in a more disastrous penalty, which, though we may escape, we shall not escape the unutterable disgrace of leaving as a cruel legacy to our children.

CHAPTER VII.

ESTABLISH JUSTICE.

§ 86. THE second avowed purpose of the American people in ordaining their Constitution was to "establish justice." This may be said to be an ultimate object of all government. It includes the doing justice themselves among the nations, their peers, and to their subjects and subordinates; requiring and administering it among all people within their jurisdiction, in their intercourse with each other, and preventing or punishing every species o injustice. No human government can be expected to accomplish all this, any more than any thing else, perfectly. Not even the divine government so does it in this imperfect world. But civil government is the divine ordinance for making the effort among men; and the human government that makes the nearest approach to its accomplishment comes the nearest to answering the purpose of its creation. The annunciation, on the face of the Constitution, that the establishment

of justice is the purpose of the people of the United States in ordaining the government, places justice itself at the foundation of the fabric, and prescribes, as a duty, that the whole administration of it should be on that principle. Neither the people nor their government, to be sure, have any rightful power to authorize injustice; but this is very different from a positive ordinance to establish justice. This requires justice universally, and with the requirement supplies the means and the power to execute it, to the extent of the region over which they rule.

§ 87. "Prior to the date of the Constitution,

the United States had, by taking a place among the nations of the earth, become amenable to the law of nations; and it was their interest, as well as their duty, to provide that those laws should be respected and obeyed. In their national character and capacity, the United States were responsible to foreign nations for the conduct of each State, relative to the law of nations and the performance of treaties; and there the inexpediency of referring all such questions to State courts, and particularly to the courts of delinquent States, became apparent. While all the States were bound to protect each, and the citizens of each, it was highly proper and reasonable, that they should be in a capacity, not only to cause justice to be done to each and the citizens of each, but also to

cause justice to be done by each, and the citizens of each; and that not by violence and force, but by a stable, sedate, and regular course of judicial procedure."1

§ 88. Notwithstanding it thus places justice. as the foundation of the government, and requires it to be administered on that principle, much pains has been taken to prove that it nevertheless actually authorizes or recognizes absolute injustice. To establish this, three different clauses of the Constitution have been cited as showing an infringement of the inalienable rights of man, in allowing one man to acquire an ownership or right of property in another, and so admitting of absolute chattel slavery. The first is where the people are divided into classes, for certain purposes, under the names of free persons and other persons. The second is where Congress is restrained temporarily from interfering with the migration of persons. And the third is where persons held to service or labor, and escaping, are required to be returned. That neither nor all of these do any such thing as is charged, is elaborately shown elsewhere. It is only necessary to remark here, that none of them authorize any injustice, or recognize any such right as is supposed. It is not known, that any other parts of the Constitution have ever been relied upon to show that it violates the sound principles of

1 Per Jay, Chief Justice, in Chisholm v. Georgia, 2 Dall. Rep. 419.

justice and moral right, which it inculcates and professes to establish.

DOMESTIC TRANQUILLITY.

§ 89. The third great purpose, which the American people constitute their government to effect, is to "insure domestic tranquillity." This is done by the certainty and efficiency with which justice is administered and enforced among men, and every species of wrong and injustice is suppressed or punished, making all persons secure and safe in the possession and enjoyment of their rights, and removing all inducement to riot, tumult, and aggression, by taking away all possibility of their success. The same means and the same authority that establish and maintain justice in the land, make the people tranquil, contented, and happy in the pursuit and enjoyment of their own rights, without motive or inducement to agitation or insurrection, and without an excuse for individual malice to attempt the gratification of personal retaliation or revenge. All the powers of the Constitution that require and enable the different departments of the government to administer it with justice and equity, and especially all the powers of the judiciary that enable them to administer the law on the same principles between man and man, tend directly to the accomplishment of this part of the