If the Constitution, in defining what are the common purposes of the Union and what the local purposes of the States of the Union, is declaratory of the principles of the Law of Connections and Unions of Free States, as it seems not unreasonable to hold, the Limited Legislative Union formed under the Constitution may perhaps be considered, in view of the supremacy of the Judiciary, as Guardians of the Constitution, over the Limited Legislature, as a species of Justiciary Union.
Moreover, if in what has been said we are correct, the relationship at present existing between the American Union and the Insular regions, is that of de facto Justiciary Union, and the American Congress, under the lead of President McKinley and President Roosevelt, has acted, with reference to these regions, according to the principles of the American system. The American Union, through President McKinley, has declared itself to be "a liberating, not a conquering nation," and has recognized the people of Hawaii, Porto Rico and the Philippines as each having a separate and local citizenship, thus recognizing each of these regions as a de facto free state connected with the American Union. The action of the American Union extends to the regulation of the action of individuals in these free States, so that a Greater American Union of Free States exists de facto. To bring into existence a Greater American Union de jure, it needs, first, the public and express recognition by the American Union of itself as the Justiciar State, and of each of the separate Insular regions within proper territorial limits, as a Free State in just connection and union with the American Union; and, secondly, the establishment by the American Union of the necessary Advisory Council for investigating facts and for advising the President before he, on behalf of the American Union as Justiciar State, exercises his superior justiciary powers, and for advising the Congress before it, in the same behalf, exercises its supreme justiciary powers. Councils suitable for advising the local Governors, when they, on behalf of the American Union as Justiciar State, exercise their inferior justiciary powers, already exist. Of such a Greater American Union, the present American Union would be the Supreme Justiciary Head, with power to finally determine the questions arising out of the relationship, not by edict founded on will and force, but by decision carefully made in each case after ascertaining the facts in each case and applying to them the principles of the Law of Connections and Unions properly applicable to them.
Is not this theory the true via media? The theory of the automatic extension of the constitution of a state over its annexed insular, transmarine and transterranean regions which from their local or other circumstances can never equally participate in the institution and operation of its government, in some cases protects individual rights, but it takes no account of the right of free statehood, which is the prime instrumentality for securing these rights. The theory of a power over these regions not regulated by a supreme law, is a theory of absolute power over both individuals and communities in these regions,—a theory which implies an absence of all rights. The theory of a power over these regions based on the principles of the Law of Connections and Unions, granting that this law is itself based on the right of human equality, protects the rights of persons, of communities, of states and of nations. On this theory the "Territory Clause" of the Constitution recognizes the Law of Connections and Unions as determining the relationship between the American Union and the Insular regions—"needful" rules and regulations being those which are adapted to accomplish the end desired and which are consistent with the principles of the Law of Connections and Unions as declared in the Declaration of Independence. On this theory, the doctrine of the Supreme Court that the civil rights of individuals in cases growing out of our relations with our Insular brethren are protected by "the fundamental principles formulated in the Constitution," or by "the applicable provisions of the Constitution," is translated into the doctrine that these individual and civil rights are protected by the principles of the Law of Connections and Unions of Free States, as these principles are formulated in the Constitution and as they are disclosed by an examination of the applicable provisions of the Constitution, and that not only are these civil rights protected by this law, but also the political rights of all the parties to the relationship. On this theory, the jurisdiction of the Supreme Court continues to be exactly the same as at present. The necessary Advisory Councils for ascertaining the just political relations between the American Union and the Insular regions and for determining the political rights growing out of that relationship, would not in the least interfere with the Supreme Court in the exercise of its functions. They would supplement that Court, which now protects the civil rights of all concerned through its adjudications in civil cases, by assisting the Congress and the President to protect and preserve the political rights of all concerned through dispositions and needful rules and regulations in political cases.
By adopting this theory of the Reformation and the American Revolution, may not the American System extend indefinitely without danger to America herself? There would be no domination, no subjection. The same Law of Connections and Unions would extend over and govern throughout the whole Greater American Union. This Greater American Justiciary Union would be but a logical application of the principles underlying the American Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Union formed by the Constitution of the United States.
It would not be the Constitution which would follow the flag into the regions which America has annexed to herself, but the Law of Connections and Unions, which is a part of the Law of Nature and of Nations according to the American System.
I recur, therefore, to my first proposition and submit to your judgment whether the terms "colony," "dependence," and "empire," on the one hand, and the terms "free state," "just connection," and "union," on the other, are not the symbols of two great and fundamentally opposed systems of politics—the one European, and the other American; whether the American terms and the American System are not capable of being applied universally and beneficently, in the way pointed out above, throughout all places outside the present Union which are within the limits of its justiciary power; and whether, if they are capable of this application, it is not our duty, both logically and ethically, to use the American terms in describing the relations between us and our Insular brethren, applying at the same time the principles of the American System, and thus calling into existence a Greater American Union.