We have seen that the tendency of republican governments is to an aggrandizement of the legislative at the expense of the other departments. The appeals to the people, therefore, would usually be made by the executive and judiciary departments.

They can make no law which will not have its full operation on themselves and their friends, as well as on the great mass of the society.

The personal right to acquire property, which is a natural right, gives to property, when acquired, a right to protection, as a social right.

It is superfluous to try by the standards of theory, a part of the constitution which is allowed on all hands to be the result not of theory, but "of a spirit of amity, and that mutual deference and concession which the peculiarity of our political situation rendered indispensable" . . . the equal vote allowed to each state, is at once a constitutional recognition of the portion of sovereignty remaining in the individual states, and an instrument for preserving that residuary sovereignty.

The proposed Constitution is, in strictness, neither a national nor a federal constitution; but a composition of both.

Every word of [the Constitution] decides a question between power and liberty.

Knowledge will forever govern ignorance.