y to the new order. But while
Republicans admitted that a measure of governmental centralization was
indispensable, they prized the individual State as still the main pillar
of our political fabric, and were hence jealous of all increased
function at the centre. It became more and more their theory that the
States, rather than the individuals of the national body politic, had
been the parties to the Constitution, so making this to be a compact
like the old Articles, and the government under it a confederacy as
before 1789.

Another issue divided the parties, that between the strict and the more
free interpretation of the Constitution--between the close
constructionists and the liberal constructionists. The question dividing
them was this: In matters relating to the powers of the general
Government, ought any unclear utterance of the Constitution to be so
explained as to enlarge those powers, or so as to confine them to the
narrowest possible sphere? Each of the two tendencies in construction
has in turn brought violence to our fundamental law, but the sentiment
of nationality and the logic of events have favored liberality rather
than narrowness in interpreting the parchment. When in charge of the
government, even strict constructionists have not been able to carry out
their theory. Thus Jefferson, to purchase Louisiana, was obliged, from
his point of view, to transcend constitutional warrant; and Madison, who
at first opposed such an institution as unconstitutional, ended by
approving the law which chartered the Second United States Bank.

The Federalists used to argue that Article I, Section VIII., the part of
the Constitution upon which debate chiefly raged, could not have been
intended as an exhaustive statement of congressional powers. The
Government would be unable to exist, they urged, to say nothing of
defending itself and accomplishing its work, unless permitted to do more
than the eighteen things there enumerated. They further insisted that
plain utterances of the Constitution presuppose the exercise by Congress
of powers not specifically enumerated, explicitly authorizing that body
to make all laws necessary for executing the enumerated powers "and all
other powers vested in the Government of the United States or in any
department or officer thereof."

In reply the Anti-Federalists made much of the titles "United States,"
"Federal," and the like, in universal use. They appealed to concessions
as to the nat