taught by history, drawn from the experience of other nations, suggested by the analogies of other governments, contained in the principles of justice and equity, may always exert their due influence upon him who studies and expounds our Consti

tution.

§ 21. It is evident, then, that the true method of interpretation is a resultant of these somewhat divergent forces, a combination of the precise, strict, verbal, narrow mode of the lawyer, and the broader, freer habit of the statesman. The one looks mainly at the letter, disregarding consequences, motives, reasons-ita lex scripta est; the other passes by the letter, and concerns itself with great principles, with considerations of a high expediency, with far-reaching national results. From the very commencement of the present government, there have existed two schools who represent these two modes of construction. The one has unduly exalted the lawyer-like, the other the statesman-like, process. Each is in error, and disasters would surely follow were either to obtain a permanent supremacy. With the one school, the Constitution loses its character as the fundamental, organic law of a government, and sinks to the level of an ordinary private statute, to be expounded with all the technical and literal precision which would be appropriate to a penal code. By them the canons of verbal criticism are invoked without any regard to the object and nature of the instrument to which they are applied. With the other school, the Constitution loses its character of law at all, and becomes simply a starting-point from which to construct a system unwritten and traditional. The one would cramp and dwarf the energies of a growing nation; the other would remove all the barriers which have been set up lest those energies should finally become self-destructive. Combine the two, and the essential ideas of a positive law, and of a political society as the subject of that law, are preserved; the safety and stability of the government are ensured; the national development may go on uninterrupted by arbitrary restraints, and unbroken by sudden shocks. Such has thus far been the method adopted by legislators, executives, and courts, and approved by the people: let us hope that it may never be abandoned.

§ 22. The study of their Political Law is of the highest importance to American lawyers and American citizens. In no other country is the legal profession placed under such an imperative duty to become familiar with this special branch of jurisprudence. The Constitution of the United States is a law to legislatures, to executives, and to courts both of the nation and of the states; the constitution of each commonwealth is, in like manner, a law to its local authorities. Every statute, every administrative act, every exercise of jurisdiction, must be tested by, and conform to, this fundamental utterance of the people's sovereign will. Hence the bar and the bench are called upon to exercise a function unknown in other countries, that of pronouncing upon the validity of a statute by comparing it with the Constitution, and by deciding as to the power of the legislature to enact it. English courts are constantly compelled to construe and interpret; but for them to declare an act of Parliament void, from a want of authority in that body, would be an anomaly indeed. Private rights and duties are affected by all governmental acts; and the American lawyer cannot meet the requirements of his profession, cannot maintain the private interests intrusted to him, unless he is acquainted not only with the text of the Constitution, but also with the judicial and legislative interpretation which forms the mass of our Political Law.

23. The motives which should urge the citizen are far higher and more imperative than those addressed to the lawyer. Second only to his duty to God, stands that to his country; the welfare of the body-politic has a stronger claim upon him than even that of family or of self. How wonderfully has this truth, forgotten perhaps for a while, been recognized, accepted, and acted upon within the last six years! But, by the organization of our government, the welfare of the bodypolitic is committed directly to the citizen. Even if not an elector, he may become one; and, at all events, he may exert a controlling influence which goes to make up a part of that public opinion which carries along with it electors and the elected. Weighty as is the obligation resting upon all citizens, it assumes a deeper and more imperative nature as it affects

the educated classes, and especially the young men and young women who are preparing for the duties of citizenship by the culture received from the college, the academy, the school. Their very knowledge and discipline should fit them to give tone and character to public opinion; to lead, and not to be driven, in all political movements. Our higher institutions of learning, and our means for a widely diffused popular education, will have miserably failed in attaining the most important object for which they were designed, if they do not make young men and women better, wiser, truer, stronger American citizens. The customary course of study need not be disturbed; it performs its good office; it gives mental vigor, and imparts knowledge. But some direct and systematic instruction in the Political Law of the United States should form a necessary part of the work done not only in every college, but in every academy and common school. That this study has not been and is not thus universal, is glaringly inconsistent with the ideas upon which our government is based; it is antagonistic to those principles of popular education which have come to be regarded as axiomatic; it has been at least the partial cause of disasters that cannot be measured, of evils that well-nigh destroyed the nation itself.

§ 24. The analysis given at the commencement of this chapter suggests the general topics which fall within the department of Political Law. In applying these abstract notions to our own country, they must be modified by the peculiar character of the Constitution, by the anomalous and complicated nature of the political organization, by the double distribution of governmental functions, and by the definite limits. placed upon the exercise of powers both by the nation and by the respective states.

In pursuing my design, the work will be divided into three parts, each to a certain extent independent of the others.

Part First will consider and answer the question, What is the Constitution, and by whom was it created? — or, in other words, will treat of the essential character of the organic law and of the body-politic which lies behind it.

Part Second will consider and answer the question, In what

manner and by whom is the Constitution to be authoritatively construed and interpreted? — or, in other words, will treat of the means and combinations for assuring the observance of the fundamental law.

Part Third will answer the question, What powers and duties are conferred or imposed upon the national government, and what conferred or imposed upon the several states?

PART FIRST.

WHAT IS THE CONSTITUTION, AND BY WHOM WAS IT CREATED? THE ESSENTIAL NATURE OF THE ORGANIC LAW, AND OF THE BODY-POLITIC WHICH LIES BEHIND IT.

§ 25. Ir does not require any extended argument to convince us that the question to be discussed in the first part of this work lies at the basis of all others. Upon the conceptions we form of the essential character of this organic law, and of the body-politic which lies behind it, must depend our notions of all the relations of the United States and the several commonwealths to each other, and of all the functions of the general and local governments. Is this Constitution the fundamental law of a nation? Then the government must, to some extent, possess national and comprehensive powers. Is it, on the other hand, a mere league, treaty, or articles of agreement and federation between sovereign and independent nations, who thereby delegate a portion of their inherent powers to the agents thus constituted? Then the powers must be limited by the very letter of the instrument which creates this agency, and are virtually under the management and control of the sovereigns who have delegated them. We are met, then, at the very threshold of the political structure we are to examine, by this most momentous consideration; and to it we should give our careful and candid thought and attention. The views we shall adopt will give shape and color to all our