sider the consequences which legitimately flow from it, and the perversions to which it has been subjected. But "the world moves," and it is not the least significant indication of the manner in which the passions generated and the new interests created by nearly three years of civil war, have upset all preconceived ideas of political science and of the theory of our Constitution, that many of my fellowcitizens are now questioning the soundness of a proposition, which but a short time ago, they would have treated as axiomatic. It is because this doubt exists, that I am compelled, much against my wishes, to defer the consideration of matters perhaps better calculated to interest the general reader, till I have completed the discussion of this question of constitutional law.

The most noticeable of the recent attacks upon the doctrine of State sovereignty, as well from its boldness and its elaborate character, as the reputation and position of its author, is to be found in an article in a recent number of The Atlantic Monthly Magazine, written by Senator Sumner of Massachusetts, and entitled "Our Domestic Relations." I shall have occasion, in a subsequent portion of this work, to consider some of the other propositions which the author of that article has attempted to establish at present I will confine my attention to that portion of his argument which aims to prove that State sovereignty has no existence under the

Constitution. As Mr. Sumner is beyond question the most distinguished of the champions of that doctrine, I presume that if I can successfully refute the reasoning contained in "Our Domestic Relations," I shall have overthrown the best argument which can be adduced in its support.

That part of "Our Domestic Relations" which is devoted to the consideration of what it styles "the miserable pretension of State sovereignty," refers also to the "pestilent pretension of State rights," in terms (not merely the different adjectives) which lead me to conjecture that the author draws in his own mind some line of distinction between the two supposed political heresies. But as he does not explain that distinction in such a manner that I have been able to discover of what it consists, I am compelled to consider the two doctrines as identical, State rights being, as ordinarily understood, the right of the States to enjoy 'unmolested that portion of sovereignty which the Constitution has not bestowed upon the Federal Government.

That no such right or no such sovereignty exists, is a conclusion which is announced in the article in question in the following words, succeeding a detailed statement of the origin of the Constitution and a recapitulation of its provisions respecting Congress and the States.

"Thus, whether we regard the larger powers vested in Congress, the powers denied to the States

without the consent of Congress, or those other provisions which accord supremacy to the United States, we shall find the pretension of State sovereignty without foundation, except in the imagination of its partisans. Before the Constitution such sovereignty may have existed; it was declared in the Articles of Confederation; but since then it has ceased to exist. It has disappeared and been lost in the supremacy of the national Government, so that it can no longer be recognized."

I shall consider separately the reasons which are thus assigned for the disappearance of the sovereignty of the States; but before doing so, it is necessary for me to have more satisfactory evidence that such sovereignty existed under the Articles of Confederation, than is contained in the qualified and hesitating admission of that fact, which the foregoing extract contains. For if it is distinctly understood that the States were sovereign when the Constitution was adopted, the argument will be narrowed down to the single question whether there is such a radical difference between the relations which now exist between the Federal Government, the States, and the people, and those which existed between the Congress of the confederation, the States, and the people, as to lead to the conclusion that the Constitution has stripped the States of rights of such incalculable importance, which they confessedly enjoyed under the Articles of Confederation.

By the Declaration of Independence, the colonies asserted that they were "free and independen States," and the Articles of Confederation, which were made in 1777 and ratified in 1778, purport to be the compact of the several States whose independence was thus asserted. It was expressly declared in them that "each State retains its sovereignty, freedom, independence," and every power, &c., not expressly delegated to the United States, and also that "the said States hereby enter into a firm league of friendship with each other." In the determination of questions each State had one vote in a congress consisting of one house only, and certain questions, enumerated in the Articles, could only be decided by "the assent of nine States," that is, by the vote of the delegations of nine States in the Congress. The President was merely the presiding officer of Congress, that body having executive as well as legislative authority, and the commander-in-chief was such military officer as Congress might appoint. The Union was to be indissoluble-that fact being asserted expressly and by implication no less than five times in the Articles of Confederation and their ratification. The title of the confederacy was, as the title of our present national Government is, "The United States," and the word "Union" was used as descriptive of the confederacy and of the bond by which the States were held together. Of course the constitutions of the several

States were appropriate for the exercise of that sovereignty which was expressly reserved to them.

After recapitulating some of these provisions, the author of "Our Domestic Relations" finds it impossible to withhold his unqualified admission that the States were then sovereign. He says, "The government thus constituted was a compact between sovereign States, or, according to its precise language, 'a firm league of friendship' between these States, administered in the recess of Congress by 'a committee of the States.'* Thus did State rights triumph."

The Union thus constituted is aptly compared in The Federalist (No. 18) to the Amphyctionic league, and the "weaknesses and disorders" which resulted from it were similar to those which afflicted the Amphyctionic states. They led to the calling

* I have copied the italics in the extract as they stand in the original text. The clear implication of this paragraph is, that the States themselves appointed a committee to manage the affairs of the Union during the recess of Congress. In truth, the "committee of the States" was merely one of the regular committees of Congress, consisting of one delegate selected by Congress from the delegation from each State, and empowered to act during the recess. The necessity of such a committee will be apparent, when it is remembered that Congress was the executive as well as the legislative authority of the Union.

There are other errors of a similar character in "Our Domestic Relations ;" of course I assume that they result from carelessness in the author's mode of expression.