Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/112

 104 § 1224. In the enumeration of the powers of congress, which is made in the eighth section of the first article, we find that of exercising exclusive legislation over such district, as shall become the seat of government. This power, like all others, which are specified, is conferred on congress, as the legislature of the Union; for, strip them of that character, and they would not possess it. In no other character can it be exercised. In legislating for the district, they necessarily preserve the character of the legislature of the Union; for it is in that character alone, that the constitution confers on them this power of exclusive legislation. This proposition need not be enforced. The second clause of the sixth article declares, that "this constitution, and the laws of the United States, which shall be made in pursuance thereof, shall be the supreme law of the land." The clause, which gives exclusive jurisdiction, is unquestionably a part of the constitution, and, as such, binds all the United States. Those, who contend, that acts of congress, made in pursuance of this power, do not, like acts made in pursuance of other powers, bind the nation, ought to show some safe and clear rule, which shall support this construction, and prove, that an act of congress, clothed in all the forms, which attend other legislative acts, and passed in virtue of a power conferred on, and exercised by congress, as the legislature of the Union, is not a law of the United States, and does not bind them.

§ 1225. One of the gentlemen sought to illustrate his proposition, that congress, when legislating for the district, assumed a distinct character, and was reduced to a mere local legislature, whose laws could possess no obligation out of the ten miles square, by a reference to the complex character of this court. It is,