the sphere of its legitimate authority."^ Its great
purpose was to avoid conflict of decision between State
and Federal authorities, to secure to every litigant
whose rights dei>ended on Federal law a decision by the
Federal Courts, and to prevent the Courts of the
several States from impairing the authority of the
Federal Government; and had the Court not been
vested with this power, it may well be doubted whether
the National Union could have been preserved* It was
not without reason that John C. Calhoun deemed this
Section "the entering wedge", destroying, as he be-
lieved, **the relation of co-equals and co-ordinates
between the Federal Government and the Governments
of the individual States. . . . The eflfect of this,'" he
said, " is to make the Government of the United States
the sole judge, in the last resort, as to the extent of its
powers. ... It is the great enforcing power to compel a
State to submit to all acts. . . . Without it, the whole
course of the Government would have been different —
the conflict between the co-ordinate Governments, in
reference to the extent of their respective powers, would
have been subject only to the action of the amending
power, and thereby the equilibrium of the system been
preserved, and the practice of the Government made to
conform to its Federal character." * That Calhoun
rightly attributed to the operation of this Section the
development of the Government on the National rather
than on the Federal theory and into a Nation rather
than into a Confederacy must be acknowledged by all
who read the opinion of Chief Justice Marshall in
Cohens v. Virginia — that opinion which has been
1 Commercial Bank of Kentucky v. Oriffith (1840), 14 Pet. 58; Mueouri v. Andriano (1891). 188 U. S. 497; Virginia v. Rives (1880), 100 U. S. 338; Murdock V. Memphis (1875), 20 Wall. 590.
- DiequisiHon on the Constitution and Oovemment of the United States (1851), by John C. Calhouiu 817-840.
