It may be objected here, that this will make a Member of Assembly accountable to Congress for his vote in Assembly; I answer, it does so in this case only, viz., when that vote is to disobey the supreme authority; no Member of Assembly can have right to give such a vote, and therefore ought to be punished for so doing-When the supreme authority is disobeyed, the government must lose its energy and effect, and of course the Empire must be shaken to its very foundation.

A government which is but half executed, or whose operations may all be stopped by a single vote, is the most dangerous of all institutions.See the present Poland, and ancient Greece buried in ruins, in consequence of this fatal error in their policy. A government which has not energy and effect, can never afford protection or security to its subjects, i. e., must ever be ineffectual to its own ends.

I cannot therefore admit, that the great ends of our Union should lie at the mercy of a single State, or that the energy of our government should be checked by a single disobedience, or that such disobedience should ever be sheltered from censure and punishment; the consequence is too capital, too fatal to be admitted. Even though I know very well that a supreme authority, with all its dignity and importance, is subject to passions like other lesser powers, that they may be and often are heated, violent, oppressive, and very tyrannical; yet I know also, that perfection is not to be hoped for in this life, and we must take all institutions with their natural defects, or reject them altogether: I will guard against these abuses of power as far as possible, but I cannot give up all government, or destroy its necessary energy, for fear of these

abuses.

But to fence them out as far as possible, and to give the States as great a check on the supreme authority, as can consist with its necessary energy and effect,

I propose that any State may petition Congress to repeal any law or decision which they have made, and if more than half the States do this, the law or decision shall be repealed, let its nature or importance be however great, excepting only such acts as create funds for the public credit, which shall never be repealed till their end is effected, or other funds equally effectual are substituted in their place; but Congress shall not be obliged to repeal any of these acts, so petitioned against, till they have time to lay the reasons of such acts before such petitioning States, and to receive their answer; because such petitions may arise from sudden heats, popular prejudices, or VOL. III-29

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the publication of matters false in fact, and may require time and means of cool reflection and the fullest information, before the final decision is made: but if after all more than half of the States persist in their demand of a repeal, it shall take place.

The reason is, the uneasiness of a majority of States affords a strong presumption that the act is wrong, for uneasiness arises much more frequently from wrong than right; but if the act was good and right, it would still be better to repeal and lose it, than to force the execution of it against the opinion of a major part of the States; and lastly, if every act of Congress is subject to this repeal, Congress itself will have stronger inducement not only to examine well the several acts under their consideration, but also to communicate the reasons of them to the States, than they would have if their simple vote gave the final stamp of irrevocable authority to their acts.

Further I propose, that if the execution of any act or order of the supreme authority shall be opposed by force in any of the States (which God forbid) it shall be lawful for Congress to send into such State a sufficient force to suppress it.

On the whole, I take it that the very existence and use of our union essentially depends on the full energy and final effect of the laws made to support it; and therefore I sacrifice all other considerations to this energy and effect, and if our Union is not worth this purchase, we must give it up the nature of the thing does not admit of any other alternative.

I do contend that our Union is worth this purchase with it, every individual rests secure under its protection against foreign or domestic insult and oppression - without it, we can have no security against the oppression, insult, and invasion of foreign powers; for no single State is of importance enough to be an object of treaty with them, nor, if it was, could it bear the expense of such treaties, or support any character or respect in a dissevered state, but must lose all respectability among the nations abroad.

We have a very extensive trade, which cannot be carried on with security and advantage, without treaties of commerce and alliance with foreign nations.

We have an extensive western territory which cannot otherwise be defended against the invasion of foreign nations, bordering on our frontiers, who will cover it with their own inhabitants, and we shall loose it forever, and our extent of empire be thereby restrained; and what is worse, their numerous posterity will in future time drive ours

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into the sea, as the Goths and Vandals formerly conquered the Romans in like circumstances, unless we have the force of the union to repel such invasions. We have, without the Union, no security against the inroads and wars of one State upon another, by which our wealth and strength, as well as ease and comfort, will be devoured by enemies growing out of our own bowels.

I conclude then, that our union is not only of the most essential consequence to the well-being of the States in general but to that of every individual citizen of them, and of course ought to be supported, and made as useful and safe as possible, by a Constitution which admits that full energy and final effect of government which alone can secure its great ends and uses.

In a dissertation of this sort, I would not wish to descend to minutiæ, yet there are some small matters which have important consequences, and therefore ought to be noticed. It is necessary that Congress should have all usual and necessary powers of self-preservation and order, e. g., to imprison for contempt, insult, or interruption, etc., and to expel their own members for due causes, among which I would rank that of nonattendance on the house, or partial attendance without such excuse as shall satisfy the house.

Where there is such vast authority and trust devolved on Congress, and the grand and most important interests of the Empire rest on their decisions, it appears to me highly unreasonable that we should suffer their august consultations to be suspended, or their dignity, authority, and influence lessened by the idleness, neglect, and non-attendance of its members; for we know that the acts of a thin house do not usually carry with them the same degree of weight and respect as those of a full house.

Besides I think, when a man is deputed a delegate in Congress, and has undertaken the business, the whole Empire becomes of course possessed of a right to his best and constant services, which if any member refuses or neglects, the Empire is injured and ought to resent the injury, at least so far as to expel and send him home, that so his place may be better supplied.

I have one argument in favor of my whole plan, viz, it is so formed that no men of dull intellects, or small knowledge, or of habits too idle for constant attendance, of close and steady attention, can do the business with any tolerable degree of respectability, nor can they find either honor, profit, or satisfaction in being there, and of course, I could wish that the choice of the electors might never fall on such a man, or if it should, that

he might have sense enough (of pain at least, if not of shame) to decline his acceptance.

For after all that can be done, I do not think that a good administration depends wholly on a good Constitution and good laws, for insufficient or bad men will always make bad work, and a bad administration, let the Constitution and laws be ever so good; the management of able, faithful, and upright men alone can cause an administration to brighten, and the dignity and wisdom of an Empire to rise into respect; make truth the line and measure of public decision; give weight and authority to the government, and security and peace to the subject.

We now hope that we are on the close of a war of mighty effort and great distress, against the greatest power on earth, whetted into the most keen resentment and savage fierceness, which can be excited by wounded pride, and which usually rises higher between brother and brother offended, than between strangers in contest. Twelve of the Thirteen United States have felt the actual and cruel invasions of the enemy, and eleven of our capitals have been under their power, first or last, during the dreadful conflict; but a good Providence, our own virtue and firmness, and the help of our friends, have enabled us to rise superior to all the power of our adversaries, and made them seek to be at peace with us.

During the extreme pressures of the war, indeed many errors in our administration have been committed, when we could not have experience and time for reflection, to make us wise; but these will easily be excused, forgiven, and forgotten, if we can now, while at leisure, find virtue, wisdom, and foresight enough to correct them, and form such establishments, as shall secure the great ends of our union, and give dignity, force, utility, and permanency to our Empire.

It is a pity we should lose the honor and blessings which have cost us so dear, for want of wisdom and firmness, in measures, which are essential to our preservation. It is now at our option, either to fall back into our original atoms, or form such an union, as shall command the respect of the world, and give honor and security to our people.

This vast subject lies with mighty weight on my mind, and I have bestowed on it my utmost attention, and here offer the public the best thoughts and sentiments I am master of. I have confined myself in this dissertation entirely to the nature, reason, and truth of my subject, without once adverting to the reception it might meet

with from men of different prejudices or interests. To find the truth, not to carry a point, has been my object.

I have not the vanity to imagine that my sentiments may be adopted; I shall have all the re

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ward I wish or expect, if my dissertation shall throw any light on the great subject, shall excite an emulation of inquiry, and animate some abler genius to form a plan of greater perfection, less objectionable, and more useful.

NOTE 1.

IN

1. Forming a plan of confederation, or a system of general government of the United States, engrossed the attention of Congress from the declaration of independence, July 4, 1776, till the same was completed by Congress, July 9, 1778, and recommended to the several States for ratification, which finally took place, March 1, 1781; from which time the said confederation was considered as the grand constitution of the general government, and the whole administration was conformed to it.

And as it had stood the test of discussion in Congress for two years, before they completed and adopted it, and in all the States for three years more, before it was finally ratified, one would have thought that it must have been a very finished and perfect plan of government.

But on trial of it in practice, it was found to be extremely weak, defective, totally inefficient, and altogether inadequate to its great ends and purposes. For,

1. It blended the legislative and executive powers together in one body.

2. This body, viz., Congress, consisted of but one house, without any check upon their resolutions.

3. The powers of Congress in very few instances were definitive and final; in the most important articles of government they could do no more than recommend to the several States; the consent of every one of which was necessary to give legal sanction to any act so recommended. 4. They could assess and levy no taxes. 5. They could institute and execute no punishments, except in the military department.

6. They had no power of deciding or controlling the contentions and disputes of different States with each other.

7. They could not regulate the general trade: or, 8. Even make laws to secure either public treaties with foreign States, or the persons of public ambassadors, or to punish violations injuries done to either of them.

or

. 9. They could institute no general judiciary powers.

10. They could regulate no public roads, canals, or inland navigation, etc., etc., etc.

And what caps all the rest was, that (whilst under such an inefficient political constitution, the only chance we had of any tolerable administration lay wholly in the prudence and wisdom of the men who happened to take the lead in our public councils) it was fatally provided by the absurd doctrine of rotation, that if any Member of Congress by three years' experience and application, had qualified himself to manage our public affairs with consistency and fitness, that he should be constitutionally and absolutely rendered incapable of serving any longer, till by three years' discontinuance, he had pretty well lost the cue or train of the public counsels, and forgot the ideas and plans which made his service useful and important; and, in the mean time, his place should be supplied by a fresh man, who had the whole matter to learn, and when he had learned it, was to give place to another fresh man; and so on to the end of the chapter.

The sensible mind of the United States, by long experience of the fatal mischiefs of anarchy, or (which is about the same thing) of this ridiculous, inefficient form of government, began to apprehend that there was something wrong in our policy, which ought to be redressed and mended; but nobody undertook to delineate the necessary amendments.

I was then pretty much at leisure, and was fully of opinion (though the sentiment at that time would not very well bear) that it would be ten times easier to form a new constitution than to mend the old one. I therefore sat myself down to sketch out the leading principles of that political constitution, which I thought necessary to the preservation and happiness of the United States of America, which are comprised in this Dissertation.

I hope the reader will please to consider, that these are the original thoughts of a private individual dictated by the nature of the subject only, long before the important theme became the great object of discussion, in the most digni

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fied and important assembly, which ever sat or decided in America.

NOTE 2.

At the time when this Dissertation was written (Feb. 16, 1783) the defects and insufficiency of the Old Federal Constitution were universally felt and acknowledged; was manifest, not only that the internal police, justice, security and peace of the States could never be preserved under it, but the finances and public credit would necessarily become so embarrassed, precarious, and void of support, that no public movement, which depended on the revenue, could be managed with any effectual certainty: but though the public mind was under full conviction of all these mischiefs, and was contemplating a remedy, yet the public ideas were not at all concentrated, much less arranged into any new system or form of government, which would obviate these evils. Under these circumstances I offered this Dissertation to the public: how far the principles of it were adopted or rejected in the New Constitution, which was four years afterwards (Sept. 17, 1787) formed by the General Convention, and since ratified by all the States, is obvious to every one. I wish here to remark the great particulars of my plan which were rejected by the Convention.

1. My plan was to keep the legislative and executive departments entirely distinct; the one to consist of the two houses of Congress, the other to rest entirely in the Grand Council of State.

2. I proposed to introduce a Chamber of Commerce, to consist of merchants, who should be consulted by the legislature in all matters of trade and revenue, and which should have the conducting of the revenue committed to them.

The first of these the Convention qualified; the second they say nothing of, i. e., take no notice of it.

3. I proposed that the great officers of state should have the perusal of all bills, before they were enacted into laws, and should be required to give their opinion of them, as far as they affected the public interest in their several departments; which report of them Congress should cause to be read in their respective houses, and entered on their minutes. This is passed over without notice.

4. I proposed that all public officers appointed by the executive authority, should be amenable both to them and to the legislative power, and removable for just cause by either of them. This is qualified by the Convention.

And in as much as my sentiments in these respects were either qualified or totally neglected by the Convention, I suppose they were wrong; however, the whole matter is submitted to the politicians of the present age, and to our posterity in future.

In sundry other things, the Convention have gone into minutiæ, e. g., respecting elections of President, Senators, and Representatives in Congress, etc., which I proposed to leave at large to the wisdom and discretion of Congress, and of the several States.

Great reasons may doubtless be assigned for their decision, and perhaps some little ones for mine. Time, the great arbiter of all human plans, may, after a while, give his decision; but neither the Convention nor myself will probably live to feel either the exultation or mortification of his approbation or disapprobation of either of our plans.

But if any of these questions should in future time become objects of discussion, neither the vast dignity of the Convention, nor the low, unnoticed state of myself, will be at all considered in the debates; the merits of the matter, and the interests connected with or arising out of it, will alone dictate the decision,