United States v. Cathcart. States against the government. But in the prize cases the doctrine is very impressively announced that the rebellion has all the attributes of a foreign or public war, and that all the duties, obligations, disabilities, and penalties incident to such a war attach to every citizen. In a word, that those who are particeps criminis in the rebellion are not the less traitors because they are rebels. In that case the court say: "It (the law of nations) contains no such anomalous doctrine as that which the court are now for the first time desired to pronounce to wit: that insurgents who have risen against their sovereign, expelled her courts, established a revolutionary government, organized armies and commenced hostilities, are not enemies because they are traitors; and a war levied on the government by traitors in order to dismember and destroy it, is not war, because it is an insurrection." And again the court say: "When the regular course of justice is interrupted by revolt, rebellion, or insurrection, so that the courts of justice can not be kept open, civil war exists, and hostilities may be prosecuted on the same footing as if those opposing the government were foreign enemies invading the land." And further on in the opinion, as descriptive of the true character of the present rebellion, the court say: "It is no loose, unorganized insurrection, having no defined boundary or possession. It has a boundary marked by lines of bayonets, and which can be crossed only by force; south of this line is enemies' territory, because it is held in possession by an organized, hostile, and belligerent power." Such are some of the deliverances of the highest judicial tribunal of the Union. They repudiate emphatically the mischievous heresy that the union of the States under the constitution is a mere league or compact, from which a State, or any number of States, may withdraw at pleasure, not only without the consent of the other States, but against their will. They deny the assumption that full and unqualified sovereignty still remains in the States or the United States v. Cathcart. people of a State, and affirm, on the contrary, that, by express words of the const tution, solemnly ratified by the people of the United States, the national government is supreme within the range of the powers delegated to it; while the States are sovereign only in the sense that they have an indisputable claim to the exercise of all the rights and powers guarantied to them by the constitution of the United States, or which are expressly or by fair implication reserved to them. I might, perhaps, close this opinion here. But the course of the learned counsel in his argument seems to justify, if it does not call for some additional views. And the first remark is, that apart from the light which the high judicial authorities to which I have referred has thrown on the subject under discussion, I should have arrived at the same conclusions which they announce. It is my strong conviction that the language of the constitution, in connection with the known history of its origin, formation, and adoption, leaves no room for a doubt as to the character and structure of the government which it created. Its history is well authenticated, and bears upon every page the indelible stamp of truth. I can not, on an occasion like this, refer to or adduce the many facts which throw light upon the views and intentions of the eminent patriots and statesmen to whom we are indebted for our inimitable constitution. One thing is certain, the American people are in no danger of estimating their services too highly, or according to their memories a measure of honor which is not justly their due. With the illustrious Washington at their head, they entered upon the arduous duty of reconstructing the government under circumstances of deep depression and gloom. The confederation under which the Union had for some time existed, had proved a lamentable failure, and was on the verge of dissolution from its own inherent weakness. The hearts of the patriots who had toiled and bled in the revolutionary struggle for national liberty and independence, were stirred to their inmost depths, from an apprehen United States v. Cathcart. sion that their great achievements would prove fruitless of the results which they had anticipated. They felt deeply the truth that, in framing a new structure of government, they must avoid the rock on which the old one had foundered, and must, above all things, incorporate an element of power to bind the States in an indissoluble national union. This is plainly indicated in the preamble, which declares as one of the objects of the constitution, the formation of "a more perfect Union," and is apparent not only from the debates in the convention, but from the language used throughout the entire instrument. After months of anxious toil and earnest deliberation, the present constitution was agreed to, and submitted to the people for their sanction and adoption. It was adopted by conventions in all the States, elected by the people for this purpose; and thus as the act of the people became the organic law. Its framers did not claim for it entire perfection; and contemplating the possibility that time would develop some necessary changes, wisely provided for its amendment by the same authority that had ordained and established it. It is not proposed to enter upon an extended discussion of the powers of the government, under the constitution thus framed and adopted. That it was designed to institute a government of the people, and for the people of the United States, and to confer upon it, within the powers granted or fairly implied, the attributes of sovereignty or supremacy, can not admit of a question. There is, in the language of the Supreme Court in a case before referred to, a qualified allegiance due to the State in which the citizen has his domicile, but it is subordinate to the allegiance due to the supreme government. The government, therefore, has a perfect right to exact, and has exacted from every one enjoying its protection, the duty of fidelity and allegiance. And it is certainly a fact, worthy of note, that there is not a word or phrase in the constitution of the United States which gives the least countenance to the theory that a State can obstruct or nullify the authority of the general government, United States v. Cathcart. Much less can exercised within its constitutional limits. the supreme folly of giving its sanction to the right of any State, or any number of States, to withdraw at will from the Union, be imputed to the constitution. Such a provision could not be viewed in any other light than as a solecism in the structure of a government. It would be substantially a provision for its own dissolution, without the sanction or agreement of the power which created it. But I am not at liberty to extend this discussion. I may remark, in closing, that there were those in the convention which framed the constitution, and in the conventions of the States which ratified it, who objected to it because it created a national consolidated or supreme government of the United States. There was no difference of opinion then as to the character of the government which the constitution created, but the ground of its opponents was, that it did not conform to their views of what it should be. The counsel has referred in his argument to the resolutions of the legislatures of Virginia and Kentucky, passed in 1798, as giving sanction to the doctrine of the right of a State, at any time, to interpose its authority to prevent or provide a remedy for the unconstitutional exercise of authority on the part of the general government, and that they sanction what is called the right of nullification, or even of secession. I can not assent to the proposition that, properly understood, they justify such a conclusion. The history of these resolutions is well known to the American people. They were designed for a special political object, which was effected, in part at least, through their instrumentality. They affirmed that the States, being parties to the constitutional compact, "in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of powers not granted by the compact, have a right, and are in duty bound to interpose to prevent the progress of the evil." A distinguished statesman has well observed, in commenting on these resolutions, that "the sort of interposition intended was left in studied obscurity." But Mr. Madison, who was the author United States v. Cathcart. of the resolutions adopted by the Virginia legislature, in his report to that body in 1799, asserts distinctly that no extra constitutional measures were intended. And thirty years later, during the administration of General Jackson, when certain prominent Southern politicians insisted that nullification was the proper remedy, in case of an invasion of the rights of a State, solemnly and earnestly protested against this construction of the Virginia resolutions. "He earnestly maintained that the separate action of an individual State was not contemplated by them, and that they had in view nothing but the concerted action of the States to procure a repeal of unconstitutional laws, or an amendment of the constitution." And in 1832, when Mr. Calhoun had succeeded in inducing South Carolina to pass an ordinance of nullification, on the avowed ground of the unconstitutionality of the laws imposing duties on imports, and that State was on the verge of open rebellion, the sturdy arm of Andrew Jackson was raised to crush it in the bud. Before resorting to force for this purpose, with a paternal anxiety for the people of that State who had been deluded by the false political teachings of their leaders, he issued his memorable proclamation, addressed to the people of that State. It is a document which well deserves to be cherished in the memories of the American people to the latest ages. It is alike remarkable for the earnest devotion of its author to the union of the States, the elevated patriotism which is exhibited in every line, and its able and unanswerable exposition of the true principles and theory of the government. The fallacies of the nullification party were held up as dangerous political heresies. Its effects upon the whole country were electrical. It was clothed with the power of truth, and carried conviction to the minds of all men of all political parties whose intellects were not so constructed as to be impervious to the voice of reason, or dead to the impulses of patriotism. But though the iron will and sturdy sense of President Jackson had thoroughly rebuked and arrested the heresy |