Separation of powers

“ When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. ”

“ They tell us “there must be a supreme authority, to which, everything else has to submit; your doctrine of co-ordinate powers and concurrent jurisdictions will incessantly bring forth collisions and conflicts.” Sir, that is the language held by the advocates of centralized authority and despotism throughout the world. There is but one form of government in which there are no collisions of co-ordinate authorities, no conflict of concurrent jurisdiction, and that is complete absolutism. ”

“ But, if neither has the exclusive right, the effect, where they disagree as to the extent of their respective powers, would be, a mutual negative on the acts of each, when they come into conflict. And the effect of this again, would be, to vest in each the power to protect the portion of authority allotted to it, against the encroachment of its co-ordinate government. Nothing short of this can possibly preserve this important division of power, on which rests the equilibrium of the entire system. ”

“ Therefore the powers of the States being bestowed or reserved by a majority of the States or of the people, no matter which; any State would disobey the majority, and thus betray the national right of self-government in the federal form, by suffering itself to be deprived of these powers. A division and a consolidation; checks and no checks; cannot exist together. ”

“ A rupture with other powers is among the greatest of national calamities; it ought, therefore, to be effectually provided, that no part of a nation shall have it in its power to bring them on the whole. ”

“ Instead of balancing power, we divide it and make it responsible, to prevent the evils of its accumulation in the hands of one interest. And such is the force of this principle of dividing power, to excite the good, and suppress the evil qualities of man, that among several hundred state governours who have already existed, not one instance has appeared of kingly qualities, of usurpation, or of war between neighbouring states. ”

“ As little doubt can there be, that the people had a right to prohibit to the states the exercise of any powers which were, in their judgment, incompatible with the objects of the general compact; to make the powers of the state governments, in given cases, subordinate to those of the nation, or to reserve to themselves those sovereign authorities which they might not choose to delegate to either. ”

“ Almost all the cahiers agreed that the prevailing disorder and the vast and ill-defined powers of the king and his ministers were perhaps the fundamental evils. One of the cahiers says: "Since arbitrary power has been the source of all the evils which afflict the state, our first desire is the establishment of a really national constitution, which shall define the rights of all and provide the laws to maintain them." No one dreamed at this time of displacing the king or of taking the government out of his hands. ”

“ The idea of two omnipotent powers is inconsistent. The natural tendency must be, either a revolt, or the destruction of the state governments, and a consolidation of them all into one general system. If we are to be consolidated, let it be on better grounds. ”

“ If it is admitted that a division of Federal and State powers can alone prevent a consolidated republic, that this species of government threatens us with a worse, and that a genuine representation of local State rights is necessary to sustain this division ”

“ It should ever be borne in mind, that collisions are incident to a division of power — but that without division of power, there can be no organization; and without organization, no constitution; and without this no liberty. To prevent collision, then, by destroying the division of power, is, in effect, to substitute an absolute for a constitutional government, and despotism in the place of liberty — evils far greater than those intended to be remedied. ”

“ There is centralized authority in full play. There a function of government claiming to be supreme, removed from the original source of sovereignty to an unmeasurable distance, entrenched in irresponsibility, endeavoring gradually to absorb all the organized powers around it. Sir, it requires but little sagacity to discern the danger and to foresee the consequences. ”

“ The main line of separation is the same perplexing issue running through all political history, the rivalry between the state and nation, one seeking to minimize, the other to magnify the sphere of the central government. ”

“ A pretension so monstrous as that which perverts a restricted agency constituted by sovereign States for common purposes, into the unlimited despotism of the majority, and denies all legitimate escape from such despotism, when powers not delegated are usurped, converts the whole constitutional fabric into the secure abode of lawless tyranny, and degrades sovereign States into provincial dependencies. ”

“ Even as recently as the last treaty of peace with Great Britain, the constitutional principle of unanimity was departed from. A weak constitution must necessarily terminate in dissolution, for want of proper powers, or the usurpation of powers requisite for the public safety. ”

“ There apparently is an almost insurmountable difficulty in the writers of other countries, only knowing unlimited, imperial supreme governments, to comprehend that a government of limited powers can be supreme in the powers granted to it. Knowing that the powers of our General Government are limited, they are apt to draw the conclusion that the fundamental unlimited power must be in the subordinate component parts, the States. ”

“ Where there are two powers, one in the State, another in the nation, one in individuals, or another in the nation, the exercise of the one power is not to be destroyed by the mere existence of the other, where that exercise is bona fide, with no intent or purpose of invading, or manifest, or natural tendency to invade it. ”

“ Without such power, the strongest would, in the end, inevitably absorb and concentrate the powers of the others in itself, as has been fully shown in the preliminary discourse — where, also, it is shown that there is but one mode in which this can be prevented; and that is, by investing each division of power, or the representative and organ of each, with a veto, or something tantamount, in some one form or another. To answer, then, the question proposed, it is necessary to ascertain what provisions the constitution, or the system itself, has made for the exercise of this important power. ”

“ That it was of the utmost consequence to bring the parties together; as, should we sever from each other, either no foreign power will ally with us at all, or the different states will form different alliances, and thus increase the horrors of those scenes of civil war and bloodshed, which, in such a state of separation and independence, would render us a miserable people. ”

“ When it is once admitted that the division of the central power is indispensable, in order to prevent all usurpation of rightful omnipotence, or, at least, to render such usurpation infrequent and difficult, it necessarily follows that this division ought to be effected in such a way that the resulting powers shall be capable of regular co-existence, that is to say, of mutually restraining, limiting, and compelling each other to seek in common for that reason, truth, and justice, which ought to regulate their will and preside over their actions. ”

“ But that surrender of rights and those grants of power must not transcend the limits set my that general principle. All surrenders of rights and all grants of power beyond those limits are concessions to despotism. — All assumptions of power beyond those limits are usurpation. Hence the true source of sovereignty is not in society, as the aggregate of individuals, but in the individuals who in the aggregate constitute the people. ”

“ They have lost the powers which the people in the Constitution gave to the Central Government; but in the field of powers left to them each is supreme within its own limits, and by the exercise of that power may trespass on the exercise of similar power by its neighbor. ”

“ The existence of competing powers, each affecting to control men in the same region of outward action, and each having partisans who regard it alone as entitled to exercise such control, implies that there is not that unity of supreme control over the outward actions of men which constitutes sovereignty and which is necessary to the complete organisation of a state. ”

“ Opposition to centralization, and to that dangerous spirit of encroachment which tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism ”

“ It must however be admitted, that in our constitutions and political disquisitions, a struggle between the light of our revolution, and the clouds of previous habits, is also discernible. The numerical analysis, a balance of orders or of powers, and a social compact between nations and their governments, often bewilder us, so as to exhibit reason and prejudice, striving for a reconciliation. Our policy, says one, abhors and rejects orders of men; but, replies the other, it loves and creates orders of power; as if power could exist abstractedly of men. ”

“ Sir, in granting Congress the power to raise armies, the People have granted all the means which are ordinary & usual, & which are consistent with the liberties & security of the People themselves; & they have granted no others. To talk about the unlimited power of the Government over the means to execute its authority, is to hold a language which is true only in regard to despotism. ”

“ Either the several States must continue separate, totally independent of each other, and liable to all the evils of jealousy, dispute, and civil dissension,—nay, liable to a civil war, upon any clashing of interests,—or they must constitute a general head, composed of representatives from all the States, and vested with the power of the whole continent to enforce their decisions. There is no other alternative. ”

“ For this devolution of power, to the people at large, includes in it a dissolution of the whole form of government established by that people, reduces all the members to their original state of equality, and by annihilating the sovereign power repeals all positive laws whatsoever before enacted. ”

“ I think it will be quite out of the power of any government to retain by force 337under its rule any considerable number of people, who, with or without, a grievance, are practically unanimous for a separate government. The Congress of Nations will, or at least ought to, require that any people seeking separation shall be nearly unanimous. ”

“ That, in a contest between the State and the General Government, if the resistance be limited on both sides to the civil process, the State, by its inherent sovereignty, standing upon its reserved powers, will prove too powerful in such a controversy, and must triumph over the Federal Government, sustained by its delegated and limited authority ”

“ The general government has no power to act in a case of secession. It concerns the Stales, in their sovereignly, and is beyond the limited sphere of the general government. Whom, then, does secession concern ? ”

“ Nor can we doubt, that when, by division, you abandon the Union, acknowledge the Constitution to be a failure, the contest would be carried on regardless of State sovereignty, and finally end in the subjugation of all to one idea and one system in government. ”

“ Indeed, so incompatible are the two systems, that every new State which is organized within our ever-extending domain makes its first political act a choice of the one and the exclusion of the other, even at the cost of civil war, if necessary. ”

“ If one of them does not possess these rights, neither can the other; and by establishing their political subordination to the court, we should exhibit to the world the political phenomenon of two governments, neither possessing a right of self-preservation, and both subjected to six men, not elected by the people, but nominated by one man. ”

“ When will rulers learn that, where liberty is not security and order can never be? We talk of absolute power; but all power hath limits, which, if not fixed by the moderation of the governors, will be fixed by the force of the governed. ”

“ We believe that the whole power of the Government, upheld and sustained by all the influences and means of all loyal men in all Sections, and of all Parties, is essentially necessary to put down the Rebellion and preserve the Union and the Constitution. ”

“ And if self preservation requires that this entire popular mind, should be able by its whole representative to repeal a law, the reason is equally cogent to prove, that each of the distinct minds composing the union, should be able to exercise the same power by its similar organ. A power which holds another to law against its will, is dominant, and inequality or war must ensue. ”

“ These powers should be limited in no respect, except in so far as to remove all danger of a too extensive exercise of the civil authority or of ambitious schemes for dominion over the republic. The desire is to be useful to the republic in a political and military way, but with all the appropriate honors, dignities, and powers over subordinate functionaries ”

“ Citizens! isolated as we are by this base decree from the great body of the people, it becomes us to constitute a separate government for ourselves. Order must be maintained, but such order as shall strike terror into the breasts of our enemies. ”

“ Certain it is, that greater societies, under one government, may in some cases make a secession, and divide into lesser, without sedition: or else, how would there be so many distinct commonwealths in the world? ”