How forcibly does the history of this subject illustrate the tendency of
power to concentration in the hands of the General Government. The power
to improve their own harbors and rivers was clearly reserved to the
States, who were to be aided by tonnage duties levied and collected by
themselves, with the consent of Congress. For thirty-four years
improvements were carried on under that system, and so careful was
Congress not to interfere, under any implied power, with the soil or
jurisdiction of the States that they did not even assume the power to
erect lighthouses or build piers without first purchasing the ground,
with the consent of the States, and obtaining jurisdiction over it.
At length, after the lapse of thirty-three years, an act is passed
providing for the examination of certain obstructions at the mouth of
one or two harbors almost unknown. It is followed by acts making small
appropriations for the removal of those obstructions. The obstacles
interposed by President Monroe, after conceding the power to
appropriate, were soon swept away.
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