Page:John P. Branch Historical Papers - Volume 2.djvu/327

180 of congress, and not as a sword which should cut up and destroy the rights of the states. So the act of Virginia ceding this district to the United States gives up the exclusive jurisdiction and soil in that territory, but it cedes no right to interfere with the reserved territory of the commonwealth.

But if such had not been the avowed object of the grant in question; if the legislature is not to be limited by these circumstances, but on the contrary, if it had the most extensive commission of legislation ever confided to any country, I contend that its acts must be limited and local, in the particular in question, and could not have the effect to overthrow the authority of the several states within their respective limits. I maintain this doctrine upon the clearest principles of general law and upon the most unquestionable authorities. Before I refer to those authorities I must request your attention, fellow-citizens, to what I have said, to show that the states, taken in relation to the union, are only, as to some subjects, “parts of one whole,” and that as to everything else, they are entire and independent sovereignties. At least, however, this is the case, in relation to the petty district of Columbia. The great state of Virginia cannot well be “a part” of that small district, and of course, the authorities of Virginia cannot be subordinate to her authorities. Virginia is as independent of it and them, as she is of the small island of Malta; and as to the subjectin question, Virginia is to be considered in every sense, as a distinct and independent sovereignty.

We are told by Huberus in his chapter de conflictu legum, that the laws of every government have power only