Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/488

 443 to consider and trace the relations, which each of these objects bears to the others; and to show, that, collectively, they comprise every thing requisite, with the blessing of Divine Providence, to render a people prosperous and happy." In Hunter v. Martin, (1 Wheat. R. 305, 324,) the Supreme Court say, (as we have seen,) "the constitution of the United States was ordained and established, not by the states in their sovereign capacities, but emphatically, as the preamble of the constitution declares, by the people of the United States;" and language still more expressive will be found used on other solemn occasions.

§ 464. But this point has been so much dwelt upon in the discussion of other topics, that it is wholly unnecessary to pursue it further. It does, however, deserve notice, that this phraseology was a matter of much critical debate in some of the conventions called to ratify the constitution. On the one hand, it was pressed, as a subject of just alarm to the states, that the people were substituted for the states; that this would involve a destruction of the states in one consolidated national government; and would terminate in the subversion of the public liberties. On the other hand, it was urged, as the only safe course for the preservation of the Union and the liberties of the people, that the government should emanate from the people, and not from the states; that it should not be, like the confederation, a mere treaty, operating by requisitions on the states; and that the people, for whose benefit it