In the discussions of this question by the advocates of the organization of a "general system of internal improvements" under the auspices of the Federal Government, reliance is had for the justification of the measure on several of the powers expressly granted to Congress, such as to establish post-offices and post-roads, to declare war, to provide and maintain a navy, to raise and support armies, to regulate commerce, and to dispose of the territory and other public property of the United States, As to the last of these sources of power, that of disposing of the territory and other public property of the United States, it may be conceded that it authorizes Congress, in the management of the public property, to make improvements essential to the successful execution of the trust; but this must be the primary object of any such improvement, and it would be an abuse of the trust to sacrifice the interest of the property to incidental purposes. As to the other assumed sources of a general power over internal improvements, they being specific powers of which this is supposed to be the incident, if the framers of the Constitution, wise and thoughtful men as they were, intended to confer on Congress the power over a subject so wide as the whole field of internal improvements, it is remarkable that they did not use language clearly to express it, or, in other words, that they did not give it as a distinct and substantive power instead of making it the implied incident of some other one; for such is the magnitude of the supposed incidental power and its capacity of expansion that any system established under it would exceed each of the others in the amount of expenditure and number of the persons employed, which would thus be thrown upon the General Government. This position may be illustrated by taking as a single example one of the many things comprehended clearly in the idea of "a general system of internal improvements," namely, roads. Let it be supposed that the power to construct roads over the whole Union, according to the suggestion of President J.Q. Adams in 1807, whilst a member of the Senate of the United States, had been conceded. Congress would have begun, in pursuance of the state of knowledge at the time, by constructing turnpikes; then, as knowledge advanced, it would have constructed canals, and at the present time it would have been embarked in an almost limitless scheme of railroads.