Page:Hawkins v. Filkins 01.pdf/11

296Rh it is conceded that, unless by the action of her state convention, held on the 4th of March, 1861, the government of the state of Arkansas was destroyed, and ceased to exist, until it was subsequently revived under the present state constitution, the court that rendered the judgment in this case, was a legal court, and the judgment rendered by it valid. Nor is there any act of the convention, to which exception in this respect can be taken, unless it be that, by which a severance of the bonds of the national union was attempted. So that the question is, in fact, narrowed to this: Was the state government destroyed by force of such act? If such was not the effect of the ordinance of secession, it is not contended that the individual acts of her citizens, in organized hostile force against the national government, however it might fix upon them personal responsibility for attempting, by force, to prevent the government of the United States from exercising its constitutional powers and authority within the state, could affect the state government, or the right to make and enforce all needful laws for the municipal government of the citizens thereof.

Before however proceeding to consider the question, reduced, as we have seen it may be, to a single proposition, there are several preliminary questions, which it will become necessary to consider. Among which, are the powers claimed and exercised by tiVe states prior to the formation of the federal government—the object and purpose for which the federal government was established—the powers conferred upon it—the bonds of union between the states and the federal government, and their reciprocal obligations and duties to each other—and finally, the power of the state to dissolve its connection with the federal government, whether by ordinance or otherwise.

The mere statement of these very important and difficult questions, about which there has been such a diversity of opinion, at all times since the formation of the national government, and which resulted in a most disastrous civil war, shows the magnitude of the questions to be decided, and the difficulties which are to be