many millions of dollars, and surrendering back all our conquests but what was deemed a barren waste; lately purchasing back, for ten millions of dollars, a small piece of the territory thus factiously and gratuitously surrendered. § 5. In equalizing religious liberty by giving to every man freedom of conscience, how perniciously soever he ay abuse it; in equalizing political liberty, by making every man eligible to hold all offices and elect all officers; in equalizing civil liberty by giving to every man entire control over his conduct, except that he shall not injure other men, the Democratic party has not always seen clearly the requirement of its own principles, but has groped its way by such lights as it possessed from time to time. We owe to the progressive nature of knowledge that Democracy now sees distinctly, that the highest attainable civil liberty for all, consists in permitting every organized locality, Territorial and State, to regulate its own domestic institutions, slavery included. The doctrine originated in our own State;* and self-complacency may well become New-Yorkers, when the election of Buchanan shall evince that the doctrine is sanctioned by our Confederacy. It constitutes the sole issue of the coming election, and no doubt will be sustained by a large electoral majority. But the election of Buchanan is not enough; he must have a Congress to support him, and State Legislatures to sustain Congress. We must show that enough thinking men exist among us to indulge weak brethren-Abolitionists, Freesoilers, Know-Nothings, Maine Lawists, political clergymen, &c.—in all the vagaries of fanatacism; to indulge foreign-born citizens in all the mistakes consequent to ignorance of our complicated governments; to indulge the most licentious press, the world ever saw, in its tirades

*See "The Wilmot Proviso," p. 9.

of disunion, illogic, and madness; to indulge even the paper self-called the head of American journalism, in its licentious advocacy of a union of all discordant factions for the sole purpose of securing the spoils of office; and finally, to indulge in his dilemma even the smitten Senator who will not oblige his political friends by dying, or his political enemies by getting well, but keeps both results in painful suspense.

THE VETO POWER OF THE PRESIDENT.*

EVERY bill which shall have passed both Houses of Congress, must be presented to the President before it can become a law:-"If he approve, he shall sign it; but if not, he shall return it, with his objections, to that House in which it shall have originated." This simple mandate of the Constitution, a latitudinarian construction attempts to dwindle into a power of rejection, only when a bill shall be unconstitutional; or the two Houses of Congress shall have passed it without due deliberation. To thus relax the veto seems to diminish the powers of Government, and we become surprised at finding the relaxation among the tenets of politicians who characteristically enlarge the powers of Government; but our surprise will cease if we remember that the relaxation diminishes restraints on the Legislature, the only usurping branch of our Government; hence the means of usurpation become increased, just in proportion as the veto power becomes diminished.

A President who subordinates his will to the will of Congress, subordinates the people to their servants.

A Representative in Congress represents the two hundred

* Published February 1st, 1851.

and thirty-third part of the United States. His constituents are locally contiguous, and he regards supremely their interests. A Senator represents the sixty-second part of the Union-the half of some one State, to which, alone, he is amenable; and its wishes control his conduct. But the President represents the whole Union--States and people. To him, therefore, belongs properly a supervision over every bill, before it shall become a law. His disapproval of a bill is national, not personal; just as the sentence of death pronounced on a convict, is a fiat of law spoken through a judge, who, personally, would shed no blood. A President should lose himself in his office, not lose his office in himself or the humility of the officer will humble the office, and humble the people whom the office typifies. The humility of a clergyman may well incline him to refrain from censuring sins, sinner as he is in common with his congregation; but he censures in the name of his Divine Master. So a house of worship-stone, brick, or woodchallenges all men within it to stand uncovered, not in reverence of the structure, but of the Deity to whom it is dedicated.

A Veto is an appeal to the people as supreme arbiter.

In law suits, a demurrer arrests the proceedings till the Court shall decide the merits of the objection, and a Presidential veto arrests legislation till the people shall decide thereon at the next Presidential election. A veto is, therefore, in honor of the people, as a court of last resort. General Jackson thus considered it when, July 10th, 1832, he vetoed a re-charter of the United States Bank. Instead, then, of being a "one man power," as its enemies delight to call it, a veto is the highest privilege that pertains to the people. Congress felt this, when they presented to General Jackson the above Bank Bill just before the expi

ration of his first official term, and when he was a candidate for re-election They knew he would veto it, and they wanted to subject his veto to the review of the people. The case constituted a direct appeal to the people by Congress and the President; and admirably illustrates the power conferred on the people by a proper exercise of the

veto.

A Presidential Veto is the people's only security against Congressional venality and usurpation.

The people may remove a Representative every second year, and a Senator every sixth year; but a re-charter of the United States Bank could not not have been corrected by a removal of all who had voted for it. The contract would have been irrevocable, had it not been arrested by a veto; and such are all the cases to which a veto has been applied. Had Monroe not vetoed the Cumberland Road Bill in 1822, or Jackson the Maysville Stock Subscription in 1830, who sees not the extent to which such legislation would have been carried by Congress, whose organization favors such legislation-the roads which it should construct in any State, provoking every other state to procure like legislation? Nay, the representative of every congressional district would be ambitious to procure for his locality what any other representative had procured; hence, every step in such legislation would produce others in a compound progression, till legislation would degenerate into a scramble for spoils. Nor should we omit among the advantages of the veto, its check on the venality of so promiscuous and numerous a body as Congress,-to say nothing of higher officials. The Galphin disclosures of last year shocked. morality; but who can help believing that the Galphin case was more peculiar in its exposure than its occurrence? The revival of old and often rejected claims against the

Government is become common; and charity tries in vain to suppose that the claims are advocated disinterestedly in Congress. The veto of President Polk saved the country in his day from French Claim spoliators; but his veto is more effectual in showing how a President ought to act, than it will be in finding imitators. The statute of limitations which every State enacts, is not designed to prevent the payment of just demands, but to provide against the evanescence of testimony; so, if a public claim seems just after fifty years of rejection, we ought to infer that the facts are forgotten which showed its injustice, not that our predecessors were disinclined to be just. Legislatures cannot be bound by a statute of limitation, but they ought to be bound by the principle which alone makes such statutes just in any case.

The Veto is powerless for evil.

We often hear that a King of England would lose his head should he thwart, by veto, the British Parliament The king, however, retains his position for life, and his veto is not susceptible of a quadrennial review by the people, like a President's; nor reversible, by a two-third vote of the Legislature. Besides, the king vetoes to retain power, which the people are seeking, through Parliament, to wrest from him; but a President vetoes to disclaim power and patronage, that Congress are attempting to invest him. with by wresting it from the people. Such has been the character of all past Presidential vetoes; and an exercise of the power evinces a victory by duty over personal ease, as may be inferred from the few vetoes which have been pronounced during our sixty-two years of national existence; and inferred from nothing more clearly than from President Polk's sanction of the Oregon Territorial Bill, with the Wilmot Proviso superadded, and which uncharac