To the federal
government is delegated the exercise of certain rights or powers of
sovereignty; and with respect to sovereignty, rights and powers are
synonymous terms; and the exercise of all other rights of sovereignty,
except as expressly prohibited, is reserved to the people of the
respective States, or vested by them in their local governments. When
we say, therefore, that a State of the Union is sovereign, we only
mean that she possesses supreme political authority, except as to
those matters over which such authority is delegated to the federal
government, or prohibited to the States; in other words, that she
possesses all the rights and powers essential to the existence of an
independent political organization, except as they are withdrawn
by the provisions of the Constitution of the United States. To the
existence of this political authority of the State--this qualified
sovereignty, or to any part of it--the ownership of the minerals of
gold and silver found within her limits is in no way essential. The
minerals do not differ from the great mass of property, the ownership
of which may be in the United States, or in individuals, without
affecting in any respect the political jurisdiction of the State. They
may be acquired by the State, as any other property may be, but when
thus acquired she will hold them in the same manner that individual
proprietors hold their property, and by the same right; by the right
of ownership, and not by any right of sovereignty.
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