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Letters of Dr. Thomas Cooper, iS 2 5- 1832 729 is a Consolidation-measure. The election of President according to the principles of our constitution is a State affair, and ought to be managed by the States, and not by the people. Our government is a federal union of States, for foreign and extraneous purposes, and ought not to interfere in any thing domestic that the States separately can manage for them- selves. But executive influence is going on so rapidly, that in a few years it will be overwhelming. Your proposal will be one main stoppage to its progress. I observe Walsh and Niles ' are attacking J. Randolph. I think his arguments are well calculated to make us hesitate. If a minister is to be sent to the Congress at Panama, I hope his hands will be well tied. If Cuba should be placed in a revolutionary State, it will at present be a black government, and the people of Cuba joined to the rascally tribe of Wilberforce's evangelical reformers, will surrender all the british west indies into the hands of the blacks. I do not say the blacks are a distinct species : but I have not the slightest doubt of their being an inferior variety of the human species ; and not capable of the same improvement as the whites. Adieu. I remain Dear Sir Yr obliged friend Thom.-vs Cooper. August 31. 1S26 CoLUJiBiA S. Carolina. Dear Sir I have been considering and reconsidering my case with a view to the formidable objection raised by Mr Webster and the government party, that the Legislature have no right to impugn or interfere with a judicial decision. As the Constitution now stands, and under the re- ceived construction of it, I think that is the case ; and so much the worse for the people who have secured to them by the amendments to the Constitution the empty privilege of petitioning [for] redress of grievances [a H.] of Representatives who have no power [to] give them relief, however flagrant the injustice complained of The liberties of the Country are given up into the hands of the judiciary to be molded by them at their discretion as a Potter moulds his clay. They are removed 'out of the power of the popular body, into the power of a Presidential body. The only grounds I have to stand upon are, if* The fine belongs now to the Treasury of the United States. I ask it to be restored, because under all circumstances it is right and proper it should be so. This does not impeach, overturn or alter the decision of the Court. With that I have nothing to do. Let it stand. But like an award of Damages by a Jury, the party to whom damages are given may renounce or restore them without any impeachment of the ver- 1 Robert Walsh, of the National Gazette, and Niles of the Register. 2 Addressed: "Honourable Mahlon Dickerson, Suckasunny, New Jersey." VOL. VI. — 4S,