[143] made of their right to do so, and formed a new association. One of the declared objects of this new partnership was to form “a more perfect union.” This certainly did not mean more perfect in respect of duration; the former union had been declared perpetual, and perpetuity admits of no addition. It did not mean that it was to be more indissoluble; the delegates of the states, in ratifying the former compact of union, had expressed themselves in terms that could scarcely be made more stringent They then said:
And we do further solemnly plight and engage the faith of our respective constituents, that they shall abide by the determinations of the United States in Congress assembled, on all questions which, by the said confederation, are submitted to them; and that the articles thereof shall be involvedly observed by the States we respectively represent; and that the Union shall be perpetual.1The formation of a “more perfect union” was accomplished by the organization of a government more complete in its various branches, legislative, executive, and judicial, and by the delegation to this government of certain additional powers of functions which had previously been exercised by the governments of the respective states—especially in providing the means of operating directly upon individuals for the enforcement of its legitimately delegated authority. There was no abandonment nor modification of the essential principle of a compact between sovereigns, which applied to the one case as fully as to the other. There was not the slightest intimation of so radical a revolution as the surrender of the sovereignty of the contracting parties would have been. The additional powers conferred upon the federal government by the Constitution were merely transfers of some of those possessed by the state governments—not subtractions from the reserved and inalienable sovereignty of the political communities which conferred them. It was merely the institution of a new agent who, however enlarged his powers might be, would still remain subordinate and responsible to the source from which they were derived—that of the sovereign people of each state. It was an amended Union, not a consolidation. It is a remarkable fact that the very powers of the federal government and prohibitions to the states, which are most relied upon by the advocates of centralism as incompatible with state sovereignty, were in force under the old confederation when the sovereignty of the states was expressly recognized. The general government had then, as now, the exclusive right and power of determining on peace and war, making treaties and alliances, maintaining an army and navy, granting letters of
