If, therefore, the persons assuming the office are not appointed _by the State_, and _in the manner_ directed by the Legislature, they are not electors; that is to say, they are not electors _de jure_; electors _de facto_ they can hardly become, since their functions exist but for a moment, and with one act they perish. What is an appointment by the State? How can _a State_ appoint? I answer, by the people, the corporators of the body politic and corporate, or by one of the departments of its government, as established by its constitution. The power to appoint cannot be renounced or divested. It must ever remain in the State, a living power, to be called into action at each recurring election. It cannot be delegated, except as the different powers of the State are by its constitution delegated to its great departments of government. If it were otherwise, it might be delegated to a foreign prince, and delegated in perpetuity. It is no answer to say that such a delegation _would_ not be made, the question is, whether it _could_ be made, without violating the Constitution of the country? I insist that it could not; and that if the Legislature of New York were to authorize our friend the Emperor Alexander, or our excellent neighbor the Governor-General of Canada, to appoint the thirty-five presidential electors to which New York is entitled in the sum total of the electoral colleges, and the electors thus appointed were to receive the certificate of the Governor of New York, and to meet, vote, and transmit their certificates to Washington, the votes might be lawfully rejected. Such an occurrence is in the highest degree improbable; but stranger things than that have happened. The Empress Catharine intervened in the election of the kings of Poland, and the interference led to the downfall of the government and the blotting of the country from the map of Europe. Indeed, I venture to express my belief, that such an intervention of foreign influence in our elections would have been hardly more startling to the imaginations of our fathers than the spectacle which our own eyes have seen; federal soldiers removing representatives from the Capitol of one State, and stationed at the doors of another, to inspect the certificates of members elected to its Legislature.