The federal government is acknowledged by all to be one of enumerated powers. The principle, that it can exercise only the powers granted to it . . . is now universally admitted.

The peculiar circumstances of the moment may render a measure more or less wise, but cannot render it more or less constitutional.

No political dreamer was ever wild enough to think of breaking down the lines which separate the States and compounding the American people into one common mass.

No one imagines that a law professing to tax will be permitted to destroy.

Certainly all those who have framed written constitutions contemplate them as forming the fundamental and paramount law of the nation, and consequently the theory of every such government must be, that an act of the legislature, repugnant to the constitution, is void.

The people made the Constitution, and the people can unmake it. It is the creature of their own will, and lives only by their will.

The French Revolution will be found to have had great influence on the strength of parties, and on the subsequent political transactions of the United States.