Mr. JOHNSON. MnPiesident, when this been I do measure was before the Senate a few days since I had stated in part In reasons for supposing that it was not within the constitutional power of Congress to pass it, and I have but a word or 2 to add in addition. The honorable member from Massachusetts [Mr. Senses] placed the authority to pass this measure a on the commercial power conferred upon Congress by the Constitution. Accordin to his interpretation of that power, there is ardly an thing that might not be done, not only by congress with the assent of the States, but by Congress in spite of the States. I think the honorable member and the Senate will find upon turning to the cases to which he alluded, the passenger cases, and more particularly to the license cases and the case of Houston vs. Moore, reported I think, in 6 Wheaten, that this riuciple has been ovefand over again proc aime as the true one with reference to the power of Congress under that clause that it does not in an manner conflict with the police power of the States; that it therefore does not conflict with any power which the States may deem necessary to preserve the health or the morals of their citizens; that it does not, consequently, conflict with the power which the States have ever been supposed to possess, not as a concurrent, but as an exclusive power, to establish nar antine. The passenger cases, upon which my friendfrom Massachusetts perhaps in the main relied, were cases involving the validity of an act of the Legislature of NewYork, which imposed a tax 11 on every captain or officer of a vessel, one dollar and a half or 2 dollars I forget the exact amount for each passenger landed in NewYerk; and subjected him to a penalty unless he paid the tax; and it appropriated the proceeds of the tax to 2 in: poses, one of which was for a hospital, an the other, I think, for the insane. TOopinion of the Supreme Court, as renounced by Mr. Justice McLean, placedt e invalidity of that law entirely upon the ground that it affected the vessel and the rights of the master and the nssengers, not after th were landed but be ore they were lauded. t was intended to be a license for the authority to land, and was intended to appropriate the sum which the party was obliged to pay in the nature of a icense for some State 11 ose. But the honorable member will fin i he will look at the opinion of the judge to whom I allude, that throughout he not only recoenized the authority of the States to establish quarantine, but treated that authority as an exclusive one and on looking at the other case to which the honorable member referred, that of Gibbons, vs. Ogden, reported in 9 Wheaton, the honor able member will find that Chief Justice marshall, in speaking for the whole court, recognized the validity of State uarantiue laws, not only as laws passed in teexercise of a concurrent power, but as laws valid, because the States possessed exclusive power over the subject. Now, what is proposed to be done by this act? Passing by the supposition that it will accomplish its purpose, supposing that the Army and the Navy can be used practically for the purpose of revealing the may aria, if it be a malaria, cause by the airs being infected by the presence of tedisease brought here by persons who may be laboring under the disease, it gives to Congress the authority to go into the States and establish hospitals or uarantine, or do anything else which in the judgment of the 3 Secretaries, who are constituted a board for that purpose, may be necessary to keep out the disease if it can be kept out, or arrest its 3 read. where is that power to terminate? If congress has the authority to legislate upon the subject, if the preservation of the health of the country is one of the objects intrusted to congress at all, it is a power not limited to the sea port, not limited in its exercise to the city, but it must be coextensive with the entire country; and if the cholera after making its appearance in the city of NewYork is en posed, in the judgment of the board, to be liliely to spread allover the State of newYork, unless it shall be arrested by the Army and the Navy and by the measures which they shall be recommended to adopt by physicians in order to keep the disease from spreading, they can go all over the State and establish hospitals, establish quarantine, so as to impede commerce strictly territorial, strictly internal. In the cases adverted to not a single judge doubted that the internal commerce of the States was never submitted to regulation by Congress under the commercial power. Indee, the very terms in which the power is commu nicated exclude the idea that it was intended to embrace internal commerce. The power conferred is the power to regulate commerce between foreign nations and the U.S and commerce among the States. Marshall, therefore, in the ease alluded to of Gibbons us. Ogden, admitted, as clear beyond dispute, as a proposition never disputed anywhere during the deliberations of the Convention or by any judicial opinion pronounced in any case in which the question arose, that the internal commerce of the States was with the States exclusively. If that proposition be true, (and I am sure my friend, the Senfrom Massachusetts, will not deny it) does it not follow that what you propose to do is without authority provided it conflicts with that reposition? man wants to go from the city of J. NewYork to Albany withhis vessel, or to travel on the canal from Albany to the extreme lakes. That commerce is clearly internal; but, like foreign commerce, it may be the means of 8 reading the disease; and if Congress, under the authority to regulate commerce, been right to reveut the spread of the disease, or the intro notion of the disease, it must have an authority to preventit from spreading an where or from being introduced anywhere. t may for the 1st time be introduced into Albany or into any of the towns sit uated u an the canal which connects the Hud son with the lakes; and what I say of NewYork is applicable to all the other States. What do you propose to do 7 To let the doctors get together and advise the board, which you are about to constitute by this resolution, formed of the 3 Secretaries. The disease may be introduced into Albany or, if it makes its 1st appearance in the city of NewYork, it may find its way into Albany. They will therefore call upon the Secretaries to establish a quarantine at Albany, and as quarantine may not answer the purpose absolutely, as the disease may find its way into Albany in spite of the narnutine, and one or more cases may be foun occurrin I in Albany, then the way to prevent the apron of the disease is to do what we do with the small pox disease establish hospitals; so that under the power which Congress is supposed to have over the health of the country, they may establish small pox hospitals and cholera hospitals everywhere throu out the States. I maintain, therefore, With no respect to the members of the Senate who think there is authority to pass this resolution, that it is contrary to the est established principles in relation to the construction of the Constitution in the particular relied upon not only the best established but principles that never have been westioned by c Supreme Court at any time. ith out troubling the Senate further, I submit that it seems to me the proposed measure is clearlybe ond the power of the Government.