power of the State within the limits of its jurisdiction. Allegiance in a Nation composed of Confederated States, and dependent Territories, is submission to the Supreme power of the National Sovereignty within the sphere of its jurisdiction. In either case, both Sovereignty and Allegiance are limited by the Constitution, and by the Constitution only. In either case, it is not for the people to disclaim or withold their allegiance because, perchance, they were parties to the Compact which limits and defines the Sovereignty. With us, even the States in their Sovereign capacity owe a certain allegiance to the National Supremacy, which allegiance is also limited by the Constitution. It is not in the power, therefore, of the people of a single State to throw off the allegiance due from the State to the National Sovereignty, without destroying the Sovereignty of the State itself. Nor is it in the power of the people of any one of the States to throw off their allegiance to its Sovereignty without abrogating the State Constitution. With us, so far is Sovereignty from resting "exclusively with the people of each State," so restrained are they by the National Sovereignty, that they cannot change their own State Government from a Republican to a Monarchical, or to any other form. Hence it is absurd, nay more it is revolutionary, to say that because the people united in creating the National Sovereignty, therefore it is not Sovereign.

Much less are the people Sovereign in the Territory, or Territories, belonging to the National Sovereignty, called the United States. The very idea of ownership involves the idea of Sovereign jurisdiction, which also includes the

idea of allegiance. This Sovereignty and allegiance may indeed be qualified, or limited, by an enactment of the General Sovereignty establishing a local Territorial Government, but neither is thereby extinguished, nor is the authority thereby delegated to the people, or to the Territorial Government, made exclusive: Nor does it give the people inhabiting therein a right to a higher state of political existence. The transfer from a Territorial to a State Organization involves a declaration of independence on the part of the Territory, or a relinquishment of its Supremacy over it on the part of the National Sovereignty. It proposes a condition of political existence which cannot be created without depriving the National Sovereignty of a part at least of its Supremacy. Not only so, but, with us, it also places the New Organization in the relations and position of a co-partner in the Sovereignty existing in the National Confederacy.

And has the National Sovereignty no interest in this political transformation? May it not say whether at all, or upon what terms, or subject to what conditions, it will consent to this new creation? Consent to relinquish its own Supremacy over its own Territory? And admit the New State, thus created, into the great Federal Copartnership?

The People of the United States, the source of Sovereignty with us, have said, CONSTITUTION, ARTICLE VI., SEC. 2, This Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all Treaties made, or which shall be made under the authority of the United States, shall be the Supreme Law of the

land: and the Judges of every State, shall be bound thereby, anything in the Constitution and laws of any State, to the contrary notwithstanding."

We may look in vain for a better exposition of Sovereignty in the Government of the United States than is here found. Supremacy to govern is Sovereignty. The Constitution is not Sovereignty, it is the Charter of Sovereignty. It is not law except in the sense of its Supremacy. Nor yet is it Supreme by itself alone, but also in the laws made in pursuance of its provisions, and in the Treaties made under the authority which it establishes. Law is not the act, but the voice of Sovereignty. The Constitution

does not act; the Law does not act; Treaties do not act ; but it is the Officers of the Government in their various departments who perform its behests. They act, and act with all the power and might of the Sovereignty whose laws they enforce, whose mandates they execute, whose voice directs their duties. It is immaterial how this Supreme power originates, or how it exists, so long as it is legitimate. While it exists, its powers are Sovereign within the sphere of its jurisdiction. This is limited by the Constitution only, and cannot be infringed or repudiated, either by the States, or by the people of the States, or Territories, so long as the Constitution is maintained in its integrity.

The Sovereignty of the Crown of Great Britain, established under the English Constitution by the Revolution of 1688, was called a Popular Sovereignty, not because it recognized the Supremacy of the popular will, but because it conceded that the people were one of the sources of its

Sovereignty. The Constitution of the United States established a freer and still more Popular Sovereignty, in that it recognized the People as the only source of its Supremacy. Popular Sovereignty does not mean the "exclusive Sovereignty of the People;" or a Sovereignty exclusive of Constitutions and Laws; but a Sovereignty, whether State or National, established under a Constitution formed by the people, acting freely, and without any extraneous or arbitrary compulsion or restraint. The Constitution thus established by the people is the Charter of Supremacy to the government, in every Popular Sovereignty. A State Sovereignty is called a Popular Sovereignty because in it both Sovereignty and Allegiance are limited by a Constitution created by the free voice of the people. So also is the National Sovereignty of the United States called a Popular Sovereignty, for the same reason. A Popular Territorial Sovereignty is an absurdity. The very terms are contradictory and antagonistic. Territorial is colonial; it implies dependence, and sovereign dependence is a political absurdity.

The people inhabiting in a dependent Territory, therefore, must necessarily be subject to the Sovereignty upon which they depend. The Sovereignty acquired under the Constitution is supreme. The Sovereignty acquired by the cession of Territory is supreme. The Sovereignty acquired by the purchase of Territory is also supreme; and if there be any greater supremacy in Sovereignty, it certainly must be that title to supremacy which is acquired by conquest. In all these modes of acquisition the exclusive supremacy of the National Government in its Terri

torial domain, thus expanded, cannot be questioned. It is above and beyond all doubt and peradventure. And although, with us, by general consent as well as by special compact, the Constitution has been adopted and referred to as limiting the exercise of thisSupremacy in our Federal and State relations, still the Supremacy of the National Sovereignty in its own Territorial domain is not thereby depreciated or destroyed. It may indeed delegate a portion of its authority to the people, by the establishment of a local Territorial government, but it does not thereby relinquish its own Supremacy, or release the people inhabiting therein from their allegiance to it, or render them independent of its superior Sovereignty. It may, at will, repeal the Act conferring those powers, and resume its exclusive jurisdiction over them. Hence there is, there can be, no inherent right in the people inhabiting in such Territory to form a government for themselves, independently of the National Sovereignty. This right, with us, is exclusive only in the people of a State, provided it be Republican and in conformity with their allegiance to the National Sovereignty. The great error of our day is, in claiming that State rights belong to the people inhabiting in the Territories before they become a State. With us, they cannot become a State Organization without the consent of the Sovereignty on which they depend. They cannot adopt a Constitution for their own government, in anticipation of their transfer from a Territorial to a State Organization, which would be of any validity, or worth, without the assent of the National Sovereignty, or its recognition of it after it is made. Still if the Supreme