Page:Review of the Proclamation of President Jackson.djvu/42

 Hence, it would be a very great solecism, to speak of any act done by one agent only, as a joint act; and therefore, no corporate act is ever properly described, as a joint act of a Corporation, even when such a body is composed of many members: for although the members may be many, the Corporation is but one, and the act, if a corporate act, must be performed by that one body only. It is not every act effected by the co-operation of several agents, however, that is properly termed a joint act. Because, although considered in reference to the number of its authors, every single act accomplished by the co-operation of several agents, must be their joint act, yet considered in reference to its intended effects, as these may be many, and attach to all, to each, or to some only of its agents, the act is referred as either joint or several, according to the nature of these intended effects. But as the intent of the act, cannot possible be inferred from the number of agents co-operating to its accomplishment, while it is admitted, that several as well as joint effects may and do result even from a joint act, the nature of such an act can only be ascertained from the intention of the agents. This intention must always be sought for, and generally, is best manifested, in the declarations of the agents employed to perform the act, especially when these declarations are uttered in the act itself, and of course at the time of performing it. If these plain propositions, which every Tyro has hitherto acknowledged to be true, are still admitted to be correct, it will be found difficult certainly, nay impossible probably, to reconcile them with the assertions of the President, when the effect intended to be produced by these assertions is remembered. The object in view in making these assertions is to prove thereby, that by virtue of the Declaration of Independence we acknowledged ourselves to be one Nation. Hence, the President says "that decisive and important step was taken jointly." Now if by this he means to say, merely, that this declaration was the work of many persons co-operating to produce it, no matter in what character they acted, he asserts a fact so unimportant to his purpose, and so familiar to every one, that it really seems almost ludicrous to utter it with such apparent gravity, if indeed it was necessary to state it at all.

But if means to be understood, as asserting that this