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CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



ing powers,' because this protection against 

 domestic violence is not a foregoing power, 

 not being mentioned until we come to the 

 fourth section of the sixth article, while this 

 provision as to making all laws, etc., is found 

 in the eighth section of the first article ; and 

 besides, where the question is whether the 

 President's power is restricted to the execution 

 of a statute, rather than to the execution of 

 the Constitution, it does not settle any thing to 

 say that Congress may make laws when neces- 

 sary and proper. That is the very question. 

 When not necessary they need not, and when 

 not proper they may not pass the law. I say 

 that Congress need not pass a law to give au- 

 thority to the President to afford this protec- 

 tion ; not that they may not. 



" The term ' United States ' includes all three 

 of the divisions of the Government, and that 

 division of the Government is to act to which 

 the duty appropriately belongs. If a State 

 should pass a law tending to create an aristoc- 

 racy, as that a State judgeship should be he- 

 reditary, then it would be the province of the 

 judiciary to fulfill the guarantee and to declare 

 such law void. In that case the judicial power 

 is ' the United States.' If all law and all form 

 of government in a State have been destroyed 

 by a rebellion, so that it is necessary to have a 

 new organization of government, then it is the 

 legislative power that must fulfill this guarantee 

 by setting up new governments, and then Con- 

 gress is ' the United States.' And here is where 

 Andrew Johnson violated his duty and departed 

 from his proper and legitimate powers, by un- 

 dertaking as the Executive to exercise legisla- 

 tive functions. If there exist domestic violence, 

 disorder, and obstruction to the laws, then it 

 is the province of the Executive on being called 

 upon to fulfill the guarantee of the Constitu- 

 tion, and the Executive is ' the United States.' 



" Mr. President, this provision of the Consti- 

 tution contemplates a sudden emergency, when 

 violence has subjected and trampled down the 

 law, and when, without waiting for the Legis- 

 lature, the Governor is to call upon the Presi- 

 dent for protection. Every other year Con- 

 gress is for nine months not in session, and 

 when in session the introduction of a bill, its 

 reference to a committee, its report upon it, its 

 being three times read and thus passing each 

 House, and then to be subjected to the approval 

 of the President, is a process inconsistent with 

 the demands of the emergency as contemplated 

 by the Constitution. I know Congress may 

 delegate some of its powers; but when the 

 duty is such that Congress cannot perform and 

 that the Executive must, and the power is 

 omitted in enumeration of the powers of Con- 

 gress, and the power is carefully stated to be- 

 long not to Congress but to the United States, 

 then we are to infer that the Constitution in- 

 tended to confer the power on the Executive, 

 and 'not that the duty was to be performed 

 either by the President, or by any one else, by 

 virtue of a delegation of power from Congress. 



" Again, the President of the United States is 

 by the Constitution invested with all the power 

 necessary to perform this duty. He is, by arti- 

 cle two,section 2, made the Commander-in-Chief 

 of the Army and Navy ; and then the Consti- 

 tution, having given him this power, expressly 

 declares that ' the President shall take care 

 that the laws be faithfully executed,' and re- 

 quires him to swear ' that he will faithfully 

 execute the office of President.' There has 

 never been any act passed requiring him to 

 perform this constitutional duty. The Consti- 

 tution need not be enacted into law to be en- 

 forced. It is itself the highest law. There 

 might or there might not be an act of Congress 

 authorizing the President to repel invasion ; 

 that is merely accidental. His duty is the 

 same. If a fleet should come up the Potomac, 

 is the President to stand like a cowardly dotard, 

 with the Army and Navy at his control, until 

 the White House is in ashes and the Capitol in 

 ruins, waiting for a declaration of war by Con- 

 gress, or authority to act from them? The 

 Constitution has made him the custodian of the 

 nation, the protector of its laws ; it has given 

 him the means to execute his high office, and 

 he must perform it. 



" We claimed that the Rio Grande was the 

 western boundary of Texas. Mexico disputed 

 it ; and President Polk sent General Taylor 

 there in 1845 to protect our interests, and war 

 existed for months before it was declared by 

 Congress. 



" We obtained possession of Louisiana in 

 1803 ; of Florida in 1819 ; and there were fre- 

 quent occasions when the President sent our 

 fleet to guard the disputed territory between 

 the Mississippi River and the Perdido. 



" It is true that it is the laws of the United 

 States, and not of the States, that the Presi- 

 dent, under the Constitution, is to see are faith- 

 fully executed ; but under our system of gov- 

 ernment the laws of the United States and the 

 laws of the States are in their execution so in- 

 separably interwoven and interlaced that it is 

 impossible that the former can be executed and 

 enforced in a State whore anarchy exists; and 

 consequently, under tlie provision that the 

 President is to see the laws of the United States 

 faithfully executed, he must see to it that an- 

 archy does not exist in the State. 



" I do not see that we have on this question 

 any thing to do with the propriety of Durell's 

 decisions. The President is intrusted with the 

 Army, not to enforce any man's views or opin- 

 ions ; he is intrusted with the duty of enforc- 

 ing the laws ; he enforces the writ which 

 speaks in the name of the United States, and is 

 tested by the Chief-Justice, and must be obeyed. 

 To hold the President responsible for unjust 

 decisions because he insists that the process of 

 the United States shall be respected, would be 

 to hold that he must sit in judgment to approve 

 or disapprove the findings of the Federal courts, 

 and would be a commingling of the executive 

 with the judicial functions of greater absurdity, 



