Thomas Benton - Thirty Years' View (Vol. I of 2)

3. The protection of American industry, as a substantive object, independent of the object of revenue, was a third question growing out of the war. Its incidental protection, under the revenue clause in the constitution, had been always acknowledged, and granted; but protection as a substantive object was a new question growing out of the state of things produced by the war. Domestic manufactures had taken root and grown up during the non-importation periods of the embargo, and of hostilities with Great Britain, and under the temporary double duties which ensued the war, and which were laid for revenue. They had grown up to be a large interest, and a new one, classing in importance after agriculture and commerce. The want of articles necessary to national defence, and of others essential to individual comfort – then neither imported nor made at home – had been felt during the interruption of commerce occasioned by the war; and the advantage of a domestic supply was brought home to the conviction of the public mind. The question of protection for the sake of protection was brought forward, and carried (in the year 1816); and very unequivocally in the minimum provision in relation to duties on cotton goods. This reversed the old course of legislation – made protection the object instead of the incident, and revenue the incident instead of the object; and was another instance of constitutional construction being made dependent, not upon its own words but upon extrinsic, accidental and transient circumstances. It introduced a new and a large question of constitutional law, and of national expediency, fraught with many and great consequences, which fell upon the period of the Thirty Years' View to settle, or to grapple with.

4. The question of internal improvement within the States, by the federal government, took a new and large development after the war. The want of facilities of transportation had been felt in our military operations. Roads were bad, and canals few; and the question of their construction became a prominent topic in Congress common turnpike roads – for railways had not then been invented, nor had MacAdam yet given his name to the class of roads which has since borne it. The power was claimed as an incident to the granted powers – as a means of doing what was authorized – as a means of accomplishing an end: and the word "necessary" at the end of the enumerated powers, was the phrase in which this incidental power was claimed to have been found. It was the same derivation which was found for the creation of a national bank, and involved very nearly the same division of parties. It greatly complicated the national legislation from 1820 to 1850, bringing the two parts of our double system of government – State and Federal – into serious disagreement, and threatening to compromise their harmonious action. Grappled with by a strong hand, it seemed at one time to have been settled, and consistently with the rights of the States; but sometimes returns to vex the deliberations of Congress. To territories the question did not extend. They have no political rights under the constitution, and are governed by Congress according to its discretion, under that clause which authorizes it to "dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States." The improvement of rivers and harbors, was a branch of the internal improvement question, but resting on a different clause in the constitution – the commercial and revenue clause – and became complex and difficult from its extension to small and local objects. The party of strict construction contend for its restriction to national objects – rivers of national character, and harbors yielding revenue.

5. The boundaries between the treaty-making and the legislative departments of the government, became a subject of examination after the war, and gave rise to questions deeply affecting the working of these two departments. A treaty is the supreme law of the land, and as such it becomes obligatory on the House of Representatives to vote the money which it stipulates, and to co-operate in forming the laws necessary to carry it into effect. That is the broad proposition. The qualification is in the question whether the treaty is confined to the business of the treaty-making power? to the subjects which fall under its jurisdiction? and does not encroach upon the legislative power of Congress? This is the qualification, and a vital one: for if the President and Senate, by a treaty with a foreign power, or a tribe of Indians, could exercise ordinary legislation, and make it supreme, a double injury would have been done, and to the prejudice of that branch of the government which lies closest to the people, and emanates most directly from them. Confinement to their separate jurisdictions is the duty of each; but if encroachments take place, which is to judge? If the President and Senate invade the legislative field of Congress, which is to judge? or who is to judge between them? or is each to judge for itself? The House of Representatives, and the Senate in its legislative capacity, but especially the House, as the great constitutional depository of the legislative power, becomes its natural guardian and defender, and is entitled to deference, in the event of a difference of opinion between the two branches of the government. The discussions in Congress between 1815 and 1820 greatly elucidated this question; and while leaving unimpugned the obligation of the House to carry into effect a treaty duly made by the President and Senate within the limits of the treaty making power – upon matters subject to treaty regulation – yet it belongs to the House to judge when these limits have been transcended, and to preserve inviolate the field of legislation which the constitution has intrusted to the immediate representatives of the people.

6. The doctrine of secession – the right of a State, or a combination of States, to withdraw from the Union, was born of that war. It was repugnant to the New England States, and opposed by them, not with arms, but with argument and remonstrance, and refusal to vote supplies. They had a convention, famous under the name of Hartford, to which the design of secession was imputed. That design was never avowed by the convention, or authentically admitted by any leading member; nor is it the intent of this reference to decide upon the fact of that design. The only intent is to show that the existence of that convention raised the question of secession, and presented the first instance of the greatest danger in the working of the double form of our government – that of a collision between a part of the States and the federal government. This question, and this danger, first arose then – grew out of the war of 1812 – and were hushed by its sudden termination; but they have reappeared in a different quarter, and will come in to swell the objects of the Thirty Years' View. At the time of its first appearance the right of secession was repulsed and repudiated by the democracy generally, and in a large degree by the federal party – the difference between a Union and a League being better understood at that time when so many of the fathers of the new government were still alive. The leading language in respect to it south of the Potomac was, that no State had a right to withdraw from the Union – that it required the same power to dissolve as to form the Union – and that any attempt to dissolve it, or to obstruct the action of constitutional laws, was treason. If, since that time, political parties and sectional localities, have exchanged attitudes on this question, it cannot alter the question of right, and may receive some interest from the development of causes which produce such changes. Secession, a question of speculation during the war of 1812, has become a practical question (almost) during the Thirty Years; and thus far has been "compromised," not settled.