The daily exchange. [volume] (Baltimore, Md.) 1858-1861, 1861-03-08

who have come to US from abroad-contrasting
'the omuipotence of Parliament" in the great
free Government of the Old World, with the sub
ordination of our whole Government legislative
and executive, to the overruling Constitution. as
expounded by the Courts. 1t this majesty of
the law; this simple but supreme power of the
written charter; which has been the barrier thus
far among us, between the rights Of communities
and individuals on the one side, and executive am
bition and legislative corruption and usurpation
on the other. Strike it down aud substitute for
it the will Of the majority, as represented by Pres
ident Congress, or mob and there is an end, at
one blow, Of everything that makes the system
decent safe, tolerabe. 1t would be better to hunt
up some 'enlightened despot' at once, and be done
with the forms. When General JACKSON, in his
famous message vetoing the charter of the Bank of
the UNITED STATES, asserted the right of the Ex-
ecutve and the Legislature to be governed, in
their refusal to enact law, by their convictions
against its constitutionaty, Notwithstanding that
similar law had been pronounced constitutional
by the Supreme Court, the doctrine awakened
general alarm, as q pernicious and indefensible
heresy. And yet, in its application, it went no
farther than to supply reason to Congress and
the President for refusing to do, what it was
within their conceded discretion to do or not TO
do. 1t prevented the passage of a law which
would have been constitutional if passed-it dill
not venture to suggest the enactment and enforce
ment Of laws which had been already declared I'M
constitutional 1t has been left for Mr.. LINCOLN
to assert the right of conducting the Government
upon principles, which the Supreme Court has by
solemn adjudication pronounced to be inconsist-
ent with the Constitution. He has acquired the
rights of inventor to the doctrine that the majority
is "the true sovereign" not only under the Consti-
tuition. but over it.
If the enormity of the pretensions thus set up,
by the head of the Republican party, were not in
the simple statement, obvious enough, his mode OF
illustrating them certainly would make it So
when analysed but for moment. What does he
mean when he talks of "the policy of the Govern
"ment upon vital questions affecting the whole
"people," as improper to be ''irrevocably fixed by
"the decisions of the Supreme Court" His
''vital questions can only "affect the whole
"people' by affecting individuals. Any law,
for instance, affecting slavery in the terri
tories, amounts to nothing, except as it a.
fects individuals carrying or desiring to carry
slaves there. Public policy, in such case, is
but the representative Of private rights or
wrongs, the spot. When, therefore, Mr..
LINCOLN desires to inaugurate there a policy
adverse to that "fxed by the decisions of the
Supreme Court" he MEANS after all, nothing
more nor less, than that his policy is to affect the
rights of individuals, in opposition to the ruling
which the Supreme Court will make in every in
dividual case. But he comedies, at the same time,
that in all individual cases the ruling of the Su-
preme Court binds and relieves the parties; and
he therefore proposes to inaugurate against the
individuals composing a community, policy
which the Supreme Court will pronounce uncon-
sututional, upon the suit of every individual in
that community. In other words, he inaugurates
a policy, or enacts and seeks to enforce q law,
against the community in gross, and insists
that the judgment of the Supreme Court should
not prevent him from so doing; while he admits
in the same breath, that the Supreme Court, by its
Judgment, may rightfuly "arrest' his policy, as
unconstitutional, in favor of each and all of the in
dividuals, in detail, of whom that community is
composed, and against whom the policy is put in
operation. 1t will be seen, therefore, that the
doctrine comes to absolutely nothing, unless it as
serts and mnintains, that in a conflict between the
Executive and Legislature on the one side, and the
judicial department on the other, the latter
must give way to what the two Others, as the re-
representatives. of popular majority, may establish
as the binding Interpretation of the Constitution.
h,,I =, 81, IL, 7
means to say, when he asserts that 'the people
will have ceased to be their own rulers if the
Supreme Court is 10 be the arbiter of consti
tutional law. Forgetting, or wilfullt putting
aside the fundamental principle of this Govern
ment, that the people are no ''rulers, except as
the Constitution ordains that they shall rule, he
hands US over to the merces of numerical major
ity, whose will makes right and wrong. Nay,
not even to a numerical majority; for the constl-
tutional dogmas of the Chicago platform and the
inaugural, if entertained by every man in the Re
publican party, are still only the opinions of a
numerical minority of the people of the Union,
and Mr. LINCOLN S discourse is idle, unless he as
sumes to treat, as majority of the whole people,
the plurality, which, in divided vote of the
country, for several candidates has rendered the
candidate of q minority the choice of the Electoral
College.
So much, then, for the canon Of constitutional
Interpretation. 1t is what the majority, actual or
technical, may prescribe, at every election. Indi-
viduals may not rebel, though the right is on
their side, the Courts have declared it; for the
laws must be executed and rebellion must be pun
ished-the right, as by the Courts expounded, to
the contrary Notwithstanding. States may not
secede, though they find the will of the majority
subversive of all their institutions, and of the
zens. Down to this. time, when the right of multi
fcation or secession has been claimed as security
against oppressive and unconstitutional legisla-
tion the reply has been, that no such security was
needed or could be demanded, because the States
had provided a tribunal, in the Constitution, for
the settlement of just such questions, and the
righting of just such wrongs. Now, however, the
authority of that very tribunal is denied in the
premises, and the escape, by means of secession,
is still as vigorously resisted. What them is left
to the minority-whether they DE States or indi-
viduals-as q shield against the arbitrary will
and power of hostile majority? Nothing but
"acquiescence," or resistance tits farce and a
folly to talk about the majority's being "held in
restraint by constitutional checks and limita-
tions," when it is itself the exclusive, and claims
to be the only legitimate arbiter of the extent to
which those "checks and limitations restrain il.
If the majority has the right to interpret the Con-
stution, it has fortiori, the right to interpret
the laws which are under the Constitution; and
public liberty and private right-all the sanctions
that depend on government, and all the guaran-
tees that cement society-hang loosely upon the
pleasure-the fanatcism-the cupidity-the des-
potsm-of mob and its demagogues This may
be the Government of Mr.. LINCOLN, bat it is not
the Government which our fathers bequeathed to
us; and if it is to be the system under which we
must expect to live hereafter, we can only say,
that no State having rights or institutions to
which the majority hostile can expect to re-
main part of such system and retain them
-
In common with all other journals throughout
the country, we have published, from time to time
the current rumors or reports from Washington
concerning the formation of Mr.. LINcoLNs Cab-
net. Believing our readers would be especially
interested in the movements of such Maryland
politicians as were supposed to desire seats in the
Cabinet for themselves or their friends, we have
given the community the benefit of all the sur.
misses upon this point which have appeared in the
Washington and New York papers, or have
reached us through other channels In this con-
nection we have frequently reproduced statements
TO the effect that the Hon. H. WINTER DAVIS Voc