Page:Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States.djvu/663

Rh The danger of extending by legislation powers given to powers not given or prohibited, is also exposed to the publick view by the same resolutions, as follows: "That the construction applied by the general government (as is evident by sundry of their proceedings) to those parts of the constitution of the United States, which delegate to congress a power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defence and general welfare of the United States, and to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the powers vested by the constitution in the government of the United States, or any department thereof, goes to the destruction of all limits prescribed to their power by the constitution. That words meant by that instrument to be subsidiary only to the execution of the limited powers, ought not to be so construed as themselves to give unlimited powers, nor a part to be taken so as to destroy the whole residue of the instrument. That the proceedings of the general government, under colour of these articles, will be a fit and necessary subject for revisal and correction at a time of greater tranquillity, while those specified in the preceding resolutions call for immediate redress." It is to be lamented that these proceedings of the general government, going to the destruction of all limits prescribed to their power by the constitution," had not been specified by the same able pen. That they could only be of a legislative nature is plain; but whether laws for subjecting agriculture, manufactures. talents and labour to legal capitalists; for rallying chartered and stock feudatories around the general government or for destroying commerce under the power of regulating it, were meant, is uncertain. The evil however has arisen from a confidence inspired by the numerical analysis. By deluding us to expect from men, that which principles alone can yield, namely, a free government, we are induced to neglect the application of principles to laws. A numerical classification of men, triple, decimal, or centuriate, as