Clarksville chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1857-1865, 1860-12-08


amount the excuses shall belong to the United
States, and no State shall without the consent
of Congress lay any duty on tonnage, keep
troops or ships of war in time Of peace, enter
into any agreement Of compact with another
State or with foreign power, or engage in war
unless actually invaded or in such imminent
danger as will not admit Of further delay.
In order still further TO secure the uninter-
rupted exercise of these high powers against
State interposition, it is provided that the
Courts and the laws Of the United States, which
shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all
treaties made or which shall be made under
the authority of the United States, shall be
the supreme law of the land, and the Judgesin
every State shall be bound therebN any thing
in the Constitution or laws of any State to the
contrary Notwithstanding. The solemn sane
ton of religion has been superadded to the OBJ
legations of official duty, and all Senators and
Representatives of the United States, all men,
bers of State Legislatures, and all Executive
and Judicial officers, both of the United States
and the several States, shall be bound by oath
or affirmation 10 support the Constitution.
In order to carry into effect these laws, the
Constitution has established perfect Govern
ment in all its forms, Legislative, Executive
!
tent of its powers, acts upon the individual citi-
zens Of every State, and executes its own de-
crees by the agency of its own officers. In
this respect it differs entirely from the Gov
eminent under the old Confederation, which
was confined to making acquisitions on the
States in their sovereign character This left
it in the discretion of each whether to obey or
to refuse, and they often declined to comply
with such acquisitions. 1t thus became neces-
sary, for the purpose of removing the barrier,
and in order to form a more perfect union, to
establish Government which could act direct
ly upon the people, and execute its own laws
without the intermediate agency of the States
This has been accomplished by the Constitution
of the United States.
In short, the Government created by the
Constitution, and drawing its authority from
the sovereign people of each of the several
States, has precisely the same right to exercise
its power over the people of all States in the
enumerated cases, chat each one Of them pos
sesses over subjects not delegated to the Uni
ted States, but reserved to the States respect
lively, or to the people. To the extent of the
delegated powers, the Constitution Of the
United States is as much part of the Consti-
tuition of each State, and is as binding upon
the people as though it had been textually in
serted therein. This Government, therefore,
is a great and powerful government, invested
with all the attributes of sovereignty of the
special subjects to which its authority extends.
| Its trainers never intended to implant in its
| bosom the seeds of its own destruction; nor
were they at its creation, guilty of the absurdi-
/ ty of providing for its own dissolution.
1t was not intended by its trainers to be the
baseless fabric of a vision, which, at the touch
of the enchanter, would vanish into thin air,
but substantial and mighty fabric, capable of
resisting the slow decay OF time, and of defy
! ing the storms of ages. Indeed, well may
jealous patriots of that day have indulged fears,
that government of such high powers might
violate the reserved rights of the States, and
wisely did they adopt the rule of a strict con-
struction of those powers, to prevent the dan
ger; but they did not fear, nor had they any
reason to imagine, that the Constitution would
ever be so interpreted as to enable any State,
by her own act and without the consent of her
sister States to discharge her people from all
or any of their Federal obligations. 1t may be
asked, then, are the people of the States with
out redress against the tyranny and oppression
of the Federal Government? BY no means
The right of resistance on the part of the gov
erned againsr the oppression of their govern
ments cannot be denied: it exists independent
of all constitutions, and has been exercised
at all periods of the worlds history. Under
it old governments have been destroyed and
under it new ones have been replaced 1t is
embodied in strong and express language, in
our own Declaration of Independence but the
distinction must ever be observed, that this is
revolution against an established government,
and not a voluntary secession from it by virtue
of an inherent constitutional right
In short, let US look the danger fairly in the
face: Secession is nothing more nor less than
revolution. 1t may or ii may not be justifable
revolution, but still it is revolution. What,
in the meantime, IS the responsibility and true
position of the executive bound by solemn
oath before God and the country to take care
that the laws be faithfully executed? From
this obligation he cannot be absolved by any
human power. But what if the performance
of this duty, in whole or in part, has been rem
dered impracticable by events over which he
could have exercised no control? Such at the
present moment is the case throughout the
State of South Carolina. So far as the laws of
the United States to secure the administration
of justice by means of the Federal Judiciary
is concerned, all the Federal officers within its
limits, through whose agency alone those laws
can be carried into execution, have already re-
signed We have no longer District Judge,
or District Attorney, in South Carolina. In
fact, the whole machinery Of the Federal Gov
e1nment necessary for the distribution of
remedial Justice among the people, has been
demolished, and it would be difficult if not
impossible, to replace it. The only acts of
Congress on the statute book bearing upon this
subject, are those of the 2Sth February, 1875,
and Sd March, 1907. These authorize the
President, after he shall have ascertained that
the Marshal with his posse comitatus is unable
to execute civil or criminal process in any par
ticular case, to call forth the militia, and en-
ploy the army and navy to aid him in perform
ing the service, having first by proclamation,
commanded the insurgents to disperse and re-
turn peaceaby to their respective abOdes with |
in a limited time. This duty cannot, by any |
possibility, be performed in a State where no |
Judicial authority exists to issue process, and !
where there is no Marshal to execute, and |
where, even if there were such an office, the |
entire population would combine in one solid |
column to resist him. .
The mere resistance of these provisions
proves how inadequate they are, without fur
thCr legislation, to overcome united OppOsi- |
ton in a single State, not to speak Of other
States who may place themselves in a similar
attitude. Congress alone has power to decide
whether the present laws cannot be amended
so as to carry out more CtfCctually the OBJ ects
of the Constitution. Tie same insupcrable OBJ
staclcs do not lie in the way OF executing the
laws for the collection of the customs. The
revenue still continues to be collected as here
toiorc At the Custom House in Charleston, and
should the Collector unfortunately resign, a
successor may be appointed to perform this
duty. Then, in regard to the property Of the
United States in South Carolina, this has been
purchased for a fair equivalent, by the consent
of the Legislature of the State, for the cree
tion OF forts, magazines, arsenals, &c, and
over these the authority to exercise exclusive
legislation has been expressly granted by the
Court to Congress. 1t is not believed that
any attempt viii be made to eXpel the United
States from this property by force; but if in
this ! should prove to be mistaken, the officer
in the command Of the forts has received Or
ders to act strictly on the defensive In such
a contingency, the responsibility for conse-
quences would righdully rest upon the heads
of the asSailantS. Apart from the execution
of the laws, so far as this may be practicable,
the Executive has no authority to decide what
shall be the relations between the Federal Go
and South Carolina. He has been
invested with no such discretion. He possess
es no power to change the relations heretofore
existing between them, much less to acknow-
ledge the independence of that State. This
would be TO invest a mere Executive officer
tb tho r,Ovar of r.g,OpiyiDCr tho diSSOlUtiOn