methods, but to place important governmental powers in the hands of those who can exercise them with the greatest difficulty and with the least knowledge of local conditions. It is in effect, so far as concerns many vital interests, to abandon the effort for good municipal and State government, and once for all, to intrust local fortune and prosperity to external authority. It is of great importance in all these matters, and particularly at the present time in commercial affairs, that State jurisdiction be not superseded, but that the Federal Constitution be construed, as it has been, so as to prevent restrictions upon intercourse among the States, at the same time that each State is left free, so far as possible, to follow its own courses in the coming development. |