The weekly pioneer and Democrat. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn. Territory) 1855-1865, 1860-08-31

ing the requisite population, as Congress
should admit into the federal Union, with
an equal vote in the management of federal
affairs as well as the exclusive power in re-
gard to their internal polity respectively
the other, not having the requisite population
for admission into the Union, could have no
vote or agency in the control of the federal
relations, but possessed the same exclusive
power over their domestic affairs and inter.
nal policy respectively as the original States,
with the right while they have less than
twenty thousand inhabitants, to choose for
their government the constitution and laws
of any one of the original States and when
they should have more than twenty thousand,
but less than the number required to entitle
them to admission into the Union, they were
authorized to form for themselves a perma-
nent constitution and government )" and in
either case they were entitled to keep del.
egate in Congress with the right of debating,
but not of voting. This Charter of Com
pact" with its fundamental conditions, which
were declared to be "unalterable without
the {" Joint consent" Of the people interested
in them, as we'll as of the United States,
thus stood on the statute book unrepealcd
and irrepealable- furnishing complete sys-
tenn of government for all "the territory
ceded or to be ceded" to the United States,
without any other legislation upon the SUBJ
ject, when, on the 14th day of May, 1857,
the federal convention assembled at Phila-
delphia and proceeded to form the constitu-
ton under which we now live. Thus it will
be seen that the dividing line between fed.
eral and local authority, in respect to the
rights of those political communities which,
for the sake of convenience and in contra
distinction to the States represented in Con-
gress, we now call territories, but which
were then known as Estates" or "new
States" was so distinctly marked at that
day that no intelligent man could fail to per-
ceive it.
1t is true that the government of the con-
federation had proved totally inadequate to
the fulfillmert of the ends for which it was
devised not because of the relations be-
tween the territories, or new States, and
the United States, but in consequence Of
having no power to enforce its DEGREES On
the federal questions which were clearly
within the scope of its expressly delegated
powers. The radical defects in the articles
of confederation were found to consist in the
fact that it was mere league between SOW
ereign States, and not a Federal Govern
ment with its appropriate departments
Executive, Legislative, and Judicial--each
clothed with authority to perform and carry
into effect its own peculiar functions. The
confederation having no power to enforce
compliance with its resolves, " the conse-
quence was, that though in theory the resO-
lutions of Congress were equivalent to laws,
yet in practice they were found to be mere
recommendations, which the States, like
other sovereignties, observed or disregarded
according to their own goodwill and gra-
cious pleasure" Congress could not impose
duties, collect taxes, raise armies, or do any
other act essential to the existence of gov
eminent, without the voluntary consent and
cooperation of each of the States Con.
gress could resolve, but could not carry its
resolutions into efect-could recommend to
the States to provide revenue for the
necessities of the federal government, but
could not use the means necessary to the
collection of the revenue when the States
failed to comply-could recommend to the
States to provide an army for the general
defence, and apportion among the States
their respective quotas, but could not enlist
the men and order them into the federal
service. For these reasons federal govern
meut, with its appropriate departments,
acting directly upon the individual citizen,
with authority to enforce it's DEGREES to the
extent of its delegated powers, and not
dependent upon the voluntary action of the
several States in their corporate capacity,
became indispensable as substitute for the
government of the confederation.
In the formation of the Constitution of the
United States the federal convention took
the British constitution, as interpreted and
expounded by the colonies during their
controversy with Great Britain, for their
model making such notifications in its
structure and principles as the change in our
condition had rendered necessary. They
intrusted the executive functions to Presi-
dent in the place of king the legislative
functions to Congress composed ola Senate
and House of Representatives, in lieu Of the
Parliament consisting of the House of Lords
and Commons; and the judicial functions
to Supreme Court and such inferior courts
as Congress should from time to time ordain
and establish. .<
Having thus divided the powers of gov
eminent into the three appropriate depart
ments, with which they had always been
familiar, they proceeded to confer upon the
federal government substantially the same
powers which they as colonies had been
willing to concede to the British government,
and to reserve to the States and to the
people the same rights and privileges which
they as colonies had denied to the British
government during the entire struggle which
terminated in our independence, and which
they had claimed for themselves and their
posterity as the birthright of all freemen,
inalienable when organized into political
communities, and to be enjoyed and exer-
cised by colonies, territories, and provinces
as fully and completely as by sovereign
States. Thus it will be seen that there is
no organic feature or fundamental principle
embodied in the Constitution OF the United
States which had not been familiar to the
people Of the colonies from the period of
their earliest settlement, and which had not
been repeatedly asserted by them when
denied by Great Britain during the whole
period of their colonial history.
Let us pause at this point for moment,
and inquire whether it be just to those illus.
| trions natriOts and sauna twho formed the