e says
that the proposed Constitution "is to be submitted to conventions chosen
by _the people in the several States_, and by them approved or
rejected"--showing what _he_ understood by "the people of the United
States," who were to ordain and establish it. These same people--that
is, "the people of the several States"--he says, in a letter to
Lafayette, April 28, 1788, "retain everything they do not, by express
terms, give up." In a letter written to Benjamin Lincoln, October 26,
1788, he refers to the expectation that North Carolina will accede to
the Union, and adds, "Whoever shall be found to enjoy the confidence of
_the States_ so far as to be elected Vice-President," etc.--showing that
in the "confederated Government," as he termed it, the States were still
to act independently, even in the selection of officers of the General
Government. He wrote to General Knox, June 17, 1788, "I can not but hope
that the States which may be disposed to make a secession will think
often and seriously on the consequences." June 28, 1788, he wrote to
General Pinckney that New Hampshire "had acceded to the new
Confederacy," and, in reference to North Carolina, "I should be
astonished if that State should withdraw from the Union."

I shall add but two other citations. They are from speeches of John
Marshall, afterward the most distinguished Chief Justice of the United
States--who has certainly never been regarded as holding high views of
State rights--in the Virginia Convention of 1788. In the first case, he
was speaking of the power of the States over the militia, and is thus
reported:

"The State governments did not derive their powers from the
General Government; but each government derived its powers from
the people, and each was to act according to the powers given
it. Would any gentleman deny this?... Could any man say that
this power was not retained by the States, as they had not given
it away? For (says he) does not a power remain till it is given
away? The State Legislatures had power to command and govern
their militia before, and have it still, undeniably, unless
there be something in this Constitution that takes it away....

"He concluded by observing that the power of governing the
militia was not vested in the States by implication, because,
being possessed of it antecedently to the adoption of the
Government, and not being divested of it by any grant or
rest