The Same Subject Continued, and the Incoherence of the Objections

to the New Plan Exposed

From the New York Packet.

Tuesday, January 15, 1788.

To the People of the State of New York:

IT IS not a little remarkable that in every case reported by

ancient history, in which government has been established with

deliberation and consent, the task of framing it has not been

committed to an assembly of men, but has been performed by some

individual citizen of preeminent wisdom and approved integrity.

Minos, we learn, was the primitive founder of the government of

Crete, as Zaleucus was of that of the Locrians. Theseus first, and

after him Draco and Solon, instituted the government of Athens.

Lycurgus was the lawgiver of Sparta. The foundation of the

original government of Rome was laid by Romulus, and the work

completed by two of his elective successors, Numa and Tullius

Hostilius. On the abolition of royalty the consular administration

was substituted by Brutus, who stepped forward with a project for

such a reform, which, he alleged, had been prepared by Tullius

Hostilius, and to which his address obtained the assent and

ratification of the senate and people. This remark is applicable to

confederate governments also. Amphictyon, we are told, was the

author of that which bore his name. The Achaean league received its

first birth from Achaeus, and its second from Aratus.

What degree of agency these reputed lawgivers might have in

their respective establishments, or how far they might be clothed

with the legitimate authority of the people, cannot in every

instance be ascertained. In some, however, the proceeding was

strictly regular. Draco appears to have been intrusted by the

people of Athens with indefinite powers to reform its government and

laws. And Solon, according to Plutarch, was in a manner compelled,

by the universal suffrage of his fellow-citizens, to take upon him

the sole and absolute power of new-modeling the constitution. The

proceedings under Lycurgus were less regular; but as far as the

advocates for a regular reform could prevail, they all turned their

eyes towards the single efforts of that celebrated patriot and sage,

instead of seeking to bring about a revolution by the intervention

of a deliberative body of citizens.

Whence could it have proceeded, that a people, jealous as the

Greeks were of their liberty, should so far abandon the rules of

caution as to place their destiny in the hands of a single citizen?

Whence could it have proceeded, that the Athenians, a people who

would not suffer an army to be commanded by fewer than ten generals,

and who required no other proof of danger to their liberties than

the illustrious merit of a fellow-citizen, should consider one

illustrious citizen as a more eligible depositary of the fortunes of

themselves and their posterity, than a select body of citizens, from

whose common deliberations more wisdom, as well as more safety,

might have been expected? These questions cannot be fully answered,

without supposing that the fears of discord and disunion among a

number of counsellors exceeded the apprehension of treachery or

incapacity in a single individual. History informs us, likewise, of

the difficulties with which these celebrated reformers had to

contend, as well as the expedients which they were obliged to employ

in order to carry their reforms into effect. Solon, who seems to

have indulged a more temporizing policy, confessed that he had not

given to his countrymen the government best suited to their

happiness, but most tolerable to their prejudices. And Lycurgus,

more true to his object, was under the necessity of mixing a portion

of violence with the authority of superstition, and of securing his

final success by a voluntary renunciation, first of his country, and

then of his life. If these lessons teach us, on one hand, to admire

the improvement made by America on the ancient mode of preparing and

establishing regular plans of government, they serve not less, on

the other, to admonish us of the hazards and difficulties incident

to such experiments, and of the great imprudence of unnecessarily

multiplying them.

Is it an unreasonable conjecture, that the errors which may be

contained in the plan of the convention are such as have resulted

rather from the defect of antecedent experience on this complicated

and difficult subject, than from a want of accuracy or care in the

investigation of it; and, consequently such as will not be

ascertained until an actual trial shall have pointed them out? This

conjecture is rendered probable, not only by many considerations of

a general nature, but by the particular case of the Articles of

Confederation. It is observable that among the numerous objections

and amendments suggested by the several States, when these articles

were submitted for their ratification, not one is found which

alludes to the great and radical error which on actual trial has

discovered itself. And if we except the observations which New

Jersey was led to make, rather by her local situation, than by her

peculiar foresight, it may be questioned whether a single suggestion

was of sufficient moment to justify a revision of the system. There

is abundant reason, nevertheless, to suppose that immaterial as

these objections were, they would have been adhered to with a very

dangerous inflexibility, in some States, had not a zeal for their

opinions and supposed interests been stifled by the more powerful

sentiment of selfpreservation. One State, we may remember,

persisted for several years in refusing her concurrence, although

the enemy remained the whole period at our gates, or rather in the

very bowels of our country. Nor was her pliancy in the end effected

by a less motive, than the fear of being chargeable with protracting

the public calamities, and endangering the event of the contest.

Every candid reader will make the proper reflections on these

important facts.

A patient who finds his disorder daily growing worse, and that

an efficacious remedy can no longer be delayed without extreme

danger, after coolly revolving his situation, and the characters of

different physicians, selects and calls in such of them as he judges

most capable of administering relief, and best entitled to his

confidence. The physicians attend; the case of the patient is

carefully examined; a consultation is held; they are unanimously

agreed that the symptoms are critical, but that the case, with

proper and timely relief, is so far from being desperate, that it

may be made to issue in an improvement of his constitution. They

are equally unanimous in prescribing the remedy, by which this happy

effect is to be produced. The prescription is no sooner made known,

however, than a number of persons interpose, and, without denying

the reality or danger of the disorder, assure the patient that the

prescription will be poison to his constitution, and forbid him,

under pain of certain death, to make use of it. Might not the

patient reasonably demand, before he ventured to follow this advice,

that the authors of it should at least agree among themselves on

some other remedy to be substituted? And if he found them differing

as much from one another as from his first counsellors, would he not

act prudently in trying the experiment unanimously recommended by

the latter, rather than be hearkening to those who could neither

deny the necessity of a speedy remedy, nor agree in proposing one?

Such a patient and in such a situation is America at this moment.

She has been sensible of her malady. She has obtained a regular

and unanimous advice from men of her own deliberate choice. And she

is warned by others against following this advice under pain of the

most fatal consequences. Do the monitors deny the reality of her

danger? No. Do they deny the necessity of some speedy and powerful

remedy? No. Are they agreed, are any two of them agreed, in their

objections to the remedy proposed, or in the proper one to be

substituted? Let them speak for themselves. This one tells us that

the proposed Constitution ought to be rejected, because it is not a

confederation of the States, but a government over individuals.

Another admits that it ought to be a government over individuals to

a certain extent, but by no means to the extent proposed. A third

does not object to the government over individuals, or to the extent

proposed, but to the want of a bill of rights. A fourth concurs in

the absolute necessity of a bill of rights, but contends that it

ought to be declaratory, not of the personal rights of individuals,

but of the rights reserved to the States in their political capacity.

A fifth is of opinion that a bill of rights of any sort would be

superfluous and misplaced, and that the plan would be

unexceptionable but for the fatal power of regulating the times and

places of election. An objector in a large State exclaims loudly

against the unreasonable equality of representation in the Senate.

An objector in a small State is equally loud against the dangerous

inequality in the House of Representatives. From this quarter, we

are alarmed with the amazing expense, from the number of persons who

are to administer the new government. From another quarter, and

sometimes from the same quarter, on another occasion, the cry is

that the Congress will be but a shadow of a representation, and that

the government would be far less objectionable if the number and the

expense were doubled. A patriot in a State that does not import or

export, discerns insuperable objections against the power of direct

taxation. The patriotic adversary in a State of great exports and

imports, is not less dissatisfied that the whole burden of taxes may

be thrown on consumption. This politician discovers in the

Constitution a direct and irresistible tendency to monarchy; that

is equally sure it will end in aristocracy. Another is puzzled to

say which of these shapes it will ultimately assume, but sees

clearly it must be one or other of them; whilst a fourth is not

wanting, who with no less confidence affirms that the Constitution

is so far from having a bias towards either of these dangers, that

the weight on that side will not be sufficient to keep it upright

and firm against its opposite propensities. With another class of

adversaries to the Constitution the language is that the

legislative, executive, and judiciary departments are intermixed in

such a manner as to contradict all the ideas of regular government

and all the requisite precautions in favor of liberty. Whilst this

objection circulates in vague and general expressions, there are but

a few who lend their sanction to it. Let each one come forward with

his particular explanation, and scarce any two are exactly agreed

upon the subject. In the eyes of one the junction of the Senate

with the President in the responsible function of appointing to

offices, instead of vesting this executive power in the Executive

alone, is the vicious part of the organization. To another, the

exclusion of the House of Representatives, whose numbers alone could

be a due security against corruption and partiality in the exercise

of such a power, is equally obnoxious. With another, the admission

of the President into any share of a power which ever must be a

dangerous engine in the hands of the executive magistrate, is an

unpardonable violation of the maxims of republican jealousy. No

part of the arrangement, according to some, is more inadmissible

than the trial of impeachments by the Senate, which is alternately a

member both of the legislative and executive departments, when this

power so evidently belonged to the judiciary department. ``We

concur fully,'' reply others, ``in the objection to this part of the

plan, but we can never agree that a reference of impeachments to the

judiciary authority would be an amendment of the error. Our

principal dislike to the organization arises from the extensive

powers already lodged in that department.'' Even among the zealous

patrons of a council of state the most irreconcilable variance is

discovered concerning the mode in which it ought to be constituted.

The demand of one gentleman is, that the council should consist of

a small number to be appointed by the most numerous branch of the

legislature. Another would prefer a larger number, and considers it

as a fundamental condition that the appointment should be made by

the President himself.

As it can give no umbrage to the writers against the plan of the

federal Constitution, let us suppose, that as they are the most

zealous, so they are also the most sagacious, of those who think the

late convention were unequal to the task assigned them, and that a

wiser and better plan might and ought to be substituted. Let us

further suppose that their country should concur, both in this

favorable opinion of their merits, and in their unfavorable opinion

of the convention; and should accordingly proceed to form them into

a second convention, with full powers, and for the express purpose

of revising and remoulding the work of the first. Were the

experiment to be seriously made, though it required some effort to

view it seriously even in fiction, I leave it to be decided by the

sample of opinions just exhibited, whether, with all their enmity to

their predecessors, they would, in any one point, depart so widely

from their example, as in the discord and ferment that would mark

their own deliberations; and whether the Constitution, now before

the public, would not stand as fair a chance for immortality, as

Lycurgus gave to that of Sparta, by making its change to depend on

his own return from exile and death, if it were to be immediately

adopted, and were to continue in force, not until a BETTER, but

until ANOTHER should be agreed upon by this new assembly of

lawgivers.

It is a matter both of wonder and regret, that those who raise

so many objections against the new Constitution should never call to

mind the defects of that which is to be exchanged for it. It is not

necessary that the former should be perfect; it is sufficient that

the latter is more imperfect. No man would refuse to give brass for

silver or gold, because the latter had some alloy in it. No man

would refuse to quit a shattered and tottering habitation for a firm

and commodious building, because the latter had not a porch to it,

or because some of the rooms might be a little larger or smaller, or

the ceilings a little higher or lower than his fancy would have

planned them. But waiving illustrations of this sort, is it not

manifest that most of the capital objections urged against the new

system lie with tenfold weight against the existing Confederation?

Is an indefinite power to raise money dangerous in the hands of the

federal government? The present Congress can make requisitions to

any amount they please, and the States are constitutionally bound to

furnish them; they can emit bills of credit as long as they will

pay for the paper; they can borrow, both abroad and at home, as

long as a shilling will be lent. Is an indefinite power to raise

troops dangerous? The Confederation gives to Congress that power

also; and they have already begun to make use of it. Is it

improper and unsafe to intermix the different powers of government

in the same body of men? Congress, a single body of men, are the

sole depositary of all the federal powers. Is it particularly

dangerous to give the keys of the treasury, and the command of the

army, into the same hands? The Confederation places them both in

the hands of Congress. Is a bill of rights essential to liberty?

The Confederation has no bill of rights. Is it an objection

against the new Constitution, that it empowers the Senate, with the

concurrence of the Executive, to make treaties which are to be the

laws of the land? The existing Congress, without any such control,

can make treaties which they themselves have declared, and most of

the States have recognized, to be the supreme law of the land. Is

the importation of slaves permitted by the new Constitution for

twenty years? By the old it is permitted forever.

I shall be told, that however dangerous this mixture of powers

may be in theory, it is rendered harmless by the dependence of

Congress on the State for the means of carrying them into practice;

that however large the mass of powers may be, it is in fact a

lifeless mass. Then, say I, in the first place, that the

Confederation is chargeable with the still greater folly of

declaring certain powers in the federal government to be absolutely

necessary, and at the same time rendering them absolutely nugatory;

and, in the next place, that if the Union is to continue, and no

better government be substituted, effective powers must either be

granted to, or assumed by, the existing Congress; in either of

which events, the contrast just stated will hold good. But this is

not all. Out of this lifeless mass has already grown an excrescent

power, which tends to realize all the dangers that can be

apprehended from a defective construction of the supreme government

of the Union. It is now no longer a point of speculation and hope,

that the Western territory is a mine of vast wealth to the United

States; and although it is not of such a nature as to extricate

them from their present distresses, or for some time to come, to

yield any regular supplies for the public expenses, yet must it

hereafter be able, under proper management, both to effect a gradual

discharge of the domestic debt, and to furnish, for a certain

period, liberal tributes to the federal treasury. A very large

proportion of this fund has been already surrendered by individual

States; and it may with reason be expected that the remaining

States will not persist in withholding similar proofs of their

equity and generosity. We may calculate, therefore, that a rich and

fertile country, of an area equal to the inhabited extent of the

United States, will soon become a national stock. Congress have

assumed the administration of this stock. They have begun to render

it productive. Congress have undertaken to do more: they have

proceeded to form new States, to erect temporary governments, to

appoint officers for them, and to prescribe the conditions on which

such States shall be admitted into the Confederacy. All this has

been done; and done without the least color of constitutional

authority. Yet no blame has been whispered; no alarm has been

sounded. A GREAT and INDEPENDENT fund of revenue is passing into

the hands of a SINGLE BODY of men, who can RAISE TROOPS to an

INDEFINITE NUMBER, and appropriate money to their support for an

INDEFINITE PERIOD OF TIME. And yet there are men, who have not only

been silent spectators of this prospect, but who are advocates for

the system which exhibits it; and, at the same time, urge against

the new system the objections which we have heard. Would they not

act with more consistency, in urging the establishment of the

latter, as no less necessary to guard the Union against the future

powers and resources of a body constructed like the existing

Congress, than to save it from the dangers threatened by the present

impotency of that Assembly?

I mean not, by any thing here said, to throw censure on the

measures which have been pursued by Congress. I am sensible they

could not have done otherwise. The public interest, the necessity

of the case, imposed upon them the task of overleaping their

constitutional limits. But is not the fact an alarming proof of the

danger resulting from a government which does not possess regular

powers commensurate to its objects? A dissolution or usurpation is

the dreadful dilemma to which it is continually exposed.