The first two resolutions of the honorable member affirm these propositions, viz.:—­

1.  That the political system under which we live, and under which Congress is now assembled, is a compact, to which the people of the several States, as separate and sovereign communities, are the parties.

2.  That these sovereign parties have a right to judge, each for itself, of any alleged violation of the Constitution by Congress; and, in case of such violation, to choose, each for itself, its own mode and measure of redress.

It is true, Sir, that the honorable member calls this a “constitutional” compact; but still he affirms it to be a compact between sovereign States.  What precise meaning, then, does he attach to the term constitutional?  When applied to compacts between sovereign States, the term constitutional affixes to the word compact no definite idea.  Were we to hear of a constitutional league or treaty between England and France, or a constitutional convention between Austria and Russia, we should not understand what could be intended by such a league, such a treaty, or such a convention.  In these connections, the word is void of all meaning; and yet, Sir, it is easy, quite easy, to see why the honorable gentleman has used it in these resolutions.  He cannot open the book, and look upon our written frame of government, without seeing that it is called a constitution.  This may well be appalling to him.  It threatens his whole doctrine of compact, and its darling derivatives, nullification and secession, with instant confutation.  Because, if he admits our instrument of government to be a constitution, then, for that very reason, it is not a compact between sovereigns; a constitution of government and a compact between sovereign powers being things essentially unlike in their very natures, and incapable of ever being the same.  Yet the word constitution is on the very front of the instrument.  He cannot overlook it.  He seeks, therefore, to compromise the matter, and to sink all the substantial sense of the word, while he retains a resemblance of its sound.  He introduces a new word of his own, viz. compact, as importing the principal idea, and designed to play the principal part, and degrades constitution into an insignificant, idle epithet, attached to compact.  The whole then stands as a “constitutional compact”!  And in this way he hopes to pass off a plausible gloss, as satisfying the words of the instrument.  But he will find himself disappointed.  Sir, I must say to the honorable gentleman, that, in our American political grammar, CONSTITUTION is a noun substantive; it imports a distinct and clear idea of itself; and it is not to lose its importance and dignity, it is not to be turned into a poor, ambiguous, senseless, unmeaning adjective, for the purpose of accommodating any new set of political notions.  Sir, we reject