Page:Works of John C. Calhoun, v1.djvu/352

 far as these influences extend, they must give a leaning to the side which can control the elections, and, through them, the department which has at its disposal the patronage of the government. Nor does their office place them beyond the reach of fear. As independent as it is, they are, like all the other officers of government, liable to be impeached: and the powers of impeaching and of trying impeachments, are vested, respectively, in the House of Representatives and the Senate — both of which emanate directly from the combined majorities which control the government. But, if both hope and fear should be insufficient to overcome the independence of the judges, the appointing power, which emanates from the same source, would, in time, fill the bench with those only whose opinions and principles accord with the other departments. And hence, all reliance on the judiciary for protection, under the most favorable view that can be taken, must, in the end, prove vain and illusory.

I have now shown that the 25th section of the judiciary act is unauthorized by the constitution; and that it rests on an assumption which would give to Congress the right to enforce, through the judiciary department, whatever measures it might think proper to adopt; and to put down all resistance by force. The effect of this is to make the government of the United States the sole judge, in the last resort, as to the extent of its powers, and to place the States and their separate governments and institutions at its mercy. It would be a waste of time to undertake to show that an assumption, which