speaking for the
younger Republicans, agreed that the greatest danger of the future lay
in weak government. They were not in the least intimidated by the
addition of $80,000,000 to the national debt as the result of war. That
sum represented to their minds simply the price, none too large, of
commercial and industrial independence.

These young aggressive spirits seemed at times quite indifferent to nice
questions of constitutional law. Calhoun dismissed constitutional
objections to a national bank with a wave of the hand: he thought
discussion of such abstract themes "a useless consumption of time." On
introducing his bill for internal improvements, in December, 1816, he
intimated that he did not propose to indulge in metaphysical subtleties
respecting the Constitution. "The instrument was not intended as a
thesis for the logician to exercise his ingenuity on; ... it ought to be
construed with plain good sense." If Clay exhibited more sensitiveness
to constitutional limitations, it was because he had to clear himself
from the charge of inconsistency. In supporting the Bank Bill in 1816 he
frankly confessed that he had changed his mind on the point of
constitutionality. He had believed the incorporation of a bank in 1811
unwarranted by the Constitution; but conditions had changed. What was
then neither necessary nor proper was now both necessary and proper. The
interpretation of the Constitution must always take existing
circumstances into account. If Clay did not add to his reputation as an
expounder of the Constitution by this speech, he represented admirably,
nevertheless, the changes which circumstances had wrought in the
convictions of his associates.

Against these new tendencies John Randolph set himself stark and grim.
"The question is," said he, replying to Calhoun's new nationalism,
"whether or not we are willing to become one great consolidated nation,
or whether we have still respect enough for those old, respectable
institutions [the States] to regard their integrity and preservation as
a part of our policy." Randolph spoke for a generation which was passing
away; but his words touched a responsive chord in the breast of
President Madison. On March 3, 1817, as he was about to leave office, he
sent to Congress a message vetoing the Internal Improvements Bill and
warning his party associates of the danger of latitudinarian views of
the Constitution. This message was Madison's farewell address. It was
thoro