vernment should exercise it in the case of the Cumberland
road. He returned it with objections to its passage, and in assigning
them took occasion to say that in the early stages of the Government he
had inclined to the construction that it had no right to expend money
except in the performance of acts authorized by the other specific
grants of power, according to a strict construction of them, but that on
further reflection and observation his mind had undergone a change; that
his opinion then was "that Congress have an unlimited power to raise
money, and that in its appropriation they have a discretionary power,
restricted only by the duty to appropriate it to purposes of common
defense, and of general, not local, national, not State, benefit;" and
this was avowed to be the governing principle through the residue of his
Administration. The views of the last Administration are of such recent
date as to render a particular reference to them unnecessary. It is well
known that the appropriating power, to the utmost extent which had been
claimed for it, in relation to internal improvements was fully
recognized and exercised by it.

This brief reference to known facts will be sufficient to show the
difficulty, if not impracticability, of bringing back the operations of
the Government to the construction of the Constitution set up in 1798,
assuming that to be its true reading in relation to the power under
consideration, thus giving an admonitory proof of the force of
implication and the necessity of guarding the Constitution with
sleepless vigilance against the authority of precedents which have not
the sanction of its most plainly defined powers; for although it is the
duty of all to look to that sacred instrument instead of the statute
book, to repudiate at all times encroachments upon its spirit, which are
too apt to be effected by the conjuncture of peculiar and facilitating
circumstances, it is not less true that the public good and the nature
of our political institutions require that individual differences should
yield to a well-settled acquiescence of the people and confederated
authorities in particular constructions of the Constitution on doubtful
points. Not to concede this much to the spirit of our institutions would
impair their stability and defeat the objects of the Constitution
itself.

The bill before me does not call for a more definite opinion upon the
particular circumstances which will warrant appropri