Even if this unity was not produced by the appointment of the revolutionary government,or by the nature of the powers exercised by them,and acquiesced in by the people,he thinks there can be no doubt that this was the necessary result of the Declaration of independence.In order that he may be fully understood upon this point,I will transcribe the entire passage relating to it:"In the next place,the colonies did not severally act for themselves,and proclaim their own independence.9It is true that some of the States had previously formed incipient governments for themselves;but it was done in compliance with the recommendations of Congress.Virginia,on the 29th of June,1776,by a convention of delegates,declared 'the government of this country,as formerly exercised under the Crown of Great Britain,totally dissolved,'and proceeded to form a new constitution of government.New Hampshire also formed a new government,in December,1775,which was manifestly intended to be temporary,'during,'as they said,'the unhappy and unnatural contest with Great Britain.'New Jersey,too,established a frame of government,on the 2d July,1776;but it was expressly declared that it should be void upon a reconciliation with Great Britain.And South Carolina,in March,1776,adopted a constitution of government;but this was in like manner 'established until an accommodation between Great Britain and America could be obtained.'But the declaration of the independence of all the colonies was the united act of all.It was 'a declaration of the representatives of the United States of America,in Congress assembled;''by the delegates appointed by the good people of the colonies,'as in a prior declaration of rights,they were called.
It was not an act done by the State governments then organized,nor by persons chosen by them.It was emphatically the act of the whole people of the united colonies,by the instrumentality of their representatives,chosen for that,among other purposes.It was an act not competent to the State governments,or any of them,as organized under their charters to adopt.Those charters neither contemplated the case nor provided for it.
It was an act of original,inherent sovereignty by the people themselves,resulting from their right to change the form of government,and to institute a new government,whenever necessary for their safety and happiness.So the Declaration of Independence treats it.No State had presumed,of itself,to form a new government,or to provide for the exigencies of the times,without consulting Congress on the subject;and when they acted,it was in pursuance of the recommendation of Congress.It was,therefore,the achievement of the whole,for the benefit of the whole.The people of the united colonies made the united colonies free and independent States,and absolved them from allegiance to the British Crown.The Declaration of Independence has,accordingly,always been treated as an act of paramount and sovereign authority,complete and perfect per se;and ipso facto working an entire dissolution of all political,connection with,and allegiance to,Great Britain.And this,not merely as a practical fact,but in a legal and constitutional view of the matter by courts of justice."The first question which this passage naturally suggests to the mind of the reader is this:if two or more nations of people,confessedly separate,distinct and independent,each having its own peculiar government,without any "direct political connection with each other,"yet owing the same allegiance to one common superior,should unite in a declaration of rights which they believed belonged to all of them all,would that circumstance alone make them "one people?"Stripped of the circumstances with which Judge Story has surrounded it,this is,at last,the only proposition involved.If Spain,Naples,and Holland,while they were "dependencies"of the Imperial Crown of France,had united in declaring that they were oppressed,in the same mode and degree,by the measures of that Crown,and that they did,for that reason,disdain all allegiance to it,and assume the station of "free and independent States,"would they thereby have become one people?
Barely this will not be asserted by any one.We should see,in that act,nothing more than the union of several independent sovereignties,for the purpose of effecting a common object,which each felt itself too weak to effect alone.Nothing would be more natural,than that nations so situated should establish a common military power,a common treasury,and a common agency,through which,to carry on their intercourse with other powers;
but that all this should unite them together,so as to form them into one nation,is a consequence not readily perceived.The case here supposed is precisely that of the American colonies,if those colonies were,in point of,fact,separate,distinct,and independent of one another.If they were so,(and I think it has been shown that they were),then the fact that they united in the Declaration of Independence does not make them "one people"any more than a similar declaration would have made Spain,Naples and Holland one people;if they were not so,then they were one people already,and the Declaration of Independence did not render them more or less identical.It is true,the analogy here supposed does not hold in every particular;the relations of the colonies to one another were certainly closer,in many respects,than those of Spain,Naples and Holland,to one another.But as to all purposes involved in the present inquiry,the analogy is perfect.The effect attributed to the Declaration of Independence presupposes that the colonies were not "one people"before;
