questions to be examined. It had been said that the Cortes ought to assemble, that the Council of Castille should convoke them, and the whole proceedings be executed under the authority of that tribunal. But the Council of Castille never possessed the right of convoking the Cortes, ... why then should they give it that authority? Was it because it had lent the whole weight of its influence to the usurpation? Because it had acted in opposition to those fundamental laws which it was established to preserve and defend? Because it had afforded the enemy every facility to usurp the sovereignty of Spain, to destroy the hereditary succession of the crown, and the dynasty legally in possession? Because it had recognized and seated on the throne a foreigner, destitute even of the shadow of a title to it? What confidence could the Spanish nation place in a government convoked by an authority incompetent, illegal, and guilty of acts which might justly be ranked with the most atrocious crimes against their country? But the Council of Castille being thus excluded from all consideration, who was to convoke the Cortes? It was the peculiar and exclusive prerogative of the King to summon them; the provinces would not submit to any other authority; they would not unite: thus, therefore, there would be no Cortes, or, if a few deputies were to assemble, that very circumstance would occasion divisions, the very evil which all were anxious to avoid. The kingdom found itself suddenly without a king and without a government, ... a situation unknown in its history, and to its laws. The people legally resumed the power of appointing a government. They created Juntas without any regard to the cities which had votes in the Cortes. The legitimate power was therefore deposited with the Juntas: in virtue of that power they had governed, and still were governing, and had been, and still were, universally acknowledged and obeyed. Their situation had not changed; the danger still existed; no new authority had supervened: the lawful authority resided entire in the Juntas to which the people had confided it. It was therefore incontestable that the sole and exclusive right of electing those who were to compose the supreme government was vested in the supreme Juntas. And whom should they elect? Most certainly individuals of their own body; for they alone derived their power from the people, and in them the nation had reposed entire confidence. Hence, if there were any province in which the military power subsisted alone, it was absolutely necessary that a supreme Junta should be constituted there, by which the people might act; this being indispensable, in order to concentrate the legitimate power of the people; for, under present circumstances, the government could not be legitimate, unless it originated in their free consent.