A man's "original and natural right" to make all contracts that are "intrinsically obligatory," and to coerce the fulfilment of them, is one of the most valuable and indispensable of all human possessions. But Marshall assumes that a man may "surrender" this right to "society," under a pledge from "society," that it will secure to him "a more safe and certain" fulfilment of his contracts, than he is capable of himself; and that "society," having thus obtained from him this "surrender," may then turn around to him, and not only refuse to fulfil its pledge to him, but may also prohibit his own exercise of his own "original and natural right," which he has "surrendered" to "society!" This is as much as to say that, if A can but induce B to intrust his (B's) property with him (A), for safekeeping, under a pledge that he (A) will keep it more safely and certainly than B can do it himself, _A thereby acquires an "unquestionable right" to keep the property forever, and let B whistle for it!_ This is the kind of assumption on which Marshall based all his ideas of the constitutional law of this country; that _constitutional_ law, which he was so famous for expounding. It is the kind of assumption, by which he expounded the people out of all their "original and natural rights." He had just as much right to assume, and practically did assume, that the people had voluntarily "come into society," and had voluntarily "surrendered" to their governments _all their other natural rights_, as well as their "original and natural right" to make and enforce their own contracts. He virtually said to all the people of this country: You have voluntarily "come into society," and have voluntarily "surrendered" to your governments all your natural rights, of every name and nature whatsoever, _for safe keeping;_ and now that these governments have, _by your own consent_, got possession of all your natural rights, they have an "_unquestionable right_" to withhold them from you forever. If it were not melancholy to see mankind thus cheated, robbed, enslaved, and murdered, on the authority of such naked impostures as these, it would be, to the last degree, ludicrous, to see a man like Marshall--reputed to be one of the first intellects the country has ever had--solemnly expounding the "constitutional powers," as he called them, by which the general and State governments were authorized to rob the people of all their natural rights as human beings.