ion, having impartially discussed and fully
considered a Constitution for the United States of America,
reported to Congress by the convention of delegates from the
United States of America, and submitted to us by a resolution of
the General Court of the said Commonwealth, passed the 25th day
of October last past, and acknowledging with grateful hearts the
goodness of the Supreme Ruler of the universe, in affording the
people of the United States, in the course of his Providence, an
opportunity, deliberately and peaceably, without fraud or
surprise, of entering into an explicit and solemn COMPACT with
each other, by assenting to and ratifying a new Constitution, in
order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure
domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote
the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to
themselves and their posterity--do, in the name and in behalf of
the people of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, assent to and
ratify the said Constitution for the United States of America."

The ratification of New Hampshire is expressed in precisely the same
words, save only the difference of date of the resolution of the
Legislature (or "General Court") referred to, and also the use of the
word "State" instead of "Commonwealth." Both distinctly accept it as a
_compact_ of the States "with each other"--which Mr. Webster, a son of
New Hampshire and a Senator from Massachusetts, declared it was not; and
not only so, but he repudiated the very "vocabulary" from which the
words expressing the doctrine were taken.

It would not need, however, this abounding wealth of contemporaneous
exposition--it does not require the employment of any particular words
in the Constitution--to prove that it was drawn up as a compact between
sovereign States entering into a confederacy with each other, and that
they ratified and acceded to it separately, severally, and
independently. The very structure of the whole instrument and the facts
attending its preparation and ratification would suffice. The language
of the final article would have been quite enough: "The ratification of
the conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment
of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the same." This is
not the "language" of a superior imposing a mandate upon subordinates.
The consent of the contracting parties is n