April 12, 1900, entitled "An Act Temporarily to
Provide Revenue and a Civil Govemment for Porto
Rico, and for Other Purposes." 31 Stat. at L. 77.
The right to recover is predicated on the
assumption that Porto Rico, by the ratification of the
treaty with Spain, became incorporated into the
United States, and therefore the act of Congress
which imposed the duty in question is repugnant to
article 1, 8, clause 1, of the Constitution providing
that "the Congress shall have power to lay and
collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay
the debts and provide for the common defense
and general welfare of the United States; but all
duties, imports, and excises shall be uniform
throughout the United States." Subsidiarily, it is
contended that the duty collected was also
repugnant to the export and preference clauses of
the Constitution. But as the case concerns no duty
on goods going from the United States to Porto
Rico, this proposition must depend also on the
hypothesis that the provisions of the Constitution
referred to apply to Porto Rico because that island
has been incorporated into the United States. It is
hence manifest that this latter contention is
involved in the previous one, and need not be
separately considered.

 The arguments at bar embrace many
 propositions which seem to me to be irrelevant, or,
 if relevant, to be so contrary to reason and so in
 conflict with previous decisions of this court as to
 cause them to require but a passing notice. To
 eliminate all controversies of this character, and
 thus to come to the pivotal contentions which the
 case involves, let me state and concede the
 soundness of some principles, referring, in doing
 so, in the margin to the authorities by which they
 are sustained, and making such comment on some
 of them as may to me appear necessary.

 First. The government of the United States was
 born of the Constitution, and all powers which it
 enjoys or may exercise must be either derived
 expressly or by implication from that instrument.
 Ever then, when an act of any department is
 challenged because not warranted by the
 Constitution, the existence of the authority is to be
 ascertained by determining whether the power has
 been conferred by the Constitution, either in
 express terms or by lawful implication, to be drawn
 from the express authority conferred, or deduced
 as an attribute which legitimately inheres in the
 nature of the powers given, and which flows from
 the character of the government established by the


Constitution. In other words, while confined to its
constitutional orbit, the government of the United
States is supreme within its lawful sphere.

 Second. Every function of the government
being thus derived from the Constitution, it follows
that that instrument is everywhere and at all times
potential in so far as its provisions are applicable.
 Third. Hence it is that wherever a power is
given by the Constitution, and there is a limitation
imposed on the authority, such restriction operates
upon and confines every action on the subject
within its constitutional limits.

 Fourth. Consequently it is impossible to
conceive that, where conditions are brought about
to which any particular provision of the Constitution
applies, its controlling influence may be frustrated
by the action of any or all of the departments of the
government. Those departments, when
discharging, within the limits of their constitutional
power, the duties which rest on them, may of
course deal with the subjects committed to them in
such a way as to cause the matter dealt with to
come under the control of provisions of the
Constitution which may not have been previously
applicable. But this does not conflict with the
doctrine just stated, or presuppose that the
Constitution may or may not be applicable at the
election of any agency of the government.

 Fifth. The Constitution has undoubtedly
 conferred on Congress the right to create such
 municipal organizations as it may deem best for all
 the territories of the United States, whether they
 have been incorporated or not, to give to the
 inhabitants as respects the local governments such
 degree of representation as may be conducive to
 the public well-being, to deprive such territory of
 representative government if it is considered just to
 do so, and to change such local governments at
 discretion.

 The plenitude of the power of Congress as just
 stated is conceded by both sides to this
 controversy. It has been manifest from the earliest
 days, and so many examples are afforded of it that
 to refer to them seems superfluous. However,
 there is an instance which exemplifies the exercise
 of the power substantially in all its forms, in such an
 apt way that reference is made to it. The instance
 referred to is the District of Columbia, which has had
 from the beginning different forms of government
 conferred upon it by Congress, some largely


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