Page:Review of the Proclamation of President Jackson.djvu/91

 X.

, January 21, 1833.

I have contended, that the several States which compose this Union, are Free, Sovereign ad Independent, yet let no one suppose, even for an instant, that in asserting their supremacy, I mean to deduce from thence, their emancipation from any obligation. A State must be constituted by rational and accountable beings; and although but an ideal creation, yet as it can only think and act through its members, it must bear their character.

It so becomes a moral and accountable being itself, bound by every moral obligation which attaches to man as an individual; and even in a higher degree.

I certainly do not concur with the learned author of this Proclamation, in the new precepts of ethics or of public law which he announces therein, when he says, "a binding obligation that has no sanction, may be broken with no other consequence than moral guilt,"—or when he infers from that postulate, that as "a league between independent Nations, generally, has no sanction other than a moral one; or if it should contain a penalty, as there is no common superior, it cannot be enforced." My error (if it is one) proceeds probably, from my utter incapacity to comprehend what is meant by moral guilt, or by a moral sanction. To my dull apprehension, moral guilt appears very like a true falsehood, and by moral sanction I must believe is meant physical morality. I doubt not, however, that all those who can understand what this State paper means, when it speaks of "aggregate character," or of "a nation for certain purposes," will as easily discover what it intends by moral guilt and moral sanction.

Nay, as formerly, we have been taught to understand for possibility of a constructive journey, and of moral Treason, we may