red, there are not two Governments, there is only one
Government. Certain functions of it are ordained to be executed by the
State, and certain other functions by the Nation, How, then, can the
State, as such, assume to set aside the ordained functions of the
Nation? How, on the other hand, might the Nation assume to control the
ordained functions of the State? Each to its own master standeth or
falleth, and that master is the people. Hence, the absurdity of the
doctrine which claims the right of a State to resume powers once
delegated to the Nation. For the State, as such, never delegated those
powers. Hence, the absurdity of secession as a dogma in American
politics. And hence, also, it equally appears how absurd is any claim on
the part of the Nation to visit upon the State organism the penalties of
the treason of individuals against itself.

Let it be remembered that the State derives none of its rights from the
Nation. How, then, can it be said to forfeit its rights to the Nation?
The State is a separate and distinct organism, deriving its rights
directly from the people within its territorial limit. They established
it, and to them alone it is responsible. In the same manner, the people
of the whole country, without regard to the territorial limits of
States, established the Nation. The people of the whole country,
therefore, have a permanent interest in the Nation, and no one portion
of them may rightfully assume to set aside its supreme obligations, in
disregard and violation of the organic law. If certain of the people of
any State have rebelled against the National Government, attempting thus
to set aside its paramount obligations, undoubtedly their lives and
property are forfeit to the Nation. But how can their individual treason
work a forfeiture of the State powers and functions? These have been
usurped, indeed, by the armed combinations of the rebellion, but they
are still complete, only awaiting the overthrow of the armed
combinations to be resumed and controlled by those persons within the
same territorial limit who have not rebelled.

It is objected to this view that it assumes a substratum of loyal people
still existing in the rebel States. The assumption is certainly
warrantable when we read of the scenes--witnesses against the Southern
Confederacy whose eloquence surpasses speech--that have attended the
overthrow of the rebellion in Tennessee; and when we remember that even
in South Carolina there a