"But ambitious encroachments of the Federal Government on the authority of the State governments would not excite the opposition of a single State, or of a few States only. They would be signals of general alarm. Every government would espouse the common cause; a correspondence would be opened; plans of resistance would be concerted; one spirit would animate and conduct the whole. The same combination, in short, would result from an apprehension of the _federal_ as was produced by the dread of a _foreign_ yoke; and, unless the projected innovations should be voluntarily renounced, the same appeal to a trial of force would be made in the one case as was made in the other. But what degree of madness would ever drive the Federal Government to such an extremity? * * * But what would be the contest in the case we are supposing? Who would be the parties? A few Representatives of the people would be opposed to the people themselves; or, rather, one set of Representatives would be contending against thirteen sets of Representatives, with the whole body of their common constituents on the side of the latter. The only refuge left for those who prophesy the downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the Federal Government may previously accumulate a military force for the projects of ambition. * * * Extravagant as the supposition is, let it, however, be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed, and let it be entirely at the devotion of the Federal Government; still it would not be going too far to say that the State governments, with the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger. The highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing army can be carried in any country, does not exceed 1/100th of the whole number of souls, or 1/25th part of the number able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield to the United States an army of more than 25 or 30,000 men. To these would be opposed a militia amounting to near 500,000 citizens, with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence." I shall not spend the time of your honors by reading the Virginia and Kentucky resolutions--the one the production of James Madison, and the other of Thomas Jefferson--with which you are so familiar. They fully bear out the doctrine for which I contend, and much more than I contend for. I wish, however, to read, from the American State Papers, vol. 21, p. 6, a series of resolutions adopted by the Legislature of Pennsylvania, on the 3d April, 1809. They are as follows: "_Resolved_, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania: