tion! If a bare majority of the voters in
any one State may, on a real or supposed knowledge of the intent with
which a law has been passed, declare themselves free from its
operation--say here it gives too little, there too much, and operates
unequally--here it suffers articles to be free that ought to be taxed,
there it taxes those that ought to be free--in this case the proceeds
are intended to be applied to purposes which we do not approve, in that
the amount raised is more than is wanted. Congress, it is true, are
invested by the Constitution with the right of deciding these questions
according to their sound discretion. Congress is composed of the
representatives of all the States, and of all the people of all the
States; but WE, part of the people of one State, to whom the
Constitution has given no power on the subject, from whom it has
expressly taken it away--_we_, who have solemnly agreed that this
Constitution shall be our law--_we_, most of whom have sworn to support
it--_we_ now abrogate this law, and swear, and force others to swear,
that it shall not be obeyed--and we do this, not because Congress have
no right to pass such laws; this we do not allege; but because they
have passed them with improper views. They are unconstitutional from the
motives of those who pass them, which we can never with certainty know,
from their unequal operation; although it is impossible from the nature
of things that they should be equal--and from the disposition which we
presume may be made of their proceeds, although that disposition has not
been declared. This is the plain meaning of the ordinance in relation to
laws which it abrogates for alleged unconstitutionality. But it does not
stop here. It repeals, in express terms, an important part of the
Constitution itself, and of laws passed to give it effect, which have
never been alleged to be unconstitutional. The Constitution declares
that the judicial powers of the United States extend to cases arising
under the laws of the United States, and that such laws the Constitution
and treaties shall be paramount to the State constitutions and laws. The
judiciary act prescribes the mode by which the case may be brought
before a court of the United States, by appeal, when a State tribunal
shall decide against this provision of the Constitution. The ordinance
declares there shall be no appeal; makes the State law paramount to the
Constitution and laws of the United States; forces jud