It is monstrous in Mr. Buchanan to assume that a body so contrived and so acting expressed in any sense the sovereign will of the people.  But, not to dwell upon this point, let us suppose that the Convention had been summoned by a competent authority, that it had been fairly chosen by its small constituency, and that its proceedings had been managed with ordinary decorum,—­would the Constitution it framed be valid, in the face of a clear popular condemnation?  We hold that it would not, because, in our estimation, and in the estimation of every intelligent American, the very essence of republicanism is “the consent of the governed.”  It is the highest function of political sovereignty to devise and ordain the organic law of society, the vital form of its being; and the characteristic difference between the despotic or oligarchical and the republican government is, that in the one case the function is exercised by a monarch or a class, and in the other by the body of the citizens.  This distinctive feature of our politics, as opposed to all others, regards the will of the people, directly or indirectly expressed, as alone giving validity to law; our National Constitution, and every one of our thirty-one State Constitutions, proceeds upon that principle; every act of legislation in the Congress and the State Assemblies supposes it; and every decision of every Court has that for its basis.  Constitutions have been adopted, undoubtedly, without a distinct submission of them to the ratification of the people; but in such cases there has been no serious agitation of the public mind, no important conflict or division of opinion, rendering such ratification necessary,—­and, in the absence of dispute, the general assent of the community to the action of its delegates might fairly be presumed.  But in no case, in which great and debatable questions were involved, has any Convention dared to close its labors without providing for their reference to the popular sanction; much less has there been any instance in which a Convention has dared to make its own work final, in the face of a known or apprehended repugnance of the constituency.  The politicians who should have proposed such a thing would have been overwhelmed with unmeasured indignation and scorn.  No sentiment more livingly pervades our national mind, no sentiment is juster in itself, than that they who are to live under the laws ought to decide on the character of the laws,—­that they whose persons, property, welfare, happiness, life, are to be controlled by a Constitution of Government, ought to participate in the formation of that government.

Conscious of this truth, and of its profound hold on the popular heart, Mr. Buchanan instructed Governor Walker to see the Kansas Constitution submitted to the people,—­to protect them against fraud and violence in voting upon it,—­and to proclaim, in the event of any interference with their rights, that the Constitution “would be and ought to be rejected by Congress.”  Walker was