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THE

ADDRESSES AND MESSAGES

OF THE

PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES,

INAUGURAL, ANNUAL, AND SPECIAL,

FROM

1789 TO 1851;

WITH

A MEMOIR OF EACH OF THE PRESIDENTS

AND

A HISTORY OF THEIR ADMINISTRATIONS:

ALSO,

THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES, AND A SELECTION OF
IMPORTANT DOCUMENTS AND STATISTICAL INFORMATION.

COMPILED FROM OFFICIAL SOURCES,

BY EDWIN WILLIAMS.

EMBELLISHED WITH PORTRAITS OF THE PRESIDENTS,

ENGRAVED ON STEEL BY VISTUS BALCH.

IN FOUR VOLUMES,
VOL. II.

NEW AND ENLARGED EDITION.

NEW YORK:

EDWARD WALKER, 114 FULTON STREET.

1853.

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in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States, in and for the Southern District of New York.

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STEREOTYPED BY C. C. SAVAGE,

13 Chambers Street, N. Y.

no other light. The people, the highest authority known to our system, from whom all our institutions spring, and on whom they depend, formed it. Had the people of the several states thought proper to incorporate themselves into one community, under one government, they might have done it. They had the power, and there was nothing then, nor is there anything now, should they be so disposed, to prevent it. They wisely stopped, however, at a certain point, extending the incorporation to that point, making the national government, thus far, a consolidated government, and preserving the state governments, without that limit, perfectly sovereign and independent of the national government. Had the people of the several states incorporated themselves into one community, they must have remained such; their constitution becoming then, like the constitution of the several states, incapable of change, until altered by the will of the majority. In the institution of a state government by the citizens of a state, a compact is formed, to which all and every citizen are equal parties. They are also the sole parties, and may amend it at pleasure. In the institution of the government of the United States, by the citizens of every state, a compact was formed between the whole American people, which has the same force, and partakes of all the qualities, to the extent of its powers, as a compact between the citizens of a state, in the formation of their own constitution. It can not be altered, except by those who formed it, or in the mode prescribed by the parties to the compact itself.

This constitution was adopted for the purpose of remedying all the defects of the confederation, and in this it has succeeded, beyond any calculation that could have been formed of any human institution. By binding the states together, the constitution performs the great office of the confederation; but it is in that sense only, that it has any of the properties of that compact, and in that it is more effectual, to the purpose, as it holds them together by a much stronger bond; and in all other respects, in which the confederation failed, the constitution has been blessed with complete success. The confederation was a compact between separate and independent states; the execution of whose articles, in the powers which operated internally, depended on the state governments. But the great office of the constitution by incorporating the people of the several states, to the extent of its powers, into one community, and enabling it to act directly on the people, was to annul the powers of the state governments to that extent, except in cases where they were concurrent, and to preclude their agency in giving effect to those of the general government. The government of the United States relies on its own means for the execution of its powers, as the state governments do for the execution of theirs ; both governments having a common origin, or sovereign, the people; the state governments the people of each state, the national government the people of every state, and being amenable to the power which created it. It is by executing its functions as a government, thus originating and thus acting, that the constitution of the United States holds the states together, and performs the office of a league. It is owing to the nature of its pow ers, and the high source whence they are derived, the people, that it performs that office better than the confederation, or any league which ever existed, being a compact which the state governments did not form, to which they are not parties, and which executes its own powers independently of them.

Thus were two separate and independent governments established over our Union, one for local purposes, over each state, by the people of the

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