Year: 1861

The great achievement of our fathers was,
to nataondliee the several separate and indie
pendent Colonies, after the struggle of the
Revolution was over to create an amperium
in imperio "-(a empire within an empire,) Of
which the motto adopted by them on their
expressive. Such a consummaton was effect
ed in the formation of the American Constitu-
ton, creating a National Government supreme
in all the attributes of IA nation, yet limited and
restricted entirely to matters of general ma
ture; while the sovereignty of the States was
preserved over all matters Of local concern
What were those general powers Of the Ma
tional Government, in the exercise of which it
was supreme, are clearly enumerated in the
Constitution. But, to preclude the idea ever
becoming current that this National Govern
ment could be blotted out by State action,
they-(the trainers of the Constitution after
stating in the preamble that it was the crea-
ture of the people, provided for its adoption
by conventions Of the people, and not by the
! legislatures of the States; that in its own
sphere the General Government should act
upon and through the people, ard not upon and
through the States Under the old Confedera-
tion that existed during the Revolution, Con-
gress had to act through the Legislatures of
the States and every law Of Congress was
virtually but recommendation to the State
Legislatures, and had to be by them enforced,
the inef1icency of which system led to the
adoption of the present Constitution.


Pinckney, of South Carolina, explained the
matter fully in the following words:


"The Convention THAT framed our Consti-
tution) saw and felt the necessity of establish
ing a government on different principles, from
the Confederation which, instead Of requiring
the Intervention of thirteen different Legisla-
lures between the demand and the compliance,
should operate on the people in the first in
stance. The necessity of having government
which should at once operate on the people
and not upon the States was conceived to be
indispensable by every delegation present.


Lowndes, of the same State, who was oppo-
sed to it at first, also understood it in the same
light:


"Ths new Constitution" said be, at once
swept all their privileges away-being sover-
eign over all ;" and, he added, that he would
thereafter, value seat in the Legislature no
higher than seat in the City Council.


But Madison, who, perhaps, did more in
originating the Constitution and our National
Government than any other man, has left on
record the ideas he had formed of the necessary
supremacy of the General Government, to be
embodied in the Constitution-ideas formed
meeting of the Convention appointed by the
States to frame it.


The following extracts from Mr.. Madisons
letter of A prl sth, 1887, to Edmund Randolph,


Vide the Madison papers, vol. 2, p. 63l ct segl
are interesting just now:


In truth, my ideas of reform strike so
deeply at the old Confederation, and lead to
such systematic change, that they scarcely
admit of the expedient


hold it for a fundamental point, that an
individual independence of the States is utter
ly irreconciabe with the idea of an aggregate
sovereignty l think, at the same time that a
consolidation of the States into one simple re-
public is not less unattainable than it would
be inexpedient Let it be tried, then, whether
any middle ground can be taken, which will at
once support due supremacy of the national
authority, and leave in force the local authori-
ties so far as they can be subordnately useful


An article ought to be inserted expressly