the express grants to Congress
contained in the instrument. In construing the Constitution we must then
next inquire, Is its exercise "necessary and proper"?--not whether it
may be convenient or useful "for carrying into execution" the power
to regulate commerce among the States. But the jealous patriots of
that day were not content even with this strict rule of construction.
Apprehending that a dangerous latitude of interpretation might be
applied in future times to the enumerated grants of power, they procured
an amendment to be made to the original instrument, which declares that
"the powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor
prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States respectively
or to the people."

The distinctive spirit and character which pervades the Constitution is
that the powers of the General Government are confined chiefly to our
intercourse with foreign nations, to questions of peace and war, and to
subjects of common interest to all the States, carefully leaving the
internal and domestic concerns of each individual State to be controlled
by its own people and legislature. Without specifically enumerating
these powers, it must be admitted that this well-marked distinction runs
through the whole instrument. In nothing does the wisdom of its framers
appear more conspicuously than in the care with which they sought to
avoid the danger to our institutions which must necessarily result from
the interference of the Federal Government with the local concerns
of the States. The jarring and collision which would occur from the
exercise by two separate governments of jurisdiction over the same
subjects could not fail to produce disastrous consequences. Besides,
the corrupting and seducing money influence exerted by the General
Government in carrying into effect a system of internal improvements
might be perverted to increase and consolidate its own power to the
detriment of the rights of the States.

If the power existed in Congress to pass the present bill, then taxes
must be imposed and money borrowed to an unlimited extent to carry such
a system into execution. Equality among the States is equity. This
equality is the very essence of the Constitution. No preference can
justly be given to one of the sovereign States over another. According
to the best estimate, our immense coast on the Atlantic, the Gulf of
Mexico, the Pacific, and the Ivakes embraces more than 9,500 miles,