148 



the character and the nature of the Govern- 

 ment. This is, as was well expressed by the 

 Senator from Tennessee this evening, not pure- 

 ly a confederacy, nor is it altogether a popular 

 government. It is a government? of the peo- 

 ple, and at the same time a confederacy. The 

 States, before the formation of the Federal 

 Government, were independent States. They 

 had the right to go into the confederacy, or not 

 to go into it, as they pleased. It was not oblig- 

 atory upon Pennsylvania to become a party to 

 the confederacy ; and, if the other States had 

 agreed to the Constitution, and Pennsylvania 

 had not agreed to it, Pennsylvania would not 

 have been a part of the Government ; and that 

 was provided for in the Constitution .itself, for 

 the very last provision of the Constitution is 

 that 



The ratification of the conventions of nine States 

 shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Con- 

 stitution between the States so ratifying the same. 



" The States, as States thus coming into the 

 Union, came in upon the basis of the Constitu- 

 tion itself. They surrendered up a portion of 

 their State authority and power, and they re- 

 tained a portion. I say that a government 

 thus formed cannot, by the authority of amend- 

 ment of the Constitution, be so changed as en- 

 tirely to depart from the spirit and the purpose 

 of the confederation." 



Mr. Howe, of Wisconsin, said : " I under- 

 stood the Senator to say that we could not, 

 by an amendment of the Constitution, change 

 the nature or character of the Government." 



Mr. Hendricks: "Yes, th nature of the 

 Government itself." 



Mr. Howe : " I wish to ask the Senator from 

 Indiana what amendment can be made to the 

 Constitution that will not change the nature or 

 character of the Government ? " 



Mr. Hendricks: "Why, sir, I can conceive 

 of very many amendments. I think, if the Sen- 

 ator will turn to the book, he will find about 

 twelve amendments that did not change the 

 character of the Government. One of these 

 amendments, to which I will refer by way of 

 illustration in answer to the Senator, was that 

 for the election of President and Vice-Presi- 

 dent: the mode of electing the President and 

 Vice-President is different from what it was 

 originally. 



" Mr. President, my objection, which I now 

 choose to state to the amendment proposed 

 and pending before the Senate, is that it does 

 change the nature of the Government ; it does 

 take away from the States a power which they 

 retained, and which is necessary to that inde- 

 pendence and sovereignty of the States which 

 the original compact contemplated they should 

 enjoy. 



"Now, Mr. President, in using the term 

 ' sovereignty of the States,' I do not mean that 

 the States have contrgl of every subject. In 

 that sense the States are not sovereign ; in that 

 sense the Federal Government is not sovereign ; 

 but in the language of the courts the States are 



CONGKESS, UNITED STATES. 



s6vereign within the sphere of their jurisdic- 

 tion or reserved powers, while the General 

 Government is sovereign within the sphere of 

 its jurisdiction. I think that the right to con- 

 trol the suffrage for the election of State offi- 

 cers is essential to the independence of the 

 States, is essential to the very nature of the 

 Government itself. 



" In further illustration of the question asked 

 by the Senator from Wisconsin, I may say that 

 the Constitution might be so amended as to 

 regulate the suffrage in the election of Federal 

 officers. I think that, for the purpose of elect- 

 ing members of Congress, by an amendment 

 of the Constitution the qualifications of the 

 voters might be defined, and that would not 

 change the nature of the Government; it would 

 change, to some extent, the mode of selecting 

 Federal officers. But when the Constitution 

 of the United States comes to regulate the 

 mode of selecting State officers, and takes away 

 from the States the control of that question, 

 you materially change the framework of the 

 Government itself. I can conceive of no power 

 so important to a State as to decide who shall 

 be her officers and in what mode these officers 

 shall be selected, whether by all the people or 

 by a portion of the people. It is for her to se- 

 lect her own officers, to define who shall be 

 her officers and how they shall be chosen ; and, 

 if you take that power away from a govern- 

 ment and confer it upon another government, 

 you have materially and very essentially 

 changed the nature of the relations between 

 the two." 



Mr. Davis, of Kentucky, said : " Will the 

 honorable Senator permit me to read from Mar- 

 shall's opinion in the case of McCulloch vs. 

 State of Maryland ? " 



Mr. Hendricks: "With great pleasure." 



Mr. Davis : " ' A power to create implies a 

 power to preserve. A power to destroy, if 

 wielded by a different hand, is hostile to and 

 incompatible with these powers to create and 

 preserve.' * The sovereignty of a State extends 

 to every thing which exists by its own author- 

 ity, or is introduced by its permission.' * That 

 the power to destroy may defeat and render 

 useless the power to create ; that there is plain 

 repugnance in conferring on one government a 

 power to control the constitutions and meas- 

 ures of another.' " 



Mr. Hendricks : " That is much -more satis- 

 factorily expressed than I was able to express 

 it. When this Government was established, 

 there were certain powers retained by the 

 States, and there were certain defined powers 

 conferred upon the Government of the United 

 States. In the exercise of the powers conferred 

 upon the Government of the United States, 

 that Government is sovereign. In the exercise 

 of the powers retained by the States those gov- 

 ernments are sovereign. Where a State has 

 the power to regulate a subject and the Gen- 

 eral Government has no control over its action 

 in that regulation, the State is completely sov- 



