CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. The Federal Constitution of the United States of America is one of the class of `written' and 'rigid' constitutions, and the most important example of a constitution of the `supreme' or 'extraordinary' type. That is to say, it is not only the result of a definite purpose and of a deliberate act of legislation, embodied in written form : it is not only incapable of modi fication by ordinary legislative processes; but it is the true supreme law of the land, to which all other law must conform, and conformity to it is the test of the validity of the ordinary law. The commanding quality of the Federal Constitu tion is the fact that it is not, like most political constitutions, including those of the several States of the American Union, a mere restriction upon the authority of the governing powers of the State, but that it creates a new frame of government, which it endows with certain limited powers, and from which it deliberately with holds all powers not so granted. The government so constituted by it is, therefore, a government of granted, and not of antecedent authority, and the Constitution is not only the supreme law of the land, but comprehends within itself the whole of that law.
There is some confusion, therefore, in the use of such phrases as the 'territorial extent,' the Constitution follows the flag,' and whether the Constitution 'applies' to certain newly acquired Territories. Strictly speaking, the Constitution has no territorial extension; it neither expands nor contracts with the limits of American juris diction; but, whatever those limits may be, it steadily and invariably binds the governmental agencies of the nation and limits their authority. In so far as it confers general powers of govern ment on the President and Congress, those powers may be exercised in tile ends of the earth as well as within the limits of the original States; where as, the restriction's upon that power are equally valid, wherever it may be exercised.
This view of the Federal Constitution, as a carefully guarded grant of powers to the Central Government, explains even those guarantees of personal liberty and security which it contains and which are commonly referred to as the Bill of Rights of the Constitution (Amendments These are not, as they are commonly understood, an unlimited charter of liberties for the people of the tnited States, but only restrictions upon the exercise of arbitrary power by the President and Congress. They are not aimed at the States or at local authority. It is announced as "a settled rule of construction of the national Con stitution, that the limitations it imposes upon the powers of government are in all eases to be understood as limitations upon the government of the Union only. except where the States are expressly mentioned" (Cooley. Constitutional Limitations, p. 19). Accordingly, even such a right as that of trial by jury in criminal eases, which is usually regarded as one of the inalien able rights of the American citizen, is by the Federal Constitution protected only against viola tion by Congress and the Federal judiciary. Ex cepting as they are restrained by their own con stitutions, there is nothing to prevent the several States from abolishing the jury system entirely.
From what has been said above it will be observed that the Constitution of the United States is not, as it is conceived by foreigners, a complete scheme of government for the people of the United States, but only a part, and that the smaller part, of such a scheme. To fill out the outline, the constitutions and laws of the several States must be taken into account. These pro vide by far the greater part of the machinery of government, the securities of life. liberty, and property, and the political rights of the citizen.
The Constitution of the United States, in the form in which it is reprinted in this article. rep resents a long process of experiment and dis cussion. in the course of which the jealousies and conflicting interests of the different States and sections of which the' Union was made up. were gradually compromised and subordinated to the common welfare of all. The Articles of Confed eration, by which the ill-jointed union of the thirteen original States was held together from 1779 to can scarcely be described as a eon st itution. in any proper sense of that term, as they created only the form and not the substance of government, and vested no real authority in the common representatives of the several common wealths. They were more in the nature of a treaty of alliance, by which the Slates bound themselves to common action. and the Congress constituted by them an international conference for promot ing the common welfare. The inconveniences and dangers of tbis arrangement speedily beeame too pressing to he and in February, 1787, Congress took such action as its limited powers permitted, and passed a resolution, suggesting that a convention of delegates from the several States be held at Philadelphia on the second Monday of May following, "for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Con federation, and reporting to Congress and the several State legislatures sueh alterations and provisions therein as shall, when agreed to by Congress and confirmed by the States, render the Federal Constitution adequate to the exigen cies of government, and the preservation of the Union." Pursuant to this resolution of Congress. dele gates from twelve of the thirteen States ( Rhode Island alone being unrepresented) assembled at Philadelphia, the convention opening its sessions in independence Dalt on May 14, 1787, under the Presidency of George Washington. For four mouths the delegates carried on the great work which had been intrusted to them, and at the olose of their deliberations, on September 17, 1787, they had completed the Constitution of the United States, with the exception of tile amendments, in tile form in which we have it to-day. Their work was promptly approved by Congress, and at the close of the year 1788 had been adopted by eleven of the States and went into operation between them. The two remaining States, North Carolina and Rhode Island, ratified it and entered into the American Union in 1789 and 1790, respectively.