Our Government is an agency of
delegated and strictly limited powers. Its founders did not look
to its preservation by force; but the chain they wove to bind
these States together was one of love and mutual good offices.
They had broken the fetters of despotic power; they had
separated themselves from the mother-country upon the question
of community independence; and their sons will be degenerate
indeed if, clinging to the mere name and forms of free
government, they forge and rivet upon their posterity the
fetters which their ancestors broke....
"The remedy for these evils is to be found in the patriotism and
the affection of the people, if it exists; and, if it does not
exist, it is far better, instead of attempting to preserve a
forced and therefore fruitless Union, that we should peacefully
part and each pursue his separate course. It is not to this side
of the Chamber that we should look for propositions; it is not
here that we can ask for remedies. Complaints, with much
amplitude of specification, have gone forth from the members on
this side of the Chamber heretofore. It is not to be expected
that they will be renewed, for the people have taken the subject
into their own hands. States, in their sovereign capacity, have
now resolved to judge of the infractions of the Federal compact,
and of the mode and measure of redress.
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