200 



CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



expressly authorized by the Constitution or by act 

 of Congress. 



44 In the first place, I call your attention to 

 the limitation to 'such cases and under such 

 circumstances as such employment may be au- 

 thorized by an act of Congress.' Taking it 

 literally, you must have an act of Congress 

 that seems to provide for that very case, that 

 shall say in terms that the marshal or Presi- 

 dent, as the case may be, when a process is 

 is>ued from a particular court and in a particu- 

 lar instance, may call upon the power of the 

 United States organized into the form of a re- 

 sponsible army, or else he can not call under 

 this section at all. 



44 Then here is another phrase : 



May be expressly authorized by act of Congress. 



"That is a term of the future; and in a 

 criminal case, construing a criminal statute 

 strictly, it might be said with a great deal of 

 force that, until you can get a new act of Con- 

 gress which authorizes it, you have no author- 

 ity at all, however many there may be of the 

 old statutes. 



44 1 am going to vote to strike out this whole 

 thing. In a government of law, where we have 

 organized a body of men whose business it is, 

 under a constitutional commander and in a case 

 where the law authorizes it, to apply the power 

 of the will of the people in the execution of 

 the law, I do not propose for one to emascu- 

 late that authority." 



Mr. Merrimon, of North Carolina, said: "Mr. 

 President, it seems to me that the argument 

 of the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Edmunds) 

 particularly, and I may say the arguments 

 generally on that side of the House, proceed 

 npon the false notion that the laws of the 

 United States are to be executed, whenever 

 physical force is necessary to that end, by the 

 use of the army. That is a great mistake. 

 The people of this country are citizens of the 

 United States, and, whether they live in one 

 place or another, they are as much bound to 

 join in the execution of the laws of the United 

 States as they are the laws of the States in 

 which they live. By possibility there can not 

 be any conflict, in contemplation of the Con- 

 stitution, between the laws of a State and of 

 the United State?. This vast machinery of 

 government, taken as a whole, is harmonious 

 in contemplation of law ; each part is without 

 conflict with the other, and each is in har- 

 mony with the other. It is as much the duty 

 of a magistrate of a State, a justice of the 

 peace, or a judge or the Governor or any offi- 

 cer of a State Government, to enforce the laws 

 of the United States as to enforce the laws of 

 the State in which they live and of which they 

 n*-e the immediate officers. The laws of the 

 United States are the laws of the people every- 

 where, and in the same measure. 



44 Take the case put by the Senator from 

 Maine (Mr. Blaine) a while ago, in which he 

 aid, suppose that a collector of internal revenue 



shall be about to seize an illicit distillery, and 

 he is resisted, where is the force to come from 

 to aid him in the execution of that law in that 

 behalf? The answer is just as simple as it 

 would be if you were to put the like case of a 

 sheriff in a State. It is not to apply for the 

 army ; it is not to call in the aid of the sol- 

 diery by application to the President or any 

 other authority ; but it is to call in the aid of 

 the posse comitatus, the people around him, 

 every citizen, everybody liable to do public 

 duty at all. The people, the posse comitatus, 

 are as much bound to respond to him, to aid 

 him, as to aid a sheriff in the execution of 

 State process, in the collection of State taxes 

 just the same, and on the same principle." 



Mr. Blaine : " Will the Senator permit a ques- 

 tion just there? " 



Mr. Merrimon : " Yes. and I will answer it 

 if I can." 



Mr. Blaine: "The case the Senator from 

 California referred to (the sixth volume of the 

 * Opinions of the Attorneys - General ' con- 

 taining the opinion) was a case of the arrest 

 of a fugitive slave, where the marshal sum- 

 moned the posse comitatus, and the posse 

 comitatus was all against him; the bystanders 

 were against him ; and then he said he had a 

 right to call in that part of the posse comita- 

 tus located there in the army of the United 

 States that would not be against him. Now I 

 ask the Senator from North Carolina this 

 question: If you attempt to seize an illicit 

 distillery, and all the surrounding population 

 feel in regard to that illicit distillery and 

 there are some parts of this country where 

 they do feel a good deal that way just as the 

 people of Boston did about the arrest of fugi- 

 tive slaves, so that when you call the posse 

 comitatus they are on the side of the illicit 

 distiller, what will you do then? " 



Mr. Merrimon: "Do as in the case of the 

 whisky insurrection in western Pennsylvania." 

 Mr. Blaine : " The troops were called in." 

 Mr. Merrimon : " Of course, but not at once. 

 Not until civil remedy after civil remedy was 

 exhausted, not until after a proclamation was 

 issued in pursuance of the laws of the United 

 States, were the military called to aid in en- 

 forcing the law." 



Mr. Blaine : " Then the Senator from North 

 Carolina would have the President issue a great 

 proclamation every time an illicit distillery was 

 to be seized." 



Mr. Merrimon: "No, sir; when we pro- 

 ceed according to the Constitution and the 

 laws it will be very seldom in this country 

 when such power will have to be employed. 

 I have not heard of any case, putting aside 

 the late war, where the American people (un- 

 less perhaps the exception the Senator has just 

 mentioned in Boston) failed to aid the mar- 

 shal in doing his office when they were prop- 

 erly called upon to do it. The American peo- 

 ple are for the most part law-abiding; the 

 laws are their laws, and they are willing to aid 



