2. Next comes the fountain, “Congress shall have power to declare war, to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy.” A power like this is from its nature unlimited. In raising and supporting an army, in providing and maintaining a navy, Congress is not restricted to any particular class or color. It may call upon all, and authorize that _contract_ which the Government makes with an enlisted soldier. But such contract would be in itself an act of manumission; for a slave cannot make a contract. And if the contract be followed by actual service, who can deny its completest efficacy in enfranchising the soldier-slave and his whole family? Shakespeare, immortal teacher, gives expression to an instinctive sentiment, when he makes Henry the Fifth, on the eve of the victory at Agincourt, encourage his men by promising,-- “For he to-day that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition.” * * * * * 3. There is still another clause: “The United States shall guaranty to every State in this Union _a republican form of government_.” Here again is a plain duty. But the question recurs, What is a republican form of government? John Adams, in the correspondence of his old age, says:-- “The customary meanings of the words _republic_ and _commonwealth_ have been infinite. They have been applied to every government under heaven,--that of Turkey and that of Spain, as well as that of Athens and of Rome, of Geneva and San Marino.”[277]