Slavery and the ConstitutionBowditch, William I. (William Ingersoll)
Religion
Slavery and the Constitution
Bowditch, William I. (William Ingersoll)
Enslaved persons -- United States -- Social conditions; Slavery -- United States
In order, therefore, that the end of the Constitution may be
accomplished, that it may really be the supreme law of the land, it must
have provided a way in which its only true meaning may be ascertained
and definitively settled. Unless it has provided a final interpreter of
its meaning, it is the merest folly to style it the supreme law of the
land, or to call on us to obey its requirement. Is the Constitution thus
deficient? Does it demand uniformity, and at the same time deny the use
of those means which are absolutely necessary to produce such
uniformity? Does it present a variable, ever-changing standard of duty,
and yet demand complete uniformity in practice?
There are three departments in the Government, namely, the Executive,
the Legislative, and the Judicial. The first two of these are each, to
some extent, supreme in its own sphere; and its acts are incapable of
revision elsewhere. "Thus, in measures exclusively of a political,
legislative, or executive character, it is plain, that, as the supreme
authority as to these questions belongs to the legislative and executive
departments, they cannot be re-examined elsewhere. Thus, Congress having
the power to declare war, to levy taxes, to appropriate money, to
regulate intercourse and commerce with foreign nations, their mode of
executing these powers can never become the subject of re-examination in
any other tribunal. So, the power to make treaties being confided to the
President and Senate, when a treaty is properly ratified, it becomes the
law of the land, and no other tribunal can gainsay its stipulations. Yet
cases may readily be imagined, in which a tax may be laid, or a treaty
made, upon motions and grounds wholly beside the intention of the
Constitution. The remedy, however, in such cases is solely by an appeal
to the people at the elections, or by the salutary power of amendment
provided by the Constitution itself.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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