Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol III).djvu/688

 680 the insurrection in Massachusetts, in 1787, had been successful, and the malcontents had been headed by a Caesar or a Cromwell? If a despotic or monarchical government were established in one state, it would bring on the ruin of the whole republic. Montesquieu has acutely remarked, that confederated governments should be formed only between states, whose form of government is not only similar, but also republican.

§ 1809. The Federalist has spoken with so much force and propriety upon this subject, that it supersedes all further reasoning. "In a confederacy," says that work, founded on republican principles, and composed of republican members, the superintending government ought clearly to possess authority to defend the system against aristocratic or monarchical innovations. The more intimate the nature of such a union may be, the greater interest have the members in the political institutions of each other; and the greater right to insist, that the forms of government, under which the compact was entered into, should be substantially maintained.

§ 1810. But a right implies a remedy; and where else could the remedy be deposited, than where it is deposited by the constitution? Governments of dissimilar principles and forms have been found less adapted to a federal coalition of any sort, than those of a kindred nature. "As the confederate republic of Germany," says Montesquieu, "consists of free cities and petty states, subject to different princes, experience shows us, that it is more imperfect, than that of