment of duties may sue out a writ of replevin, and, by virtue of that writ, the goods are to be restored to him. A writ of replevin is a writ which the sheriff is bound to execute, and for the execution of which he is bound to employ force, if necessary. He may call out the posse, and must do so, if resistance be made. This posse may be armed or unarmed. It may come forth with military array, and under the lead of military men. Whatever number of troops may be assembled in Charleston, they may be summoned, with the governor, or commander-in-chief, at their head, to come in aid of the sheriff. It is evident, then, Sir, that the whole military power of the State is to be employed, if necessary, in dispossessing the custom-house officers, and in seizing and holding the goods, without paying the duties. This is the second step in the peaceable remedy.

Sir, whatever pretences may be set up to the contrary, this is the direct application of force, and of military force. It is unlawful, in itself, to replevy goods in the custody of the collectors. But this unlawful act is to be done, and it is to be done by power. Here is a plain interposition, by physical force, to resist the laws of the Union. The legal mode of collecting duties is to detain the goods till such duties are paid or secured. But force comes, and overpowers the collector and his assistants, and takes away the goods, leaving the duties unpaid. There cannot be a clearer case of forcible resistance to law. And it is provided that the goods thus seized shall be held against any attempt to retake them, by the same force which seized them.

Having thus dispossessed the officers of the government of the goods, without payment of duties, and seized and secured them by the strong arm of the State, only one thing more remains to be done, and that is, to cut off all possibility of legal redress; and that, too, is accomplished, or thought to be accomplished. The ordinance declares, that all judicial proceedings, founded on the revenue laws (including, of course, proceedings in the courts of the United States), shall be null and void. This nullifies the judicial power of the United States. Then comes the test-oath act. This requires all State judges and jurors in the State courts to swear that they will execute the ordinance, and all acts of the legislature passed in pursuance thereof. The ordinance declares, that no appeal shall be allowed from the decision of the State courts to the Supreme Court of the United States; and the replevin act makes it an indictable offence for any clerk to furnish a copy of the record, for the purpose of such appeal.

The two principal provisions on which South Carolina relies, to resist the laws of the United States, and nullify the authority of this government, are, therefore, these:--

1. A forcible seizure of goods, before duties are paid or secured, by the power of the State, civil and military.

2. The taking away, by the most effectual means in her power, of all legal redress in the courts of the United States; the confining of judicial proceedings to her own State tribunals; and the compelling of her judges and jurors of these her own courts to take an oath, beforehand, that they will decide all cases according to the ordinance, and the acts passed under it; that is, that they will decide the cause one way. They do not swear to try it, on its own merits; they only swear to decide it as nullification requires.

The character, Sir, of these provisions defies comment. Their object is as plain as their means are extraordinary. They propose direct resistance, by the whole power of the State, to laws of Congress, and cut off, by methods deemed adequate, any redress by legal and judicial authority. They arrest legislation, defy the executive, and banish the judicial power of this government. They authorize and command acts to be done, and done by force, both of numbers and of arms, which, if done, and done by force, are clearly acts of rebellion and treason.

Such, Sir, are the laws of South Carolina; such, Sir, is the peaceable remedy of nullification. Has not nullification reached, Sir, even thus early, that point of direct and forcible resistance to law to which I intimated, three years ago, it plainly tended?

And now, Mr. President, what is the reason for passing laws like these? What are the oppressions experienced under the Union, calling for measures which thus threaten to sever and destroy it? What invasions of public liberty, what ruin to private happiness, what long list of rights violated, or wrongs unredressed, is to justify to the country, to posterity, and to the world, this assault upon the free Constitution of the United States, this great and glorious work of our fathers? At this very moment, Sir, the whole land smiles in peace, and rejoices in plenty. A general and a high prosperity pervades the country; and, judging by the common standard, by increase of population and wealth, or judging by the opinions of that portion of her people not embarked in these dangerous and desperate measures, this prosperity overspreads South Carolina herself.

Thus happy at home, our country, at the same time, holds high the character of her institutions, her power, her rapid growth, and her future destiny, in the eyes of all foreign states. One danger only creates hesitation; one doubt only exists, to darken the otherwise unclouded brightness of that aspect which she exhibits to the view and to the admiration of the world. Need I say, that that doubt respects the permanency of our Union? and need I say, that that doubt is now caused, more than any thing else, by these very proceedings of South Carolina? Sir, all Europe is, at this moment, beholding us, and looking for the issue of this controversy; those who hate free institutions, with malignant hope; those who love them, with deep anxiety and shivering fear.

The cause, then, Sir, the cause! Let the world know the cause which has thus induced one State of the Union to bid defiance to the power of the whole, and openly to talk of secession. Sir, the world will scarcely believe that this whole controversy, and all the desperate measures which its support requires, have no other foundation than a difference of opinion upon a provision of the Constitution, between a majority of the people of South Carolina, on one side, and a vast majority of the whole people of the United States, on the other. It will not credit the fact, it will not admit the possibility, that, in an enlightened age, in a free, popular republic, under a constitution where the people govern, as they must always govern under such systems, by majorities, at a time of unprecedented prosperity, without practical oppression, without evils such as may not only be pretended, but felt and experienced,--evils not slight or temporary, but deep, permanent, and intolerable,--a single State should rush into conflict with all the rest, attempt to put down the power of the Union by her own laws, and to support those laws by her military power, and thus break up and destroy the world's last hope. And well the world may be incredulous. We, who see and hear it, can ourselves hardly yet believe it. Even after all that had preceded it, this ordinance struck the country with amazement. It was incredible and inconceivable that South Carolina should plunge headlong into resistance to the laws on a matter of opinion, and on a question in which the preponderance of opinion, both of the present day and of all past time, was so overwhelmingly against her. The ordinance declares that Congress has exceeded its just power by laying duties on imports, intended for the protection of manufactures. This is the opinion of South Carolina; and on the strength of that opinion she nullifies the laws. Yet has the rest of the country no right to its opinion also? Is one State to sit sole arbitress? She maintains that those laws are plain, deliberate, and palpable violations of the Constitution; that she has a sovereign right to decide this matter; and that, having so decided, she is authorized to resist their execution by her own sovereign power; and she declares that she will resist it, though such resistance should shatter the Union into atoms.

Mr. President, I do not intend to discuss the propriety of these laws at large; but I will ask, How are they shown to be thus plainly and palpably unconstitutional? Have they no countenance at all in the Constitution itself? Are they quite new in the history of the government? Are they a sudden and violent usurpation on the rights of the States? Sir, what will the civilized world say, what will posterity say, when they learn that similar laws have existed from the very foundation of the government, that for thirty years the power was never questioned, and that no State in the Union has more freely and unequivocally admitted it than South Carolina herself?

To lay and collect duties and imposts is an express power granted by the Constitution to Congress. It is, also, an exclusive power; for the Constitution as expressly prohibits all the States from exercising it themselves. This express and exclusive power is unlimited in the terms of the grant, but is attended with two specific restrictions: first, that all duties and imposts shall be equal in all the States; second, that no duties shall be laid on exports. The power, then, being granted, and being attended with these two restrictions, and no more, who is to impose a third restriction on the general words of the grant? If the power to lay duties, as known among all other nations, and as known in all our history, and as it was perfectly understood when the Constitution was adopted, includes a right of discriminating while exercising the power, and of laying some duties heavier and some lighter, for the sake of encouraging our own domestic products, what authority is there for giving to the words used in the Constitution a new, narrow, and unusual meaning? All the limitations which the Constitution intended, it has expressed; and what it has left unrestricted is as much a part of its will as the restraints which it has imposed.

But these laws, it is said, are unconstitutional on account of the motive. How, Sir, can a law be examined on any such ground? How is the motive to be ascertained? One house, or one member, may have one motive; the other house, or another member, another. One motive may operate to-day, and another to-morrow. Upon any such mode of reasoning as this, one law might be unconstitutional now, and another law, in exactly the same words, perfectly constitutional next year. Besides, articles may not only be taxed for the purpose of protecting home products, but other articles may be left free, for the same purpose and with the same motive. A law, therefore, would become unconstitutional from what it omitted, as well as from what it contained. Mr. President, it is a settled principle, acknowledged in all legislative halls, recognized before all tribunals, sanctioned by the general sense and understanding of mankind, that there can be no inquiry into the motives of those who pass laws, for the purpose of determining on their validity. If the law be within the fair meaning of the words in the grant of the power, its authority must be admitted until it is repealed. This rule, everywhere acknowledged, everywhere admitted, is so universal and so completely without exception, that even an allegation of fraud, in the majority of a legislature, is not allowed as a ground to set aside a law.

But, Sir, is it true that the motive for these laws is such as is stated? I think not. The great object of all these laws is, unquestionably, revenue. If there were no occasion for revenue, the laws would not have been passed; and it is notorious that almost the entire revenue of the country is derived from them. And as yet we have collected none too much revenue. The treasury has not been more reduced for many years than it is at the present moment. All that South Carolina can say is, that, in passing the laws which she now undertakes to nullify, particular imported articles were taxed, from a regard to the protection of certain articles of domestic manufacture, higher than they would have been had no such regard been entertained. And she insists, that, according to the Constitution, no such discrimination can be allowed; that duties should be laid for revenue, and revenue only; and that it is unlawful to have reference, in any case, to protection. In other words, she denies the power of DISCRIMINATION. She does not, and cannot, complain of excessive taxation; on the contrary, she professes to be willing to pay any amount for revenue, merely as revenue; and up to the present moment there is no surplus of revenue. Her grievance, then, that plain and palpable violation of the Constitution which she insists has taken place, is simply the exercise of the power of DISCRIMINATION. Now, Sir, is the exercise of this power of discrimination plainly and palpably unconstitutional?

I have already said, the power to lay duties is given by the Constitution in broad and general terms. There is also conferred on Congress the whole power of regulating commerce, in another distinct provision. Is it clear and palpable, Sir, can any man say it is a case beyond doubt, that, under these two powers, Congress may not justly discriminate, in laying duties, for the purpose of countervailing the policy of foreign nations, or of favoring our own home productions? Sir, what ought to conclude this question for ever, as it would seem to me, is, that the regulation of commerce and the imposition of duties are, in all commercial nations, powers avowedly and constantly exercised for this very end. That undeniable truth ought to settle the question; because the Constitution ought to be considered, when it uses well-known language, as using it in its well-known sense. But it is equally undeniable, that it has been, from the very first, fully believed that this power of discrimination was conferred on Congress; and the Constitution was itself recommended, urged upon the people, and enthusiastically insisted on in some of the States, for that very reason. Not that, at that time, the country was extensively engaged in manufactures, especially of the kinds now existing. But the trades and crafts of the seaport towns, the business of the artisans and manual laborers,--those employments, the work in which supplies so great a portion of the daily wants of all classes,--all these looked to the new Constitution as a source of relief from the severe distress which followed the war. It would, Sir, be unpardonable, at so late an hour, to go into details on this point; but the truth is as I have stated. The papers of the day, the resolutions of public meetings, the debates in the contentions, all that we open our eyes upon in the history of the times, prove it.

Sir, the honorable gentleman from South Carolina has referred to two incidents connected with the proceedings of the Convention at Philadelphia, which he thinks are evidence to show that the power of protecting manufactures by laying duties, and by commercial regulations, was not intended to be given to Congress. The first is, as he says, that a power to protect manufactures was expressly proposed, but not granted. I think, Sir, the gentleman is quite mistaken in relation to this part of the proceedings of the Convention. The whole history of the occurrence to which he alludes is simply this. Towards the conclusion of the Convention, after the provisions of the Constitution had been mainly agreed upon, after the power to lay duties and the power to regulate commerce had both been granted, a long list of propositions was made and referred to the committee, containing various miscellaneous powers, some or all of which it was thought might be properly vested in Congress. Among these was a power to establish a university; to grant charters of incorporation; to regulate stage-coaches on the post-roads, and also the power to which the gentleman refers, and which is expressed in these words: "To establish public institutions, rewards, and immunities, for the promotion of agriculture, commerce, trades, and manufactures." The committee made no report on this or various other propositions in the same list. But the only inference from this omission is, that neither the committee nor the Convention thought it proper to authorize Congress "to establish public institutions, rewards, and immunities," for the promotion of manufactures, and other interests. The Convention supposed it had done enough,--at any rate, it had done all it intended,--when it had given to Congress, in general terms, the power to lay imposts and the power to regulate trade. It is not to be argued, from its omission to give more, that it meant to take back what it had already given. It had given the impost power; it had given the regulation of trade; and it did not deem it necessary to give the further and distinct power of establishing public institutions.

The other fact, Sir, on which the gentleman relies, is the declaration of Mr. Martin to the legislature of Maryland. The gentleman supposes Mr. Martin to have urged against the Constitution, that it did not contain the power of protection. But if the gentleman will look again at what Mr. Martin said, he will find, I think, that what Mr. Martin complained of was, that the Constitution, by its prohibitions on the States, had taken away from the States themselves the power of protecting their own manufactures by duties on imports. This is undoubtedly true; but I find no expression of Mr. Martin intimating that the Constitution had not conferred on Congress the same power which it had thus taken from the States.

But, Sir, let us go to the first Congress; let us look in upon this and the other house, at the first session of their organization.

We see, in both houses, men distinguished among the framers, friends, and advocates of the Constitution. We see in both, those who had drawn, discussed, and matured the instrument in the Convention, explained and defended it before the people, and were now elected members of Congress, to put the new government into motion, and to carry the powers of the Constitution into beneficial execution. At the head of the government was WASHINGTON himself, who had been President of the Convention; and in his cabinet were others most thoroughly acquainted with the history of the Constitution, and distinguished for the part taken in its discussion. If these persons were not acquainted with the meaning of the Constitution, if they did not understand the work of their own hands, who can understand it, or who shall now interpret it to us?

Sir, the volume which records the proceedings and debates of the first session of the House of Representatives lies before me. I open it, and I find that, having provided for the administration of the necessary oaths, the very first measure proposed for consideration is, the laying of imposts; and in the very first committee of the whole into which the House of Representatives ever resolved itself, on this its earliest subject, and in this its very first debate, the duty of so laying the imposts as to encourage manufactures was advanced and enlarged upon by almost every speaker, and doubted or denied by none. The first gentleman who suggests this as the clear duty of Congress, and as an object necessary to be attended to, is Mr. Fitzsimons, of Pennsylvania; the second, Mr. White, of VIRGINIA; the third, Mr. Tucker, of SOUTH CAROLINA.

But the great leader, Sir, on this occasion, was Mr. Madison. Was he likely to know the intentions of the Convention and the people? Was he likely to understand the Constitution? At the second sitting of the committee, Mr. Madison explained his own opinions of the duty of Congress, fully and explicitly. I must not detain you, Sir, with more than a few short extracts from these opinions, but they are such as are clear, intelligible, and decisive. "The States," says he, "that are most advanced in population, and ripe for manufactures, ought to have their particular interest attended to, in some degree. While these States retained the power of making regulations of trade, they had the power to cherish such institutions. By adopting the present Constitution, they have thrown the exercise of this power into other hands; they must have done this with an expectation that those interests would not be neglected here." In another report of the same speech, Mr. Madison is represented as using still stronger language; as saying that, the Constitution having taken this power away from the States and conferred it on Congress, it would be a fraud on the States and on the people were Congress to refuse to exercise it.

Mr. Madison argues, Sir, on this early and interesting occasion, very justly and liberally, in favor of the general principles of unrestricted commerce. But he argues, also, with equal force and clearness, for certain important exceptions to these general principles. The first, Sir, respects those manufactures which had been brought forward under encouragement by the State governments. "It would be cruel," says Mr. Madison, "to neglect them, and to divert their industry into other channels; for it is not possible for the hand of man to shift from one employment to another without being injured by the change." Again: "There may be some manufactures which, being once formed, can advance towards perfection without any adventitious aid; while others, for want of the fostering hand of government, will be unable to go on at all. Legislative provision, therefore, will be necessary to collect the proper objects for this purpose; and this will form another exception to my general principle." And again: "The next exception that occurs is one on which great stress is laid by some well-informed men, and this with great plausibility; that each nation should have, within itself, the means of defence, independent of foreign supplies; that, in whatever relates to the operations of war, no State ought to depend upon a precarious supply from any part of the world. There may be some truth in this remark; and therefore it is proper for legislative attention."

In the same debate, Sir, Mr. Burk, from SOUTH CAROLINA, supported a duty on hemp, for the express purpose of encouraging its growth on the strong lands of South Carolina. "Cotton," he said, "was also in contemplation among them, and, if good seed could be procured, he hoped might succeed." Afterwards, Sir, the cotton was obtained, its culture was protected, and it did succeed. Mr. Smith, a very distinguished member from the SAME STATE, observed: "It has been said, and justly, that the States which adopted this Constitution expected its administration would be conducted with a favorable hand. The manufacturing States wished the encouragement of manufactures, the maritime States the encouragement of ship-building, and the agricultural States the encouragement of agriculture."

Sir, I will detain the Senate by reading no more extracts from these debates. I have already shown a majority of the members of SOUTH CAROLINA, in this very first session, acknowledging this power of protection, voting for its exercise, and proposing its extension to their own products. Similar propositions came from Virginia; and, indeed, Sir, in the whole debate, at whatever page you open the volume, you find the power admitted, and you find it applied to the protection of particular articles, or not applied, according to the discretion of Congress. No man denied the power, no man doubted it; the only questions were, in regard to the several articles proposed to be taxed, whether they were fit subjects for protection, and what the amount of that protection ought to be. Will gentlemen, Sir, now answer the argument drawn from these proceedings of the first Congress? Will they undertake to deny that that Congress did act on the avowed principle of protection? Or, if they admit it, will they tell us how those who framed the Constitution fell, thus early, into this great mistake about its meaning? Will they tell us how it should happen that they had so soon forgotten their own sentiments and their own purposes? I confess I have seen no answer to this argument, nor any respectable attempt to answer it. And, Sir, how did this debate terminate? What law was passed? There it stands, Sir, among the statutes, the second law in the book. It has a preamble, and that preamble expressly recites, that the duties which it imposes are laid "for the support of government, for the discharge of the debts of the United States, and the encouragement and protection of manufactures." Until, Sir, this early legislation, thus coeval with the Constitution itself, thus full and explicit, can be explained away, no man can doubt of the meaning of that instrument in this respect.

Mr. President, this power of discrimination, thus admitted, avowed, and practised upon in the first revenue act, has never been denied or doubted until within a few years past. It was not at all doubted in 1816, when it became necessary to adjust the revenue to a state of peace. On the contrary, the power was then exercised, not without opposition as to its expediency, but, as far as I remember or have understood, without the slightest opposition founded on any supposed want of constitutional authority. Certainly, SOUTH CAROLINA did not doubt it. The tariff of 1816 was introduced, carried through, and established, under the lead of South Carolina. Even the minimum policy is of South Carolina origin. The honorable gentleman himself supported, and ably supported, the tariff of 1816. He has informed us, Sir, that his speech on that occasion was sudden and off-hand, he being called up by the request of a friend. I am sure the gentleman so remembers it, and that it was so; but there is, nevertheless, much method, arrangement, and clear exposition in that extempore speech. It is very able, very, very much to the point, and very decisive. And in another speech, delivered two months earlier, on the proposition to repeal the internal taxes, the honorable gentleman had touched the same subject, and had declared "that a certain encouragement ought to be extended at least to our woollen and cotton manufactures." I do not quote these speeches, Sir, for the purpose of showing that the honorable gentleman has changed his opinion: my object is other and higher. I do it for the sake of saying that that cannot be so plainly and palpably unconstitutional as to warrant resistance to law, nullification, and revolution, which the honorable gentleman and his friends have heretofore agreed to and acted upon without doubt and without hesitation. Sir, it is no answer to say that the tariff of 1816 was a revenue bill. So are they all revenue bills. The point is, and the truth is, that the tariff of 1816, like the rest, did discriminate; it did distinguish one article from another; it did lay duties for protection. Look to the case of coarse cottons under the minimum calculation: the duty on these was from sixty to eighty per cent. Something beside revenue, certainly, was intended in this; and, in fact, the law cut up our whole commerce with India in that article.

It is, Sir, only within a few years that Carolina has denied the constitutionality of these protective laws. The gentleman himself has narrated to us the true history of her proceedings on this point. He says, that, after the passing of the law of 1828, despairing then of being able to abolish the system of protection, political men went forth among the people, and set up the doctrine that the system was unconstitutional. "And the people," says the honorable gentleman, "received the doctrine." This, I believe, is true, Sir. The people did then receive the doctrine; they had never entertained it before. Down to that period, the constitutionality of these laws had been no more doubted in South Carolina than elsewhere. And I suspect it is true, Sir, and I deem it a great misfortune, that, to the present moment, a great portion of the people of the State have never yet seen more than one side of the argument. I believe that thousands of honest men are involved in scenes now passing, led away by one-sided views of the question, and following their leaders by the impulses of an unlimited confidence. Depend upon it, Sir, if we can avoid the shock of arms, a day for reconsideration and reflection will come; truth and reason will act with their accustomed force, and the public opinion of South Carolina will be restored to its usual constitutional and patriotic tone.

But, Sir, I hold South Carolina to her ancient, her cool, her uninfluenced, her deliberate opinions. I hold her to her own admissions, nay, to her own claims and pretensions, in 1789, in the first Congress, and to her acknowledgments and avowed sentiments through a long series of succeeding years. I hold her to the principles on which she led Congress to act in 1816; or, if she have changed her own opinions, I claim some respect for those who still retain the same opinions. I say she is precluded from asserting that doctrines, which she has herself so long and so ably sustained, are plain, palpable, and dangerous violations of the Constitution.

Mr. President, if the friends of nullification should be able to propagate their opinions, and give them practical effect, they would, in my judgment, prove themselves the most skilful "architects of ruin," the most effectual extinguishers of high-raised expectation, the greatest blasters of human hopes, that any age has produced. They would stand up to proclaim, in tones which would pierce the ears of half the human race, that the last great experiment of representative government had failed. They would send forth sounds, at the hearing of which the doctrine of the divine right of kings would feel, even in its grave, a returning sensation of vitality and resuscitation. Millions of eyes, of those who now feed their inherent love of liberty on the success of the American example, would turn away from beholding our dismemberment, and find no place on earth whereon to rest their gratified sight. Amidst the incantations and orgies of nullification, secession, disunion, and revolution, would be celebrated the funeral rites of constitutional and republican liberty.

But, Sir, if the government do its duty, if it act with firmness and with moderation, these opinions cannot prevail. Be assured, Sir, be assured, that, among the political sentiments of this people, the love of union is still uppermost. They will stand fast by the Constitution, and by those who defend it. I rely on no temporary expedients, on no political combination; but I rely on the true American feeling, the genuine patriotism of the people, and the imperative decision of the public voice. Disorder and confusion, indeed, may arise; scenes of commotion and contest are threatened, and perhaps may come. With my whole heart, I pray for the continuance of the domestic peace and quiet of the country. I desire, most ardently, the restoration of affection and harmony to all its parts. I desire that every citizen of the whole country may look to this government with no other sentiments than those of grateful respect and attachment. But I cannot yield even to kind feelings the cause of the Constitution, the true glory of the country, and the great trust which we hold in our hands for succeeding ages. If the Constitution cannot be maintained without meeting these scenes of commotion and contest, however unwelcome, they must come. We cannot, we must not, we dare not, omit to do that which, in our judgment, the safety of the Union requires. Not regardless of consequences, we must yet meet consequences; seeing the hazards which surround the discharge of public duty, it must yet be discharged. For myself, Sir, I shun no responsibility justly devolving on me, here or elsewhere, in attempting to maintain the cause. I am bound to it by indissoluble ties of affection and duty, and I shall cheerfully partake in its fortunes and its fate. I am ready to perform my own appropriate part, whenever and wherever the occasion may call on me, and to take my chance among those upon whom blows may fall first and fall thickest. I shall exert every faculty I possess in aiding to prevent the Constitution from being nullified, destroyed, or impaired; and even should I see it fall, I will still, with a voice feeble, perhaps, but earnest as ever issued from human lips, and with fidelity and zeal which nothing shall extinguish, call on the PEOPLE to come to its rescue.

[Footnote 1: Mr. Rives.]

PUBLIC DINNER AT NEW YORK.

A SPEECH DELIVERED AT A PUBLIC DINNER GIVEN BY A LARGE NUMBER OF CITIZENS OF NEW YORK, IN HONOR OF MR. WEBSTER, ON MARCH 10TH, 1831.

[In February, 1831, several distinguished gentlemen of the city of New York, in behalf of themselves and a large number of other citizens, invited Mr. Webster to a public dinner, as a mark of their respect for the value and success of his efforts, in the preceding session of Congress, in defence of the Constitution of the United States. His speech in reply to Mr. Hayne (contained in an earlier part of this volume), which, by that time, had been circulated and read through the country to a greater extent than any speech ever before delivered in Congress, was the particular effort which led to this invitation.

The dinner took place at the City Hotel, on the 10th of March, and was attended by a very large assembly.

Chancellor Kent presided, and, in proposing to the company the health of their guest, made the following remarks:--

"New England has been long fruitful in great men, the necessary consequence of the admirable discipline of her institutions; and we are this day honored with the presence of one of those cherished objects of her attachment and pride, who has an undoubted and peculiar title to our regard. It is a plain truth, that he who defends the constitution of his country by his wisdom in council is entitled to share her gratitude with those who protect it by valor in the field. Peace has its victories as well as war. We all recollect a late memorable occasion, when the exalted talents and enlightened patriotism of the gentleman to whom I have alluded were exerted in the support of our national Union and the sound interpretation of its charter.

"If there be any one political precept pre-eminent above all others and acknowledged by all, it is that which dictates the absolute necessity of a union of the States under one government, and that government clothed with those attributes and powers with which the existing Constitution has invested it. We are indebted, under Providence, to the operation and influence of the powers of that Constitution for our national honor abroad and for unexampled prosperity at home. Its future stability depends upon the firm support and due exercise of its legitimate powers in all their branches. A tendency to disunion, to anarchy among the members rather than to tyranny in the head, has been heretofore the melancholy fate of all the federal governments of ancient and modern Europe. Our Union and national Constitution were formed, as we have hitherto been led to believe, under better auspices and with improved wisdom. But there was a deadly principle of disease inherent in the system. The assumption by any member of the Union of the right to question and resist, or annul, as its own judgment should dictate, either the laws of Congress, or the treaties, or the decisions of the federal courts, or the mandates of the executive power, duly made and promulgated as the Constitution prescribes, was a most dangerous assumption of power, leading to collision and the destruction of the system. And if, contrary to all our expectations, we should hereafter fail in the grand experiment of a confederate government extending over some of the fairest portions of this continent, and destined to act, at the same time, with efficiency and harmony, we should most grievously disappoint the hopes of mankind, and blast for ever the fruits of the Revolution.

"But, happily for us, the refutation of such dangerous pretensions, on the occasion referred to, was signal and complete. The false images and delusive theories which had perplexed the thoughts and disturbed the judgments of men, were then dissipated in like manner as spectres disappear at the rising of the sun. The inestimable value of the Union, and the true principles of the Constitution, were explained by clear and accurate reasonings, and enforced by pathetic and eloquent illustrations. The result was the more auspicious, as the heretical doctrines which were then fairly reasoned down had been advanced by a very respectable portion of the Union, and urged on the floor of the Senate by the polished mind, manly zeal, and honored name of a distinguished member from the South.

"The consequences of that discussion have been extremely beneficial. It turned the attention of the public to the great doctrines of national rights and national union. Constitutional law ceased to remain wrapped up in the breasts, and taught only by the responses, of the living oracles of the law. Socrates was said to have drawn down philosophy from the skies, and scattered it among the schools. It may with equal truth be said, that constitutional law, by means of those senatorial discussions and the master genius that guided them, was rescued from the archives of our tribunals and the libraries of lawyers, and placed under the eye, and submitted to the judgment, of the American people. Their verdict is with us, and from it, there lies no appeal."

As soon as the immense cheering and acclamations with which this address and toast were received had subsided, Mr. Webster rose and addressed the company as follows.]

I owe the honor of this occasion, Gentlemen, to your patriotic and affectionate attachment to the Constitution of our country. For an effort, well intended, however otherwise of unpretending character, made in the discharge of public duty, and designed to maintain the Constitution and vindicate its just powers, you have been pleased to tender me this token of your respect. It would be idle affectation to deny that it gives me singular gratification. Every public man must naturally desire the approbation of his fellow-citizens; and though it may be supposed that I should be anxious, in the first place, not to disappoint the expectations of those whose immediate representative I am, it is not possible but that I should feel, nevertheless, the high value of such a mark of esteem as is here offered. But, Gentlemen, I am conscious that the main purpose of this occasion is higher than mere manifestation of personal regard. It is to evince your devotion to the Constitution, your sense of its transcendent value, and your just alarm at whatever threatens to weaken its proper authority, or endanger its existence.

Gentlemen, this could hardly be otherwise. It would be strange, indeed, if the members of this vast commercial community should not be first and foremost to rally for the Constitution, whenever opinions and doctrines are advanced hostile to its principles. Where sooner than here, where louder than here, may we expect a patriotic voice to be raised, when the union of the States is threatened? In this great emporium, at this central point of the united commerce of the United States, of all places, we may expect the warmest, the most determined and universal feeling of attachment to the national government. Gentlemen, no one can estimate more highly than I do the natural advantages of your city. No one entertains a higher opinion than myself, also, of that spirit of wise and liberal policy, which has actuated the government of your own great State in the accomplishment of high objects, important to the growth and prosperity both of the State and the city. But all these local advantages, and all this enlightened state policy, could never have made your city what it now is, without the aid and protection of a general government, extending over all the States, and establishing for all a common and uniform system of commercial regulation. Without national character, without public credit, without systematic finance, without uniformity of commercial laws, all other advantages possessed by this city would have decayed and perished, like unripe fruit. A general government was, for years before it was instituted, the great object of desire to the inhabitants of this city. New York, at a very early day, was conscious of her local advantages for commerce; she saw her destiny, and was eager to embrace it; but nothing else than a general government could make free her path before her, and set her forward on her brilliant career. She early saw all this, and to the accomplishment of this great and indispensable object she bent every faculty, and exerted every effort. She was not mistaken. She formed no false judgment. At the moment of the adoption of the Constitution, New York was the capital of one State, and contained thirty-two or three thousand people. It now contains more than two hundred thousand people, and is justly regarded as the commercial capital, not only of all the United States, but of the whole continent also, from the pole to the South Sea. Every page of her history, for the last forty years, bears high and irresistible testimony to the benefits and blessings of the general government. Her astonishing growth is referred to, and quoted, all the world over, as one of the most striking proofs of the effects of our Federal Union. To suppose her now to be easy and indifferent, when notions are advanced tending to its dissolution, would be to suppose her equally forgetful of the past and blind to the present, alike ignorant of her own history and her own interest, metamorphosed, from all that she has been, into a being tired of its prosperity, sick of its own growth and greatness, and infatuated for its own destruction. Every blow aimed at the union of the States strikes on the tenderest nerve of her interest and her happiness. To bring the Union into debate is to bring her own future prosperity into debate also. To speak of arresting the laws of the Union, of interposing State power in matters of commerce and revenue, of weakening the full and just authority of the general government, would be, in regard to this city, but another mode of speaking of commercial ruin, of abandoned wharfs, of vacated houses, of diminished and dispersing population, of bankrupt merchants, of mechanics without employment, and laborers without bread. The growth of this city and the Constitution of the United States are coevals and contemporaries. They began together, they have flourished together, and if rashness and folly destroy one, the other will follow it to the tomb.

Gentlemen, it is true, indeed, that the growth of this city is extraordinary, and almost unexampled. It is now, I believe, sixteen or seventeen years since I first saw it. Within that comparatively short period, it has added to its number three times the whole amount of its population when the Constitution was adopted. Of all things having power to check this prosperity, of all things potent to blight and blast it, of all things capable of compelling this city to recede as fast as she has advanced, a disturbed government, an enfeebled public authority, a broken or a weakened union of the States, would be most efficacious. This would be cause efficient enough. Every thing else, in the common fortune of communities, she may hope to resist or to prevent; but this would be fatal as the arrow of death.

Gentlemen, you have personal recollections and associations, connected with the establishment and adoption of the Constitution, which are necessarily called up on an occasion like this. It is impossible to forget the prominent agency exercised by eminent citizens of your own, in regard to that great measure. Those great men are now recorded among the illustrious dead; but they have left names never to be forgotten, and never to be remembered without respect and veneration. Least of all can they be forgotten by you, when assembled here for the purpose of signifying your attachment to the Constitution, and your sense of its inestimable importance to the happiness of the people.

I should do violence to my own feelings, Gentlemen, I think I should offend yours, if I omitted respectful mention of distinguished names yet fresh in your recollections. How can I stand here, to speak of the Constitution of the United States, of the wisdom of its provisions, of the difficulties attending its adoption, of the evils from which it rescued the country, and of the prosperity and power to which it has raised it, and yet pay no tribute to those who were highly instrumental in accomplishing the work? While we are here to rejoice that it yet stands firm and strong, while we congratulate one another that we live under its benign influence, and cherish hopes of its long duration, we cannot forget who they were that, in the day of our national infancy, in the times of despondency and despair, mainly assisted to work out our deliverance. I should feel that I was unfaithful to the strong recollections which the occasion presses upon us, that I was not true to gratitude, not true to patriotism, not true to the living or the dead, not true to your feelings or my own, if I should forbear to make mention of ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

Coming from the military service of the country yet a youth, but with knowledge and maturity, even in civil affairs far beyond his years, he made this city the place of his adoption; and he gave the whole powers of his mind to the contemplation of the weak and distracted condition of the country. Daily increasing in acquaintance and confidence with the people of New York, he saw, what they also saw, the absolute necessity of some closer bond of union for the States. This was the great object of desire. He never appears to have lost sight of it, but was found in the lead whenever any thing was to be attempted for its accomplishment. One experiment after another, as is well known, was tried, and all failed. The States were urgently called on to confer such further powers on the old Congress as would enable it to redeem the public faith, or to adopt, themselves, some general and common principle of commercial regulation. But the States had not agreed, and were not likely to agree. In this posture of affairs, so full of public difficulty and public distress, commissioners from five or six of the States met, on the request of Virginia, at Annapolis, in September, 1786. The precise object of their appointment was to take into consideration the trade of the United States; to examine the relative situations and trade of the several States; and to consider how far a uniform system of commercial regulations was necessary to their common interest and permanent harmony. Mr. Hamilton was one of these commissioners; and I have understood, though I cannot assert the fact, that their report was drawn by him. His associate from this State was the venerable Judge Benson, who has lived long, and still lives, to see the happy results of the counsels which originated in this meeting. Of its members, he and Mr. Madison are, I believe, now the only survivors. These commissioners recommended, what took place the next year, a general Convention of all the States, to take into serious deliberation the condition of the country, and devise such provisions as should render the constitution of the federal government adequate to the exigencies of the Union. I need not remind you, that of this Convention Mr. Hamilton was an active and efficient member. The Constitution was framed, and submitted to the country. And then another great work was to be undertaken. The Constitution would naturally find, and did find, enemies and opposers. Objections to it were numerous, and powerful, and spirited. They were to be answered; and they were effectually answered. The writers of the numbers of the Federalist, Mr. Hamilton, Mr. Madison, and Mr. Jay, so greatly distinguished themselves in their discussions of the Constitution, that those numbers are generally received as important commentaries on the text, and accurate expositions, in general, of its objects and purposes. Those papers were all written and published in this city. Mr. Hamilton was elected one of the distinguished delegation from the city to the State Convention at Poughkeepsie, called to ratify the new Constitution. Its debates are published. Mr. Hamilton appears to have exerted, on this occasion, to the utmost, every power and faculty of his mind.

The whole question was likely to depend on the decision of New York. He felt the full importance of the crisis; and the reports of his speeches, imperfect as they probably are, are yet lasting monuments to his genius and patriotism. He saw at last his hopes fulfilled; he saw the Constitution adopted, and the government under it established and organized. The discerning eye of Washington immediately called him to that post, which was far the most important in the administration of the new system. He was made Secretary of the Treasury; and how he fulfilled the duties of such a place, at such a time, the whole country perceived with delight and the whole world saw with admiration. He smote the rock of the national resources, and abundant streams of revenue gushed forth. He touched the dead corpse of the Public Credit, and it sprung upon its feet. The fabled birth of Minerva, from the brain of Jove, was hardly more sudden or more perfect than the financial system of the United States, as it burst forth from the conceptions of ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

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