which it prescribes
to the public officers, the sanctity with which they shall religiously
observe those oaths, and the patriotism with which the people shall
shield it by their own sovereign will, which has made the Constitution
supreme. It must be exerted against the will of a mere representative
majority or not at all. It is alone in pursuance of that will that any
measure can reach the President, and to say that because a majority
in Congress have passed a bill he should therefore sanction it is
to abrogate the power altogether and to render its insertion in the
Constitution a work of absolute supererogation. The duty is to guard the
fundamental will of the people themselves from (in this case; I admit,
unintentional) change or infraction by a majority in Congress; and in
that light alone do I regard the constitutional duty which I now most
reluctantly discharge. Is this bill now presented for my approval or
disapproval such a bill as I have already declared could not receive my
sanction? Is it such a bill as calls for the exercise of the negative
power under the Constitution? Does it violate the Constitution by
creating a national bank to operate _per se_ over the Union? Its title,
in the first place, describes its general character. It is "an act to
provide for the better collection, safe-keeping, and disbursement of the
_public_ revenue by means of a _corporation_ to be styled the _Fiscal
Corporation_ of the _United States_." In style, then, it is plainly
national in its character. Its powers, functions, and duties are those
which pertain to the _collecting, keeping_, and _disbursing_ the
_public_ revenue. The means by which these are to be exerted is a
_corporation_ to be styled the _Fiscal_ Corporation of the United
States. It is a corporation created by the Congress of the United
States, in its character of a national legislature for the whole
Union, to perform the _fiscal_ purposes, meet the _fiscal_ wants and
exigencies, supply the _fiscal_ uses, and exert the _fiscal_ agencies
of the Treasury of the United States. Such is its own description of
itself. Do its provisions contradict its title? They do not. It is true
that by its first section it provides that it shall be established in
the District of Columbia; but the amount of its capital, the manner
in which its stock is to be subscribed for and held, the persons and
bodies, corporate and politic, by whom its stock may be held, the
appointment of its direct