Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/271

 CH. IV.] or collective capacities, and as contradistinguished from the individuals, of whom they consist. Though this principle docs not run through all the powers delegated to the union; yet it pervades and governs those, on which the efficacy of the rest depends. Except as to the rule of apportionment, the United States have an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money; but they have no authority to raise either by regulations extending to the individuals of America. The consequence of this is, that though in theory their resolutions concerning those objects are laws, constitutionally binding on the members of the Union; yet, in practice, they are mere recommendations, which the states observe or disregard at their option." Again. "The concurrence of thirteen distinct sovereignties is requisite under the confederation to the complete execution of every important measure, that proceeds from the Union. It has happened, as was to have been foreseen. The measures of the Union have not been executed. The delinquences of the state have, step by step, matured themselves to an extreme, which has at length arrested all the wheels of the national government, and brought them to an awful stand. Congress at this time scarcely possess the means of keeping up the forms of administration till the states can have time to agree upon a more substantial substitute for the present shadow of a federal government."

§ 452. A farther illustration of this topic may be gathered from the palpable defect in the confederation, of any power to give a sanction to its laws. Congress had no power to exact obedience, or punish disobedience to its ordinances. They could neither impose fines,