The same rule of construction of the right of appropriation has been observed and the same liberal policy pursued toward the other new States, with certain modifications adapted to the situation of each, which were adopted with the State of Ohio.  As, however, the reasoning which is applicable to the compact with Ohio in relation to the right of appropriation, in which light only I have adverted to it, is equally applicable to the several compacts with the other new States, I deem it unnecessary to take a particular notice of them.

It is proper to observe that the money which was employed in the construction of all the other roads was taken directly from the Treasury.  This fact affords an additional proof that in the contemplation of Congress no difference existed in the application of money to those roads between that which was raised by the sale of lands and that which was derived from taxes, duties, imposts, and excises.

So far I have confined my remarks to the acts of Congress respecting the right of appropriation to such measures only as operate internally and affect the territory of the individual States.  In adverting to those which operate externally and relate to foreign powers I find only two which appear to merit particular attention.  These were gratuitous grants of money for the relief of foreigners in distress—­the first in 1794 to the inhabitants of St. Domingo, who sought an asylum on our coast from the convulsions and calamities of the island; the second in 1812 to the people of Caracas, reduced to misery by an earthquake.  The considerations which were applicable to these grants have already been noticed and need not be repeated.

In this examination of the right of appropriation I thought it proper to present to view also the practice of the Government under it, and to explore the ground on which each example rested, that the precise nature and extent of the construction thereby given of the right might be clearly understood.  The right to raise money would have given, as is presumed, the right to use it, although nothing had been said to that effect in the Constitution; and where the right to raise it is granted without special limitation, we must look for such limitation to other causes.  Our attention is first drawn to the right to appropriate, and not finding it there we must then look to the general powers of the Government as designated by the specific grants and to the purposes contemplated by them, allowing to this (the right to raise money), the first and most important of the enumerated powers, a scope which will be competent to those purposes.  The practice of the Government, as illustrated by numerous and strong examples directly applicable, ought surely to have great weight in fixing the construction of each grant.  It ought, I presume, to settle it, especially where it is acquiesced in by the nation and produces a manifest and positive good.  A practical construction, thus supported, shows that it has reason on its side and is called for by the interests of the Union.  Hence, too, the presumption that it will be persevered in.  It will surely be better to admit that the construction given by these examples has been just arid proper than to deny that construction and still to practice on it—­to say one thing and to do another.