one evil example will lead to other measures still more mischievous; and if the principle of constructive powers, or supposed advantages, or temporary circumstances, shall ever be permitted to justify the assumption of a power not given by the Constitution, the General Government will, before long, absorb all the powers of Legislation, and you will have, in effect, but one Consolidated Government. From the extent of our country, its diversified interests, different pursuits, and different habits, it is too obvious for argument, that a single Consolidated Government would be wholly inadequate to watch over and protect its interests; and every friend of our free institutions should be always prepared to maintain unimpaired, and in full vigor, the rights and Sovereignty of the States, and to confine the action of the General Government strictly to the sphere of its appropriate duties."*

How wise, patriotic, and even prophetic, were these admonitions of the Hero of New Orleans, and the Sage of the Hermitage! He was, indeed, both hero and sage! In him was presented the rare combination of both military and civic attainments of a very high order. Highest in eminence above all others of this class in the annals of the world stands Washington! Jackson approached as near this great unapproachable model of the general and statesman combined, as perhaps any ever will or can. He left the impress of his ideas deeply fixed upon the times in which he lived. And no more important admonition did he ever give his countrymen than that in the closing part of the extract from his Farewell Address I have just read. This, with all the solemnity of dying declarations, may be received as the strongest evidence of his opinions that ours is a Confede

* Statesman's Manual, vol. ii, p. 952.

racy of Sovereign States, and that our liberties, as well as the preservation of the Union, which was so dear to him, depend upon their preservation as such! His last parting words to his countrymen were, to be prepared to maintain unimpaired, and in full vigor, the Sovereignty of the States!

May I not, then, upon his authority, again ask if the conclusion, before stated, that the Constitution is a Compact between Sovereign States, is not indisputably established?

MAJOR HEISTER. Waiving that point, I do not yet see that the right of a State to secede from the Union, in disregard of her obligations under the Compact, follows that conclusion.

MR. STEPHENS. That is another question. We must settle one thing at a time. Do you all now give it up that the Constitution is a Compact between Sovereign States? All being silent we will then take that to be an established truth, and proceed a step further.

COLLOQUY XI.

THE GREAT TRUTH ESTABLISHED THAT THE CONSTITUTION IS A COMPACT BETWEEN SOVEREIGN STATES-THE GOVERNMENT OF THE UNITED STATES IS STRICTLY A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT-EACH STATE FOR ITSELF HAS THE RIGHT TO JUDGE OF INFRACTIONS AS WELL AS THE MODE AND MEASURE OF REDRESS-THE RIGHT OF A STATE TO WITHDRAW FROM THE UNION UPON BREACH OF THE COMPACT BY OTHER PARTIES TO IT SPRINGS FROM THE VERY NATURE OF THE GOVERNMENT-THE COMPACT WAS BROKEN BY THIRTEEN STATES OF THE UNION-WEBSTER, STORY, TUCKER, RAWLE, DE TOCQUEVILLE, WADE, GREELEY AND LINCOLN UPON THIS RIGHT TO WITHDRAW OR SECEDE IN SUCH CASE.

MR. STEPHENS. We are then, it seems, by the assent of all, brought to the conclusion, that the Constitution of the United States was formed by separate, distinct, and Sovereign States. This is the conclusion to which we are all, however willingly or reluctantly, compelled to come at last, not only by the testimony of witnesses of the highest order, and by the decisions of the judicial tribunal of the highest authority, the Supreme Court of the United States, Chief Justice Marshall at its head, but by the everlasting records themselves, by all the great facts of our history, which can never be obliterated or effaced.

We have seen that the Union existing between these States, anterior to the formation of the new Constitution, was a Compact, or as Judge Marshall expressed it, nothing but "a league" between Sovereign States.

We have seen that in remodelling the Articles of the old Confederation, it was not the object, or design of any of the parties, to change the nature or character of that