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JAMES JACKSON KILPATRICK

THE
SOVEREIGN  STATES

Notes of a Citizen of Virginia



Originally published by
Henry Regnery Company
Chicago, 1957

Fiftieth Anniversary Edition
Published by Old Line Press
Charles Town, West Virginia
2007


This HTML version is Public Domain,
courtesy of Old Line Press.
This presentation is not authorized
or endorsed by the author.


The great and leading principle is, that the General Government emanated from the people of the several States, forming distinct political communities, and acting in their separate and sovereign capacity, and not from all of the people forming one aggregate political community; that the Constitution of the United States is, in fact, a compact, to which each State is a party, in the character already described; and that the several States, or parties, have a right to judge of its infractions; and in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exercise of power not delegated, they have the right, in the last resort, to use the language of the Virginia Resolutions, “to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining, within their respective limits, the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining to them.”
This right of interposition, thus solemnly asserted by the State of Virginia, be it called what it may—State-right, veto, nullification, or by any other name—I conceive to be the fundamental principle of our system, resting on facts historically as certain as our revolution itself, and deductions as simple and demonstrative as that of any political or moral truth whatever; and I firmly believe that on its recognition depend the stability and safety of our political institutions. . .

John C. Calhoun      

 Mr. Kilpatrick 
CONTENTS

Introduction
 
Part I. THE SOVEREIGN STATES
1. The Beginnings
2. The State
3. The Articles of Confederation
4. “We the People”
5. The States in the Constitution
6. The Prophetic Mr. Henry
7. The States Ratify
 
Part II. THE RIGHT TO INTERPOSE
1. A Cast of Characters
2. The Chisholm Case
3. Debt Assumption
4. The Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions
5. Mr. Madison's Report of 1799
 
Part III. THE STATES FIGHT BACK
1. The Olmstead Case
2. The Case of the Lands of Lord Fairfax
3. The Embargo Crisis
4. Matters of the Militia
5. Events of 1814
6. The Hartford Convention
7. The Bank of the United States
8. Internal Improvements
9. Kentucky vs. the Court
10. Georgia vs. the Court
11. Calhoun and Nullification
12. The Case for Nullification
13. The Personal Liberty Laws
14. The Obligation of Contracts
15. After the War
16. The Reconstruction Cases
17. The Commerce Clause (Commenced)
18. Interlude in a Speakeasy
19. The Commerce Clause (Continued)
 
Part IV. THE STATES TODAY
1. The Southern States
2. Some Notes on the Fourteenth Amendment
3. Some Notes on Police Power
4. The Transcendent Issue
 
  Notes
  Table of Cases
  Index
Transcription and HTML layout by Joel T. LeFevre.

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