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Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 5: (search)
eory, was binding upon her, as a majority of the whole people had adopted it. A fortiori, North Carolina and Rhode Island were in a state of rebellion in 1789-‘90, while they declined to ratify and recognize the Constitution adopted by the other eleven fractions of this united people. Yet no hint of any such pretension—of any claim of authority over them by the majority—of any assertion of the supremacy of the Union—is to be found in any of the records of that period. It might have been unnecessary to bestow so much time and attention in exposing the absurdity of the deductions from a theory so false, but for the fact that it has been specious enough to secure the countenance of men of such distinction as Webster, Story, and Everett, and that it has been made the plea to justify a bloody war against that principle of state sovereignty and independence, which was regarded by the fathers of the Union as the corner stone of the structure and the basis of the hope for its perp
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 6: (search)
Federal Government and accretions of power Revival of old errors Mistakes and misstatements Webster, Story, and Everett who ordained and established the Constitution? In the progressive growtht again, and presented to the country as expositions of the true meaning of the Constitution. Webster, one of the first to revive some of those early misconceptions so long ago refuted as to be almtial point of inquiry now is, by what authority the Constitution was ordained and established. Webster says it was done by the people of the United States in the aggregate; Everett repeats substantiublic, through reckless assertion and confident and incessant repetition. I remember, says Mr. Webster, to have heard Chief-Justice Marshall ask counsel, who was insisting upon the authority of anthat Mr. Hume never wrote the History of England? A Legislature may alter the law, continues Mr. Webster, but no power can reverse a fact. Hence, if the Convention of 1787 had expressly declared th
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 7: (search)
the Articles of Confederation was a compact. Webster, in his rejoinder to Hayne on January 27, 183n against any such cavil as that preferred by Webster and his followers, that the Constitution is nhey are not epic poems. In an examination of Webster's remarks, I do not find that he announces tresent Constitution. The former Union was—as Webster expressly admits—as nobody denies—a compact bed States in the one just as in the other. Webster is particularly unfortunate in his criticismserms which he attacks to an ulterior purpose, Webster says: This is the reason, sir, which make 557, 558. In these and similar passages, Webster virtually concedes that, if the Constitution d in the writings of the fathers to show that Webster's new vocabulary was the very language they fnclusive, and should not have been unknown to Webster, for they are the language of Massachusetts, a compact of the states with each other—which Webster, a son of New Hampshire and a Senator from M
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 8: (search)
rally sovereign and independent when they were united under the Articles of Confederation, is distinctly asserted in those articles, and is admitted even by the extreme partisans of consolidation. Of right, they are still sovereign, unless they have surrendered or been divested of their sovereignty; those who deny the proposition have been vainly called upon to point out the process by which they have divested themselves, or have been divested of it, otherwise than by usurpation. Since Webster spoke and Story wrote upon the subject, however, the sovereignty of the states has been vehemently denied, or explained away as only a partial, imperfect, mutilated sovereignty. Paradoxical theories of divided sovereignty and delegated sovereignty have arisen, to create that confusion of ideas and engender those mischievous and unfounded conclusions, of which Judge Story speaks. Confounding the sovereign authority of the people with the delegated powers conferred by them upon their govern
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 9: (search)
igin of all power—their inherent sovereignty—and this, not by express grant, but by implication? Everett, following, whether consciously or not, in the line of Webster's ill-considered objection to the term compact, takes exception to the sovereignty of the states on the ground that the word sovereignty does not occur in the Con institute another supreme government which it would be treason to resist? This confusion of ideas pervades the treatment of the whole subject of sovereignty. Webster has said, and very justly so far as these United States are concerned: The sovereignty of government is an idea belonging to the other side of the Atlantic. No stion, these gentlemen are blinded to the plain and primary truth that the only way in which the people ordained the Constitution was as the people of States. When Webster says that in the Constitution it is the people who speak, and not the States, he says what is untenable. The states are the people. The people do not speak, nev
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 10: (search)
e convention of 1787, and their fate further testimony Hamilton, Madison, Washington, Marshall, etc. later theories Webster: his views at various periods speech at Capon Springs State rights not a sectional theory. Looking back for a momenr period—but when he had already served for several years in Congress, and had attained the full maturity of his powers— Webster held the views which were presented in a memorial to Congress of citizens of Boston, December 15, 1819, relative to the und to observe the compact. A bargain can not be broken on one side, and still bind the other side. Curtis's Life of Webster, Chapt. XXXVII, Vol. II, pp. 518, 519. The principles which have been set forth in the foregoing chapters, althougin the Senate of the United States against what I believed to be the mistaken construction of the Constitution taught by Webster and his adherents. While I honored the genius of that great man, and held friendly personal relations with him, I consi
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 12: (search)
Chapter 12: Coercion the alternative to secession repudiation of it by the Constitution and the fathers of the Constitutional era difference between Webster and Hamilton. The alternative to secession is coercion. That is to say, if no such right as that of secession exists—if it is forbidden or precluded by the Constitution—then it is a wrong; by a well settled principle of public law, for every wrong there must be a remedy, which in this case must be the application of forcon of military coercion was uniformly treated, as in the above extracts, with still more abhorrence. No principle was more fully and finally settled on the highest authority than that, under our system, there could be no coercion of a state. Webster, in his elaborate speech of February 16, 1833, arguing throughout against the sovereignty of the states, and in the course of his argument sadly confounding the ideas of the federal Constitution and the federal government, as he confounds the so
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Chapter 13: (search)
accessions of new members, as the Constitution fixes those relations permanently, and furnishes the normal standard which is applicable to all. The Boston memorial to Congress, referred to in a foregoing chapter, as prepared by a committee with Webster at its head, says that the new states are universally considered as admitted into the Union upon the same footing as the original States, and as possessing, in respect to the Union, the same rights of sovereignty, freedom, and independence, as tould fail, or if the state making it should suffer an adverse decision, the advocates of that remedy have not revealed what they proposed as the next step—supposing the infraction of the compact to have been of that character which, according to Webster, dissolved it. Secession, on the other hand, was the assertion of the inalienable right of a people to change their government, whenever it ceased to fulfill the purpose for which it was ordained and established. Under our form of government
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Appendix E (search)
ng them through and through. Here Adams aroused his countrymen in the War of Independence, and Webster invoked them almost with the dying breath of his body—invoked with that voice of majesty and p shall be happy to carry away with me, that the Democracy, in the language of your own glorious Webster, still lives; lives, not as his great spirit did, when it hung 'twixt life and death, like a stal Government—such discussion as is commemorated in this picture of your own great and glorious Webster, when he specially addressed our best, most tried, and greatest man, the pure and incorruptiblehey stood to each other in the relation of personal affection and esteem, and never did I see Mr. Webster so agitated, never did I hear his voice falter, as when he delivered the eulogy on John C. Caatesman. Of that I will only say, on this occasion, that very early in my Congressional life Mr. Webster was arraigned for an offense which affected him most deeply. He was no accountant, and all k
Jefferson Davis, The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Appendix H (search)
st have revolution, I say let it be a revolution such as our fathers made when they were denied their natural rights. So much for that. It has quieted apprehension; and I hope that the artillery will not be brought here; that the militia will not be called out; and that the female schools will continue their sessions as heretofore. [Laughter.] The authority of Mr. Madison, however, was relied on by the Senator from Tennessee; and he read fairly an extract from Mr. Madison's letter to Mr. Webster, and I give him credit for reading what it seems to me destroys his whole argument. It is this clause: The powers of the Government being exercised, as in other elective and responsible governments, under the control of its constituents, the people, and the Legislatures of the States, and subject to the revolutionary rights of the people in extreme cases. Now, sir, we are confusing language very much. Men speak of revolution; and when they say revolution they mean blood. Our fath
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