JOHN C. CALHOUN

The Real Character of the Union

(From On Nullification)

Notwithstanding all that has been said, I may say that neither the Senator from Delaware (Mr. Clayton), nor any other who has spoken on the same side, has directly and fairly met the great question at issue: Is this a Fed5 eral Union? a union of States, as distinct from that of individuals? Is the sovereignty in the several States, or in the American people in the aggregate? The very language which we are compelled to use when speaking of our political institutions affords proof conclusive as to its real 10 character. The terms union, federal, united, all imply a combination of sovereignties, a confederation of States. They never apply to an association of individuals. Who ever heard of the United State of New York, of Massachusetts, or of Virginia? Who ever heard the term federal or 15 union applied to the aggregation of individuals into one community? Nor is the other point less clear that the sovereignty is in the several States, and that our system is a union of twenty-four sovereign powers, under a constitutional compact, and not of a divided sovereignty between the 20 States severally and the United States. In spite of all that has been said, I maintain that sovereignty is in its nature indivisible. It is the supreme power in a State, and we might just as well speak of half a square, or half of a triangle, as of half a sovereignty. It is a gross error to confound the 25 exercise of sovereign powers with sovereignty itself, or the delegation of such powers with the surrender of them. A sovereign may delegate his powers to be exercised by as many agents as he may think proper, under such conditions and with such limitations as he may impose; but to sur

render any portion of his sovereignty to another is to an- 30 nihilate the whole. The Senator from Delaware calls this metaphysical reasoning, which he says he cannot comprehend. If by metaphysics he means that scholastic refinement which makes distinctions without difference, no one can hold it in more utter contempt than I do; but if, on the contrary, he 35 means the power of analysis and combination - that power which reduces the most complex idea into its elements, which traces causes to their first principle, and, by the power of generalization and combination, unites the whole in one system then, so far from deserving contempt, it is 40 the highest attribute of the human mind. It is the power which raises man above the brute which distinguishes his faculties from mere sagacity, which he holds in common with the inferior animals. It is the power which has raised the astronomer from being a mere gazer at the stars to the high 45 intellectual eminence of a Newton or a Laplace, and astronomy itself from a mere observation of isolated facts into that noble science which displays to our admiration the system of the universe. And shall this high power of the mind, which has effected such wonders when directed to the laws which 50 control the material world, be forever prohibited, under a senseless cry of metaphysics, from being applied to the high purposes of political science and legislation? I hold them to be subject to laws as fixed as matter itself, and to be as fit a subject for the application of the highest intellectual 55 power. Denunciation may, indeed, fall upon the philosophical inquirer into these first principles, as it did upon Galileo and Bacon, when they first unfolded the great discoveries which have immortalized their names; but the time will come when truth will prevail in spite of prejudice and de- 60 nunciation, and when politics and legislation will be considered as much a science as astronomy and chemistry.

In connection with this part of the subject, I understood

the senator from Virginia (Mr. Rives) to say that sov 65 ereignty was divided, and that a portion remained with the States severally, and that the residue was vested in the Union. By Union, I suppose the senator meant the United States. If such be his meaning — if he intended that the sovereignty was in the twenty-four States, in whatever 70 light he may view them, our opinions will not disagree; but, according to my conception, the whole sovereignty is in the several States, while the exercise of sovereign powers is divided-a part being exercised under compact, through this general government, and the residue through the sepa75 rate State governments. But if the senator from Virginia (Mr. Rives) means to assert that the twenty-four States form but one community, with a single sovereign power as to the objects of the Union, it will be but a revival of the old question, of whether the Union is a union between 80 States, as distinct communities, or a mere aggregate of the American people, as a mass of individuals; and in this light his opinions would lead directly to consolidation.

DANIEL WEBSTER

On the Language of Calhoun's Resolutions

(From The Constitution Not a Compact)

The first two resolutions of the honorable member affirm these propositions, viz. :

1. That the political system under which we live, and under which Congress is now assembled, is a compact, to 5 which the people of the several States, as separate and sovereign communities, are the parties.

2. That these sovereign parties have a right to judge, each for itself, of any alleged violation of the Constitution by Congress; and, in case of such violation, to choose, each 10 for itself, its own mode and measure of redress.