FAMILIAR

EXPOSITION OF THE CONSTITUTION

OF THE

UNITED STATES:

CONTAINING

A BRIEF COMMENTARY

ON EVERY CLAUSE, EXPLAINING THE TRUE NATURE, REASONS, AND OBJECTS
THEREOF; DESIGNED FOR THE USE OF SCHOOL LIBRARIES

AND GENERAL READERS.

WITH

AN APPENDIX,

CONTAINING IMPORTANT PUBLIC DOCUMENTS, ILLUSTRATIVE OF

THE CONSTITUTION.

BY JOSEPH STORY, LL. D.

DANE PROFESSOR OF LAW IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY.

"This Government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed,
adopted upon full investigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its
principles, in the distribution of its powers uniting security with energy, and
containing, within itself, a provision for its own amendment, has a just claim to
your confidence and respect." - President Washington's Farewell Address to the
People of the United States.

Some conections, Additions, Celafenry, &c. anggurtes by Jars.

BOSTON:

MARSH, CAPEN, LYON, AND WEBB.

1840.

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1840, by MARSH, CAPEN, LYON, AND WEBB,

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Massachusetts.

EDUCATION PRESS.

PREFACE.

THE present Work is designed, not only for private reading, but as a text book for the highest classes in our Common Schools and Academies. It is also adapted to the use of those, who are more advanced, and have left school, after having passed through the common branches of education. It may also be studied with advantage by those, who have arrived at maturer years, but whose pursuits have not allowed them leisure to acquire a thorough knowledge of the Republican Constitution of Government, under which they live. Some of the subjects, which are here treated of, may seem remote from those topics, which ordinarily engage the attention of our youth, and some of them may seem to be of such an abstract political nature, that the full value of them can scarcely be felt, except by persons, who have had some experience of the duties and difficulties of social life. But, I think, that it will be found, upon closer examination, that an objection of this sort can properly apply to very few passages in the Work; and that even. those, which fall within the scope of the objection, will furnish sources of reflection, and means of knowledge, which will essentially aid the student in his future progress, and place him, as it were, upon the vantage ground, to master the leading principles of politics, and public policy. The Work has been framed upon the basis of my larger