to oppose, in like manner, any encroachment by the other. The two houses
have each its own appropriate powers and authorities, which it is bound
to preserve. They have, too, different constituents. The members of the
Senate are representatives of States; and it is in the Senate alone that
the four-and-twenty States, as political bodies, have a direct influence
in the legislative and executive powers of this government. He is a
strange advocate of State rights, who maintains that this body, thus
representing the States, and thus being the strictly federal branch of
the legislature, may not assert and maintain all and singular its own
powers and privileges, against either or both of the other branches.

If any thing be done or threatened derogatory to the rights of the
States, as secured by the organization of the Senate, may we not lift up
our voices against it? Suppose the House of Representatives should vote
that the Senate ought not to propose amendments to revenue bills; would
it be the duty of the Senate to take no notice of such proceeding? Or,
if we were to see the President issuing commissions to office to persons
who had never been nominated to the Senate, are we not to remonstrate?

Sir, there is no end of cases, no end of illustrations. The doctrines of
the Protest, in this respect, cannot stand the slightest scrutiny; they
are blown away by the first breath of discussion.

And yet, Sir, it is easy to perceive why this right of declaring its
sentiments respecting the conduct of the executive is denied to either
house, in its legislative capacity. It is merely that the Senate might
be presented in the odious light of _trying_ the President, judicially,
without regular accusation or hearing. The Protest declares that the
President is _charged with a crime, and, without hearing or trial, found
guilty and condemned_. This is evidently an attempt to appeal to popular
feeling, and to represent the President as unjustly treated and unfairly
tried. Sir, it is a false appeal. The President has not been tried at
all; he has not been accused; he has not been charged with crime; he has
not been condemned. Accusation, trial, and sentence are terms belonging
to judicial proceedings. But the Senate has been engaged in no such
proceeding. The resolution of the 28th of March was not an exercise of
judicial power, either in form, in substance, or in intent. Everybody
knows that the Senate can exercise no judicial power until