pose that sovereign power shall be dragged into court." He also said, speaking of suits between citizens of different states in the Federal court: "By what laws would a case be tried? By the laws of the state where the contract was made; according to those laws, and those only, can it be decided." These considerations overcame the repugnance of some of the members of the convention and the instrument was ratified. Strange to say, within five years states were called at the bar of the Federal court. On the 19th of February, 1793, the Supreme Court, in Chisholm v. Georgia, decided that it had jurisdiction. Two days later the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution was proposed, which took away all such jurisdiction. As to the other point made by him, that suits would be decided by the law of the state where the contract was made, after his death it was decided, in Swift v. Tyson, that if the question be one of general commercial law the Federal courts will follow their own opinions as to what the law is and will not be controlled by the decisions of the state courts. While he was a member of the Virginia legislature a resolution was introduced condemning Jay's Treaty as unconstitutional and inexpedient. Marshall's argument as to the power of the executive to conclude a commercial treaty was so convincing that the portion of the resolution which denounced the treaty as unconstitutional was abandoned. He was a member of the commission which went to France in 1797. The French Directory would not officially receive the envoys, and after they had remained in Paris six months they were obliged to return without even an official discussion of their mission. They had received, however, some hints that in order to pave the way of negotiations, it was necessary to propose a loan by the United States to the French treasury, and also to pay some two hundred and fifty thousand dollars as a private gratification to certain high officers of government. Unsuccessful as the mission was, the envoys on their return were received with popular enthusiasm, and it was at a banquet in their honor that the famous historical words were spoken, "millions for defense, but not a cent for tribute." While in Congress he spoke against the resolution censuring President Adams for his course in reference to the extradition of Robbins. The speech was a powerful one, and settled forever the relations of the executive to matters of extradition. It will be found reported in Bee's Reports and also in the fifth volume of Wheaton. Gallatin was expected to answer it. During the greater part of the speech he sat listening; toward the close of the speech he walked up and down in the lobby in full hearing of Marshall, and when a friend asked him what answer he would make, he said: "I will not answer it, because it can not be answered." At the time Marshall became Chief Justice, there were but sixteen states in the Union. Vermont, Kentucky and Tennessee had been admitted. The territory now occupied by Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin was simply a territory-the Northwest Territory, held under authority of a deed from the commonwealth of Virginia, which was executed in 1784-five years before the Constitution was adopted; and which provided for the admission into the "federal union" of states to be carved out of this territory. West of the Mississippi River, which was the western boundary of the United States, lay French dominions, ceded to France by Spain in 1800-Louisiana, extending from the sources of the Mississippi to the Gulf of Mexico; while on the south the United States was bounded by Florida. The first great expansion of territory was made through Thomas Jefferson by the purchase from France, in 1803, of Louisiana. Jefferson was a strict constructionist, and believed the purchase to be unconstitutional, but necessary; inasmuch as the power that held the mouth of the Mississippi River was the natural enemy of the United States; he, therefore, carried out the purchase, expecting to obtain an amendment to the Constitution ratifying his act; no amendment to that effect was ever adopted; but by popular acquiescence the purchase was approved. It seems the irony of fate that Jefferson should have been called on to do this work in shaping history. Madison, his Secretary of State, in an eloquent passage of oratory, contended that extent of territory is not dangerous to the Union. The neglectful treatment the envoys of the United States received from France in 1797 well shows the little regard then paid to this country by European nations. Wise men, indeed, had foreseen the future of this country. It had been said: "Westward the star of empire takes its way; It is believed that this course of the star of the empire was made possible only by the institution and development of a national government, with a strong executive and judiciary. In process of time the name of the Republican party was changed to Democratic; and that party under its new name continued the policy of watchful jealousy against any aggressions that might be made on the states by the Federal power; and yet it came to pass that in 1833 Andrew Jackson, the head of the Democratic party, threatened the use of force in the struggle arising out of the act of South Carolina professing to nullify an act of Congress. Marshall warmly sustained Jackson in his course. Jefferson was then dead. I wish it were possible that in this country among men of general intelligence and information there might be the same familiarity with the political history of this country during the threescore years from the meeting of the Continental Congress to the death of John Marshall that there is with the political history of Great Britain during the like period from the meeting of the Long Parliament to the death of William III; it is to be desired, but hardly to be expected. In this connection I would mention John Marshall's life of George Washington, in five volumes; a book that has been highly praised and rather sharply criticised. Of course it has long since been superseded as a biography, but it will always be of value as a book of reference. When it was written, the time had not come for a life of Washington that should be a permanent standard biography. As a result of the progress of invention and discovery, communication between Washington City and San Francisco to-day requires less time than was necessary between Philadelphia and New York when Marshall became Chief Justice. When Marshall became Chief Justice, the government of the United States was not a very strong government. During the eleven years in which the Supreme Court had existed, it had decided but one hundred cases, and its opinions covered but five hundred pages of Dallas' reports, in which they were reported, with opinions of other courts of the United States and of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. John Jay, the first Chief Justice, had resigned his position in order to become Governor of New York. The Federal government was felt by many people to be an experiment. Indeed, to this day it is a puzzle to people of other nations. Edward A. Freeman, the great historian, during the early part of our Civil War, published the first volume of a book entitled "The History of Federal Government from the founding of the Amphictyonic Council to the Disruption of the United States." As the "Disruption of the United States" has been indefinitely postponed, the book has never been finished. The colonies had managed their own affairs, but the parliament of England was supreme, and here was the germ of the idea of an extraordinary legislature which has borne much fruit. On the one hand, in the affairs of a government with a written constitution, the legislature is not supreme, but there is an extraordinary legislature which is supreme in that government; that is, the body, |