Have we not seen, in America, that treaties were violated, though they are, in all countries, considered as the supreme law of the land? Was it not, therefore, necessary to declare in explicit terms, that they should be so here? How, then, is this Constitution on a different footing from the government of Britain? The worthy member says, that they can make a treaty relinquishing our rights, and inflicting punishments; because all treaties are declared paramount to the constitutions and laws of the states. An attentive consideration of this will show the committee that they can do no such thing. The provision of the 6th article is, that this Constitution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all the treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land. They can, by this, make no treaty which shall be repugnant to the spirit of the Constitution, or inconsistent with the delegated powers. The treaties they make must be under the authority of the United States, to be within their province. It is sufficiently secured, because it only declares that, in pursuance of the powers given, they shall be the supreme law of the land, notwithstanding any thing in the constitution or laws of particular states.
The fact which he has adduced from the English history respecting the Russian ambassador, does not apply to this part of the Constitution. The arrest of that ambassador was an offence against the law of nations. There was no tribunal to punish it before. An act was therefore made to prevent such offences for the future; appointing a court to try offenders against it, and pointing out their punishment. That act acknowledges the arrest to have been a violation of the law of nations, and that it was a defect in their laws that no remedy had been provided against such violations before. I think it must appear, to the satisfaction of the committee, that this power is similar to what it is in England.
Mr. GEORGE MASON. Mr. Chairman, it is true that this is one of the greatest acts of sovereignty, and therefore ought to be most strongly guarded. The cession of such a power, without such checks and guards, cannot be justified: yet I acknowledge such a power must rest somewhere. It is so in all governments. If, in the course of an unsuccess-
