National sovereignty

“ In the teeth of the facts, our early history presents a great variety of assertions of State independence by leading men, State Legislatures, or State constitutions, which still form the basis of the argument for State sovereignty. The State constitutions declared the State to be sovereign and independent, even though the framers knew that the existence of the State depended on the issue of the national struggle against the mother country. ”

“ The circumstance that the powers of the sovereignty are, in this country, between the national and state governments, does not afford the distinction required. It does not follow from this that each of the portions of power, delegated to the one or the other, is not sovereign with regard to its proper objects. ”

“ But sovereignty, it has been shown, is not in the government, but in the state, and the state is inseparable from the public domain. The people organized and held by the domain or national territory, are under God the sovereign nation, and remain so as long as the nation subsists without subjection to another. The government, as distinguished from the state or nation, has only a delegated authority, governs only by a commission from the nation. ”

“ If the national government shows itself so regardless of the honor and interests of a State as has been evinced by the cold indifference with which negotiations for the last fifty years have been carried on, it becomes the solemn duty of the sovereignty thus trampled upon to rise and maintain its own rights. ”

“ The whole power of the people, on the representative principle, is divided between them. The State governments are independent of each other, and to the extent of their powers are complete sovereignties. The National Government begins where the State governments terminate, except in some instances where there is a concurrent jurisdiction between them. This Government is also, according to the extent of its powers, a complete sovereignty. I speak here, as repeatedly mentioned before, altogether of representative sovereignties, for the real sovereignty is in the people alone. ”

“ But with these broad admissions, if we would compare the sovereignty acknowledged to exist in the mass of our people with the power claimed by other sovereignties, even by those which have been considered most purely democratic, we shall find a most essential difference. All others lay claim to power limited only by their own will. The majority of our citizens, on the contrary, possess a sovereignty with an amount of power precisely equal to that which has been granted to them by the parties to the national compact, and nothing beyond. ”

“ A common seal and common money are signs of National Unity. In each the supreme sovereignty of the Nation is manifest. The first is like the national flag, and stands for the Nation, especially in treaties with foreign powers. The second is a national convenience, if not necessity, taking its distinctive character from the Nation, [Pg 46] so that everywhere it is a representative of the Nation. ”

“ By this compact these States are bound together as one great independent nation; and with respect to their common and national affairs, exercise a joint sovereignty, whose will can only be manifested by the acts of their delegates in Congress assembled. As a nation they must be governed by one common law of nations ”

“ It has been shown that, in becoming parts of a nation, not members of a league, they surrendered many of their essential parts of sovereignty. The right to make treaties, declare war, levy taxes, exercise exclusive judicial and legislative powers, were all functions of sovereign power. ”

“ Again and again, when owing to mismanagement of the national resources, the poverty of the exchequer, or from some other cause, the supremacy at sea was endangered or temporarily lost, one will find the people clamouring for steps to be taken to maintain it. On the other hand, such was the deep and abiding sentiment with respect to the sovereignty of the sea, when this king or that wished to embark upon a policy or engage in a war for an object that was secret or unpopular, there was no better method of deceiving the people than by declaring that the dominion of the sea was in danger. ”

“ Upholding national unity and territorial integrity, contributing to social stability and economic development, and taking account of its history and realities, the People's Republic of China has decided that upon China's resumption of the exercise of sovereignty over Macao, a Macao Special Administrative Region will be established in accordance with the provisions of Article 31 of the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, and that under the principle of "one country, two systems", the socialist system and policies will not be practiced in Macao. ”

“ The sovereignty of a nation or state, considered with reference to its association, as a body politic, may be absolute and uncontrollable in all respects, except the limitations which it chooses to impose upon itself. But the sovereignty of the government, organized within the state, may be of a very limited nature. ”

“ To invest Congress with the exclusive sovereignty in every matter relative to foreign nations and the general mass of our Union, retaining to the States their individual sovereignty in matters merely domestic. ”

“ If sovereignty be surrendered and transferred, in part or entirely, by the several States, it must be transferred to somebody; and the question is, to whom? Not, certainly, to the government — as has been thoughtlessly asserted by some; for that would subvert the fundamental principle of our system — that sovereignty resides in the people. But if not to the government, it must be transferred — if at all — to the people, regarded in the aggregate, as a nation. ”

“ Now if a Federal State is recognised as a State of its own, side by side with its member-States, it is evident that sovereignty must be divided between the Federal State on the one hand, and, on the other, the member-States. ”

“ To establish the condition of things essential to the recognition of this fact there must be a people occupying a known territory, united under some known and defined form of government, acknowledged by those subject thereto, in which the functions of government are administered by usual methods, competent to mete out justice to citizens and strangers, to afford remedies for public and for private wrongs, and able to assume the correlative international obligations and capable of performing the corresponding international duties resulting from its acquisition of the rights of sovereignty. ”

“ Very soon, however, the claims of other Powers to maritime sovereignty—of Denmark, Venice, England—were similarly assailed, and the controversy became general. It may be noted that those who took part in it on the one side or the other, including some of the most learned men of their age, were in large measure inspired by patriotic motives. National interests as much as lofty ethics or legal principles were at its root. Even Grotius, notwithstanding his impassioned appeal to the conscience of the world for the liberty of the sea and the freedom of commerce, was not exempt from this weakness. ”

“ Now it is very apparent to your Committee, that the power to admit States, created in territories, beyond the limits of the old United States is one of the most critical and important, whether we consider its nature, or its consequences. It is, in truth, nothing less than the power to create in foreign countries, new political sovereignties, and to divest the old United States of a proportion of their political sovereignty, in favor of such foreigner. ”

“ But the Union is formed by the surrender by each of the States of its individual sovereignty, and each State by its admission into the Union surrenders its individual sovereignty, or binds itself by a constitutional compact to merge its individual sovereignty in that of the whole. ”

“ It is external independence with regard to the liberty of action outside its borders in the intercourse with other States which a State enjoys. It is internal independence with regard to the liberty of action of a State inside its borders. As comprising the power of a State to exercise supreme authority over all persons and things within its territory, sovereignty is territorial supremacy. As comprising the power of a State to exercise supreme authority over its citizens at home and abroad, sovereignty is personal supremacy. ”

“ The sovereignty of government is an idea belonging to the other side of the Atlantic. No such thing is known in North America. Our governments are all limited. In Europe, sovereignty is of feudal origin, and imports no more than the state of the sovereign. It comprises his rights, duties, exemptions, prerogatives, and powers. But with us, all power is with the people. They alone are sovereign ”

“ Not content with declaring that the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable, and therefore beyond the control of any sovereignty, the Declaration went further, and, by abnegation worthy of perpetual honor, solemnly restrained the new sovereignty,—simply claiming for it the “power to do all acts and things which independent states may OF RIGHT do.” ”

“ Under this system, the sovereignty is not in the possession of the governments, therefore it cannot be transferred from them to the general government; so that in no point of view of this definition can we discover that it applies to the present system.
In the exercise of its powers will be insured the exercise of their powers to the state governments; it will insure peace and stability to them; their strength will increase with its strength; their growth will extend with its growth. ”

“ The second great compromise of the American constitution consists in the series of arrangements by which sovereignty is divided between the states and the federal government. In all domestic legislation and jurisdiction, civil and criminal, in all matters relating to tenure of property, marriage and divorce, the fulfilment of contracts and the punishment of malefactors, each separate state is as completely a sovereign state as France or Great Britain. In speaking to a British audience a concrete illustration may not be superfluous. ”

“ Let us consider first the problem of international relations. The doctrine of sovereignty, formulated in the seventeenth century and crystallized by Austin at the beginning of the nineteenth, made sovereignty the hallmark of the state. The person or persons, to whom the bulk of a given society render habitual obedience, either do or do not render habitual obedience in turn to some other person or persons. If they do not, the society constitutes a sovereign state; if they do, it is only part of a sovereign state. ”

“ The words ‘state sovereignty’ acquired an odious significance in the days of our civil struggle, but the idea for which they stand is nevertheless a precious one and represents what is probably America’s most valuable contribution to the science of government. ”

“ Notwithstanding the limited sovereignty possessed by the people of the United Stages and the restricted grant of power to the Government which they have adopted, enough has been given to accomplish all the objects for which it was created. It has been found powerful in war, and hitherto justice has been administered, and intimate union effected, domestic tranquillity preserved, and personal liberty secured to the citizen. ”

“ Limited rights are delegated by the people to their governments, or trustees, and all the residue of the attributes of sovereignty are retained. The division of the powers into such as are delegated specifically to the common and joint government of all the States, to be exercised for the benefit and safety of each and all; and the reservation of all to the States respectively, to be exercised through the separate governments, is what makes ours a system of governments. ”

“ Under the complex American system of government, in which the Federal Union and the several States each claim sovereignty and independent action within certain limitations, it became the theory and practice that towards each other the several States occupied the attitude of foreign nations, which relation was governed by international law, and that the principle of comity alone controlled the recognition and enforcement by any State of the law of any other State. ”

“ But no ordinary citizen of the United States probably ever thought of sovereignty except as residing either in the government of his state or in the federal government consisting of congress and president, or sometimes in one way, sometimes in the other. ”

“ It is never easy to point out in our complex modern governments the exact organs in which sovereignty is lodged. On the whole, however, it is always safe to ascribe sovereignty to the highest91 originative or law-making body of the state,—the body by whose determinations both the tasks to be carried out by the Administration and the rules to be applied by the courts are fixed and warranted. ”

“ Each State in the Union has its own Governor, House of Representatives, Senate, and Judiciary, and is in every respect a sovereign State—they like the word as much as they pretend to dislike the reality—acting perfectly independently within its limits, except in such cases as were mutually agreed upon by the terms of the Union, and to some of which we shall refer by and by. This sovereignty of individual States renders the elective franchise different in different States. ”

“ No law has any effect, of its own force, beyond the limits of the sovereignty from which its authority is derived. The extent to which the law of one nation, as put in force within its territory, whether by executive order, by legislative act, or by judicial decree, shall be allowed to operate within the dominion of another nation, depends upon what our greatest jurists have been content to call 'the comity of nations.' Although the phrase has been often criticised, no satisfactory substitute has been suggested. ”

“ It is one of the essential attributes of sovereignty which belongs to every independent nation, to determine for itself, how it will deal with rebels and insurgents against its authority and government. ”