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upon the Government of the United States.
The Constitution, the supreme law of the land, must state in writing exactly the rights delegated by the States for their common government.
The powers not so delegated were reserved by the States to themselves.
They possessed them because they had never parted with them.
An attempt in the Philadelphia Convention to insert a clause in the Constitution prohibiting a State's withdrawal from the Union then being formed could not have succeeded, while an express provision authorizing such secession would have been regarded as unwise and suggestive of disunion of States which were then trying to form “a more perfect union.”
If the framers of the Constitution, when at work in the Quaker City, said nothing upon this very important point, the States to be bound, if they ratified it, said much.
They did not purpose to be blindly gagged and bound to the wheels of the Federal chariot, for they possessed sovereign power.
In the Declaration of Independence the colonies were not declared independent of Great Britain in a collective capacity, but each separate colony was transformed thereby into an independent State; and so his Britannic Majesty treats them by name in a provisional agreement in 1782.
When George III withdrew the scepter of his power from the Virginia colony it was an empire in territory, and became absolutely a free, independent, and sovereign State.
The allegiance of her citizens to her was undisputed and admitted.
Before the life-blood could circulate in the veins of the new Government it must be stamped with the approbation of the States; it had no power to act unless ratified by nine of these States.
If the other four did not ratify the Constitution, the government so formed was not binding on them.
The State conventions called for this purpose were for the most part cautious and exceedingly slow of action.
To the State of Lee's nativity the independence of the colonies and their union afterward as States was largely due. One of her sons held the sword and another the pen that accomplished this great work.
The superb oratory of another kept the camp fires of the Revolution burning brightly, while in ringing tones still another of
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