gentleman from Virginia assigns to it. And I must own, that I so far coincide with the gentleman from Virginia. If the power can be traced to no more legitimate source than to that of appropriating the public treasure, I yield the question.

The truth is, that there is no specific grant, in the constitution, of the power of appropriation; nor was any such requisite. It is a resulting power. The constitution vests in Congress the power of taxation, with but few limitations, to raise a public revenue. It then enumerates the powers of Congress. And it follows, of necessity, that Congress has the right to apply the money, so raised, to the execution of the powers so granted. The clause, which concludes the enumeration of the granted powers, by authorizing the passage of all laws, "necessary and proper" to effectuate them, comprehends the power of appropriation. And the framers of the constitution recognize it by the restriction, that no money shall be drawn from the treasury but in virtue of a previous appropriation by law. It is to me wonderful how the President should have brought his mind to the conclusion, that, under the power of appropriation, thus incidentally existing, a right could be set up, in its nature almost without limitation, to employ the public money. He combats with great success and much ability, any deduction of power from the clause relating to the general welfare. He shows that the effect of it would be to overturn, or render useless and nugatory, the careful enumeration of our powers; and that it would convert a cautiously limited government into one without limitation. The same process of reasoning by which his mind was brought to this just conclusion, one would have thought, should have warned him against his claiming, under the power of appropriation, such a vast latitude of authority. He reasons strongly against the power, as claimed by us, harmless and beneficent and limited, as it must be admitted to be, and yet he sets up a power boundless in its extent, unrestrained to the object of internal improvements, and comprehending the whole scope of human affairs! For, if the power exists, as he asserts it, what human restraint is there upon it? He does, indeed, say, that it cannot be exerted so as to interfere with the territorial jurisdiction of the States. But this is a restriction altogether gratuitous, flowing from the bounty of the President, and not found in the prescriptions of the constitution. If we have a right, indefinitely, to apply the money of the government to internal improvements, or to any other object, what is to prevent the application of it to the purchase of the sovereignty itself, of a State, if a State were mean enough to sell its sovereignty-to the purchase of kingdoms, empires, the globe itself? With an almost unlimited power of taxation; and, after the revenue is raised, with a right to apply it under no other limitations than those which the President's caution has suggested, I VOL. II.-19

cannot see what other human power is needed. It has been said, by Cæsar or Bonaparte, no doubt_thought by both, that, with soldiers enough, they could get money enough; and, with money enough, they could command soldiers enough. According to the President's interpretation of the constitution, one of these great levers of public force and power is possessed by this government. The President seems to contemplate, as fraught with much danger, the power, humbly as it is claimed, to effect the internal improvement of the country. And, in his attempt to overthrow it, sets up one of infinitely greater magnitude. The quantum of power which we claim over the subject of internal improvement, is, it is true, of greater amount and force than that which results from the President's view of the constitution; but then it is limited to the object of internal improvements; whilst the power set up by the President has no such limitation; and, in effect, as I conceive, has no limitation whatever, but that of the ability of the people to bear taxation.

With the most profound respect for the President, and after the most deliberate consideration of his argument, I cannot agree with him. I cannot think that any political power accrues to this government, from the mere authority which it possesses to appropriate the public revenue. The power to make internal improvements draws after it most certainly the right to appropriate money to consummate the object. But I cannot conceive that this right of appropriation draws after it the power of internal improvements. The appropriation of money is consequence, not cause. It follows, it does not precede. According to the order of nature, we first determine upon the object to be accomplished, and then appropriate the money necessary to its consummation. According to the order of the constitution, the power is defined, and the application, that is, the appropriation of the money requisite to its effectuation, follows as a necessary and proper means. The practice of congressional legislation is conformable to both. We first inquire what we may do, and provide by law for its being done, and we then appropriate, by another act of legislation, the money necessary to accomplish the specified object. The error of the argument lies in its beginning too soon. It supposes the money to be in the treasury, and then seeks to disburse it. But how came it there? Congress cannot impose taxes without an object. Their imposition must be in reference to the whole mass of our powers, to the general purposes of government, or with the view to the fulfilment of some one of those powers, or to the attainment of some one of those purposes. In either case, we consult the constitution, and ascertain the extent of the authority which is confided to us. We cannot, constitutionally lay the taxes without regard to the extent of our powers; and then, having acquired the money of the public, appropriate it, because we have got it, to any object indefinitely.

The gentleman from Virginia, in speaking of incidental powers, used a species of argument which I entreat him candidly to reconsider. He said, that the chain of cause and effect was without end; that if we argued from a power expressly granted to all others, which might be convenient or necessary to its execution, there were no bounds to the power of this government; that, for example, under the power "to provide and maintain a navy," the right might be assumed to the timber necessary to its construction, and the soil on which it grew. The gentleman might have added, the acorns from which it sprung. What, upon the gentleman's own hypothesis, ought to have been his conclusion? That Congress possessed no power to provide and maintain a navy. Such a conclusion would have been quite as logical, as that Congress has no power over internal improvements, from the possible lengths to which this power may be pushed. No one ever has, or can controvert the existence of incidental powers. We may apply different rules for their extraction, but all must concur in the necessity of their actual existence. They result from the imperfections of our nature, and from the utter impossibility of foreseeing all the turns and vicissitudes in human affairs. They cannot be defined. Much is attained when the power, the end, is specified and guarded. Keeping that constantly in view, the means necessary to its attainment must be left to the sound and responsible discretion of the public functionary. Intrench him as you please, employ what language you may, in the constitutional instrument, necessary and proper," "indispensably necessary," or any other, and the question is still left open-does the proposed measure fall within the scope of the incidental power, circumscribed as it may be? Your safety against abuse must rest in his interest, his integrity, his responsibility to the exercise of the elective franchise; finally, in the ultimate right, when all other redress fails, of an appeal to the remedy, to be used only in extreme cases, of forcible resistance against intolerable oppression.

Doubtless, by an extravagant and abusive enlargement of incidental powers, the State governments may be reduced within too narrow limits. Take any power, however incontestably granted to the general government, and employ

I disclaim, for myself, several sources to which others have ascended, to arrive at the power in question. In making this disclaimer, I mean to cast no imputation on them. I am glad to meet them by whatever road they travel, at the point of a constitutional conclusion. Nor do their positions weaken mine; on the contrary, if correctly taken, and mine also are justified by fair interpretation, they add strength to mine. But I feel it my duty, frankly and sincerely, to state my own views of the constitution. In coming to the ground on which I make my stand to maintain the power, and where I am ready to meet its antagonist, I am happy, in the outset, to state my hearty concurrence with the gentleman from Virginia, in the old 1798 republican principles (now become federal also), by which the constitution is to be interpreted. I agree with him, that this is a limited government; that it has no powers but the granted powers; and that the granted powers are those which are expressly enumerated, or such as, being implied, are necessary and proper to effectuate the enumerated powers. And, if I do not show the power over federative, national, internal improvements, to be fairly deducible, after the strictest application of these principles, I entreat the committee unanimously to reject the bill. The gentleman from Virginia has rightly anticipated, that, in regard to roads, I claim the power, under the grant, to establish post offices and post roads. The whole question, on this part of the subject, turns upon the true meaning of this clause, and that again upon the genuine signification of the word "establish." According to my understanding of it, the meaning of it is, to fix, to make firm, to build. According to that of the gentleman from Virginia, it is to designate, to adopt. Grammatical criticism was to me always unpleasant, and I do not profess to be any proficient in it. But I will confidently appeal, in support of my definition, to any vocabulary whatever, of respectable authority, and to the common use of the word. That it cannot mean only adoption, is to me evident; for adoption pre-supposes establishment, which is precedent in its very nature. That which does not exist, which is not established, cannot be adopted. There is, then, an essential difference between the gentleman from Virginia and me.

I consider the power as original and creative; he as derivative, adoptive. But I will show, out of the mouth of the President himself, who agrees with the gentleman from Virginia, as to the sense of this word, that what I contend for is its genuine meaning. The President, in almost the first lines of his message to this House, of the fourth of May, 1822, returning the Cumberland bill with his veto, says, 66 a power to establish turnpikes, with gates and tolls, &c., implies a power to adopt and execute a complete system of internal improvement." What is the sense in which the word "establish" is here used? Is it not creative? Did the President mean to adopt or designate some pre-existing turnpikes, with gates, &c., or, for the first time, to set them up, under the authority of Congress? Again, the President says, "if it exist as to one road [that is, the power to lay duties of transit, and to take the land on a valuation], it exists as to any other, and to as many roads as Congress may think proper to establish." In what sense does he here employ the word? The truth is, that the President could employ no better than the constitutional word, and he is obliged to use it in the precise sense for which I contend. But I go to a higher authority than that of the chief magistrate-to that of the constitution itself. In expounding that instrument, we must look at all its parts; and if we find a word, the meaning of which it is desirable to obtain, we may safely rest upon the use which has been made of the same word in other parts of the instrument. The word "establish" is one of frequent recurrence in the constitution; and I venture to say, that it will be found uniformly to express the same idea. In the clause enumerating our powers, Congress has power "to establish a uniform rule of naturalization," | &c. In the preamble, "We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, &c., do ordain and establish this constitution," &c. What pre-existing code of justice was adopted? Did not the people of the United States, in this high, sovereign act, contemplate the construction of a code adapted to their federal condition? The sense of the word, as contended for, is self-evident, when applied to the constitution.

its own inherent force and energy, without necessary dependence upon the State governments. If my construction secures this object; and if that of my opponents places the execution of this trust at the pleasure and mercy of the State governments, we must reject theirs and assume mine. But the construction of the President does not make it so dependent. He' contends that we can only use, as post-roads, those which the States shall have previously established; that they are at liberty to alter, to change, and of course to shut them up at pleasure. It results from this view of the President that any of the great mail routes now existing, that, for example, from south to north, may be closed at pleasure or by caprice, by any one of the States, or its authorities, through which it passes-by that of Delaware or any other. Is it possible that that construction of the constitution can be correct, which allows a law of the United States, enacted for the good of the whole, to be obstructed or defeated in its operation by any one of twenty-four sovereignties? The gentleman from Virginia, it is true, denies the right of a State to close a road which has been designated as a post road. But suppose the State, no longer having occasion to use it for its own separate and peculiar purposes, withdraws all care and attention from its preservation. Can the State be compelled to repair it? No! the gentleman from Virginia must say, and I will say-may not the general government repair this road which is abandoned by the State power? May it not repair it in the most efficacious manner? And may it not protect and defend that which it has thus repaired, and which there is no longer an interest or inclination in the State to protect and defend? Or does the gentleman mean to contend that a road may exist in the statute book, which a State will not, and the general government cannot, repair and improve? And what sort of an account should we render to the people of the United States, of the execution of the high trust confided, for their benefit, to us, if we were to tell them that we had failed to execute it, because a State would not make a road for us?

those roads which are made for State purposes, to promote the national object, ill as they may be adapted to it. It may never be necessary to make more than a few great national arteries of communication, leaving to the States the lateral and minor ramifications. Even these should only be executed, without pressure upon the resources of the country, and according to the convenience and ability of government. But, surely, in the performance of a great national duty imposed upon this government, which has for its object the distribution of intelligence,

to perform the substance of the trust, and not content ourselves with a mere inefficient paper execution of it. If I am right in these views, the power to establish post roads being in its nature original and creative, and the government having adopted the roads made by State means, only from its inability to exert the whole extent of its authority, the controverted power is expressly granted to Congress, and there is an end of the question.

It ought to be borne in mind, that this power over roads was not contained in the articles of confederation, which limited Congress to the establishment of post-offices; and that the general character of the present constitution, as contrasted with those articles, is that of an enlargement of power. But, if the construction of my opponents be correct, we are left precisely where the articles of confederation left us, notwithstanding the additional words contained in the present constitution. What, too, will the gentlemen do with the first member of the clause to establish post-offices? Must Congress adopt, designate, some pre-existing office, established by State authority? But there is none such. May it not then fix, build, create, establish offices of its own?

The gentleman from Virginia sought to alarm us by the awful emphasis with which he set before us the total extent of post roads in the union. Eighty thousand miles of post roads! exclaimed the gentleman; and will you assert for the general government jurisdiction, and erect turnpikes, on such an immense distance? Not to-day, nor to-morrow; but this government is to last, I trust, forever: we may at least hope it will endure until the wave of population, cultivation and intelligence, shall have washed the rocky mountains and mingled with the Pacific. And may we not also hope that the day will arrive when the improvements and the comforts of social life shall spread over the wide surface of this vast continent? All this is not to be suddenly done. Society must not be burdened or oppressed. Things must be gradual and progressive. The same species of formidable array which the gentleman makes, might be exhibited in reference to the construction of a navy, or any other of the great purposes of government. We might be told of the fleets and vessels of great maritime powers, which whiten the ocean; and triumphantly asked if we should vainly attempt to cope with or rival that tremendous power? And we should shrink from the effort, if we were to listen to his counsels, in hopeless despair. Yes, sir, it is a subject of peculiar delight to me to look forward to the proud and happy period, distant as it may be, when circulation and association between the Atlantic and Pacific and the Mexican gulf, shall be as free and perfect as they are at this moment in England, or in any other the most highly-improved country on the globe. In the mean time, without bearing heavily upon any of our important interests, let us apply our

But what most staggers my honorable friend, is the jurisdiction over the sites of roads and other internal improvements which he supposes Congress might assume; and he considers the exercise of such a jurisdiction as furnishing the just occasion for serious alarm. Let us analyze the subject. Prior to the erection of a road under the authority of the general government, there existed, in the State through which it passes, no actual exercise of jurisdiction over the ground which it traverses as a road. There was only the possibility of the exercise of such a jurisdiction, when the State should, if ever, erect such a road. But the road is made by the authority of Congress, and out of the fact of its erection arises a necessity for its preservation and protection. The road is some thirty or fifty or sixty feet in width, and with that narrow limit passes through a part of the territory of the State. The capital expended in the making of the road incorporates itself with, and becomes a part of the permanent and immovable property of the State. The jurisdiction which is claimed for the general government, is that only which relates to the necessary defence, protection, and preservation of the road. It is of a character altogether conservative. Whatever does not relate to the existence and protection of the road remains with the State. Murders, trespasses, contracts, all the occurrences and transactions of society upon the road, not affecting its actual existence, will fall within the jurisdiction of the civil or criminal tribunals of the State, as if the road had never been brought into existence. How much remains to the State? How little is claimed for the general government? Is it possible that a jurisdiction so limited, so harmless, so unambitious, can be regarded as seriously alarming to the sovereignty of the States? Congress now asserts and exercises, without contestation, a power to protect the mail in its transit, by the sanction of all suitable penalties. The man who violates it is punished with death, or otherwise, according to the circumstances of the case. This power is exerted as incident to that of establishing post-offices and post roads. Is the protection of the thing in transitu a power more clearly deducible from the grant, than that of facilitating, by means of a practicable road, its actual transportation? Mails certainly imply roads, roads imply their own preservation, their preservation implies the power to preserve them, and the constitution tells us, in express terms, that we shall establish the one and the other.

In respect to cutting canals, I admit the question is not quite so clear as in regard to roads. With respect to these, as I have endeavored to show, the power is expressly granted. In regard to canals it appears to me to be fairly comprehended in, or deducible from, certain granted powers. Congress has power to regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the sev