and has only such power as the people gave it; and thus being of and from the people, it (or they) can not destroy its (or their) own liberties.  Were our government hereditary instead of elective; were our institutions monarchical instead of republican; had we privileged classes perpetuated by primogeniture, there might be some danger of placing too much power in the hands of the Federal Government; but formed as our institutions are, framed as our Constitution is, educated as our people are, there can be no fear of having the central power or general Federal Government too strong, or its authority supreme.  Without strength there can be no authority; without authority there can be no respect; without respect there can be no government; without government there can be no civilization.  The doctrine of State rights as applied to the communities forming the American Union, elevates the State over the nation, demands that the Federal shall yield to the State laws, and completely ignores the supremacy of the united authority of the whole people.  This theory carried out logically, would make counties equal to States; towns equal to counties; wards and districts equal to towns; neighborhoods equal to districts and wards; and to come down to the last application of the principle, every one man in a neighborhood equal to the whole, in fact, superior, if the State rights doctrine be true, that the State is supreme within its own limits.  The application of this principle ends society by destroying the order based on authority, and placing the State above the Nation, and the individual above the State.  Civilized societies are but the aggregation of persons coming or remaining together for mutual interest and protection.  This mutual interest requires certain rules for the protection of the weak from the encroachments of the strong in the society, as well as from outside enemies.  These rules take the form of laws.  These laws must be administered; their administration requires power.  This power is placed in the hands of certain members of this society, community, or State, as the case may be, for the good of the whole State, and each individual claiming protection from the State, or whose interest is promoted by being a member thereof, is under moral as well as legal obligations to submit to this authority thus exercised by the chosen executors of the public will.  Rights that might pertain to one man on an island by himself, do not attach to man in civilized communities.  There he must not go beyond the landmarks established by law, and he agrees to this arrangement by remaining in the State or community.  The same principle is equally applicable to the States of the American Union.  Before the adoption of the Federal Constitution, they were separate, distinct, and so far as any central head or supreme governing power was concerned, independent States, or, in fact, sovereignties.  True, they had tried to get along under a sort of confederation agreement, a kind of temporary alliance for offensive