was right, that of the other was power. ...

Where, then, did each State get the sovereignty, freedom, and
independence, which the articles of confederation declare it
retains?--not from the whole people of the whole Union--not from
the Declaration of Independence--not from the people of the State
itself. It was assumed by agreement between the legislatures of the
several States, and their delegates in Congress, without authority
from or consultation of the people at all.

In the Declaration of Independence, the enacting and constituent
party dispensing and delegating sovereign power is the whole people
of the United Colonies. The recipient party, invested with power, is
the United Colonies, declared United States.

In the articles of confederation, this order of agency is inverted.
Each State is the constituent and enacting party, and the United
States in Congress assembled the recipient of delegated power--and
that power delegated with such a penurious and carking hand that it
had more the aspect of a revocation of the Declaration of
Independence than an instrument to carry it into effect.

None of these indispensably necessary powers were ever conferred by
the State legislatures upon the Congress of the federation; and well
was it that they never were. The system itself was radically
defective. Its incurable disease was an apostasy from the principles
of the Declaration of Independence. A substitution of separate State
sovereignties, in the place of the constituent sovereignty of the
people, was the basis of the Confederate Union.