"We have received it [the Constitution] as the work of the assembled wisdom of the nation. We have trusted to it as to the sheet anchor of our safety in the stormy times of conflict with a foreign or domestic foe. We have looked to it with sacred awe as the palladium of our liberties, and with all the solemnities of religion have pledged to each other our lives and fortunes here and our hopes of happiness hereafter in its defense and support. Were we mistaken, my countrymen, in attaching this importance to the Constitution . . .? No. We were not mistaken. The letter of this great instrument is free from this radical fault. . . . No, we did not err! . . . The sages . . . have given us a practical and, as they hoped, a permanent* Constitutional compact. . . . The Constitution is still the object of our reverence, the bond of our Union, our defense in danger, the source of our prosperity in peace: it shall descend, as we have received it, uncorrupted by sophistical construction, to our posterity. . . ." - Andrew Jackson - Valedictory
*Underlining added for emphasis
And, it was Thomas Jefferson who used another metaphor with reference to the Constitution when he indicated that "the People" must "bind them (government) by the chains of the Constitution." In another instance, he declared: "It was intended to lace them up straitly within the enumerated powers. . . ."
Arrogantly, though, the current President does not seem to see himself as the Constitution places him--a temporary employee/servant of "the People," but as some supra-Constitutional figure whose judgments are not to be questioned or challenged.
I'm reminded of John Quincy Adams' remark in his "Jubilee" Address:
"Every change of a President of the United States, has exhibited some variety of policy from that of his predecessor. In more than one case, the change has extended to political and even to moral principle; but the policy of the country has been fashioned far more by the influences of public opinion, and the prevailing humors in the two Houses of Congress, than by the judgment, the will, or the principles of the President of the United States. The President himself is no more than a representative of public opinion at the time of his election; and as public opinion is subject to great and frequent fluctuations, he must accommodate his policy to them; or the people will speedily give him a successor; or either House of Congress will effectually control his power. It is thus, and in no other sense that the Constitution of the United States is democratic - for the government of our country, instead of a Democracy the most simple, is the most complicated government on the face of the globe. From the immense extent of our territory, the difference of manners, habits, opinions, and above all, the clashing interests of the North, South, East, and West, public opinion formed by the combination of numerous aggregates, becomes itself a problem of compound arithmetic, which nothing but the result of the popular elections can solve.
I will be voting for Daniel Webster to the U.S Congress today.
Incidently, he has been targeted by fellow “republican” New York Governor Bloomberg. He has spent $1.1 million propping up and lying for Val Demmmings who is Webster’s opponent. She quit as Orange County sheriff after only two years to run for Congress. She supports everything Bloomberg, Pelosi, obama and Reid support.
It is understandable that Daniel Webster would have said this during the era in which he lived. So he is correct for his time, the late 18th and 19th centuries. Anarchy would have been the result in his time, and for some time after.
But the quote needs an update. Today it should read ...if the American Constitution should fail, there will be totalitarianism throughout the world. The real techniques of totalitarian rule had not been seriously developed at that point. His world was a world of kingdoms, some good, some benign and some downright malevolent. But the power to enslave in totality, through the overwhelming apparatus of an all-powerful state—although rooted in human nature and hinted at throughout history (Egypt, Alexander, Rome)—did not really come to fruition until the 20th century.
Compared to what will really happen if the American Constitution fails, anarchy is a relatively mild and even preferable option.
JOHN ADAMS, letter to Abigail Adams, Jul. 17, 1775
-- Daniel Webster (1782 - 1852)
-- Daniel Webster (1782 - 1852)
ping
It is with great regret that the outcome of the present election has no baring on the fate of a Federal Constitution which is already been rendered unworthy of the paper its written on by the Federal magistrates supposedly charged with upholding that Constitution.
The fact remains if the fate of any free republican Constitution depends upon each of the regular elections then that Constitution means nothing.
It is with great irony that Danial Webster is one of the men who help bring about the downfall of the Federal Constitution when he removed the most critical element in the enforcement of any contract for mutual benefit. The requirement of the consent of the governed to remain party to it.(the Civil War). With that critical check removed it was simply a matter of time before the majority starts voting away the rights of the now “captive” minority, and the Constitution which defines their bounds was thus meaningless.
You see the Federal courts have never seriously impaired The Federal Government in preforming any act the whims of the majority might desire it to do, for the very simple reason that those Federal courts are hand picked by the very same federal politicians welding that power. It should thus be expected that they will show the greatest defiance to the will and desire of their appointing master. Like it or not from a review of history that is precisely what they have always done. Rights of the minority and consent of the governed(constitution) be dammed.
The point im making is without State level nullification the entire American system falls apart.