The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Speech of Daniel Webster
• I
• Ii
• Iii
• Iv
• V
• Vi

IV

But it is said that it might happen that an army would not be raised by voluntary enlistment, in which case the power to raise an army would be granted in vain, unless they might be raised by compulsion. If this reasoning could prove anything it would equally show that whenever the legitimate powers of the Constitution should be so badly administered as to cease to answer the great ends intended by them, such new powers may be assumed or usurped, as any existing administration may deem expedient. This is a result of his own reasoning to which the Secretary does not profess to go. But it is a true result. For if it is to be assumed that all powers were granted, which might by possibility become necessary, and that government itself is the judge of this possible necessity, then the powers of the government are precisely what it chooses they should be. Apply the same reasoning to any other power granted to Congress and test its accuracy by its result. Congress has power to borrow money. How is it to exercise this power? Is it confined to voluntary loans? There is no express limitation to that effect, and in the language of the Secretary it might happen, indeed, it has happened, that persons could not be found willing to lend. Money might be borrowed then in any other mode. In other words, Congress might resort to a forced loan. It might take the money of any man by force and give in exchange Exchequer notes or Certificates of Stock. Would this be quite constitutional, Sir? It is entirely within the reasoning of the Secretary, and it is the result of his argument, outraging the rights of individuals in a far less degree than the practical consequences which he himself draws from it. A compulsory loan is not to be compared, in point of enormity, with a compulsory military service.

If the Secretary of War has proved the right of Congress to enact a law enforcing a draft of men out of the Militia into the Regular Army, he will at any time be able to prove quite as clearly that Congress has power to create a Dictator. The arguments which have helped him in one case will equally help him in the other. The same reason of a supposed or possible state necessity which is urged now, may be repeated then with equal pertinency and effect.

Sir, in granting Congress the power to raise armies, the People have granted all the means which are ordinary and usual, and which are consistent with the liberties and security of the People themselves and they have granted no others. To talk about the unlimited power of the government over the means to execute its authority is to hold a language which is true only in regard to despotisms. The tyranny of Arbitrary Government consists as much in its means as in its ends, and it would be a ridiculous and absurd constitution which should be less cautious to grant against abuses in the one case than in the other. All the means and instruments which a free government exercises, as well as the ends and objects it pursues, are to partake of its own essential character, and to be conformed to its genuine spirit. A free government with arbitrary means to administer it is a contradiction, a free government without adequate provisions for personal security is an absurdity, a free government with an uncontrolled power of military conscription is a solecism, at once the most ridiculous and abominable that ever entered into the head of man.