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To the People of
the State of New York:
OOOOIN REVIEWING the defects of the
existing Confederation, and showing that they cannot be supplied by a
government of less energy than that before the public, several of the
most important principles of the latter fell of course under
consideration. But as the ultimate object of these papers is to
determine clearly and fully the merits of this Constitution, and the
expediency of adopting it, our plan cannot be complete without taking
a more critical and thorough survey of the work of the convention,
without examining it on all its sides, comparing it in all its parts,
and calculating its probable effects.
OOOOThat this remaining task may be
executed under impressions conducive to a just and fair result, some
reflections must in this place be indulged, which candor previously
suggests.
OOOOIt is a misfortune, inseparable from
human affairs, that public measures are rarely investigated with that
spirit of moderation which is essential to a just estimate of their
real tendency to advance or obstruct the public good; and that this
spirit is more apt to be diminished than promoted, by those occasions
which require an unusual exercise of it. To those who have been led by
experience to attend to this consideration, it could not appear
surprising, that the act of the convention, which recommends so many
important changes and innovations, which may be viewed in so many
lights and relations, and which touches the springs of so many
passions and interests, should find or excite dispositions unfriendly,
both on one side and on the other, to a fair discussion and accurate
judgment of its merits. In some, it has been too evident from their
own publications, that they have scanned the proposed Constitution,
not only with a predisposition to censure, but with a predetermination
to condemn; as the language held by others betrays an opposite
predetermination or bias, which must render their opinions also of
little moment in the question. In placing, however, these different
characters on a level, with respect to the weight of their opinions, I
wish not to insinuate that there may not be a material difference in
the purity of their intentions. It is but just to remark in favor of
the latter description, that as our situation is universally admitted
to be peculiarly critical, and to require indispensably that something
should be done for our relief, the predetermined patron of what has
been actually done may have taken his bias from the weight of these
considerations, as well as from considerations of a sinister nature.
The predetermined adversary, on the other hand, can have been governed
by no venial motive whatever. The intentions of the first may be
upright, as they may on the contrary be culpable. The views of the
last cannot be upright, and must be culpable. But the truth is, that
these papers are not addressed to persons falling under either of
these characters. They solicit the attention of those only, who add to
a sincere zeal for the happiness of their country, a temper favorable
to a just estimate of the means of promoting it.
OOOOPersons of this character will
proceed to an examination of the plan submitted by the convention, not
only without a disposition to find or to magnify faults; but will see
the propriety of reflecting, that a faultless plan was not to be
expected. Nor will they barely make allowances for the errors which
may be chargeable on the fallibility to which the convention, as a
body of men, were liable; but will keep in mind, that they themselves
also are but men, and ought not to assume an infallibility in
rejudging the fallible opinions of others.
OOOOWith equal readiness will it be
perceived, that besides these inducements to candor, many allowances
ought to be made for the difficulties inherent in the very nature of
the undertaking referred to the convention.
OOOOThe novelty of the undertaking
immediately strikes us. It has been shown in the course of these
papers, that the existing Confederation is founded on principles which
are fallacious; that we must consequently change this first
foundation, and with it the superstructure resting upon it. It has
been shown, that the other confederacies which could be consulted as
precedents have been vitiated by the same erroneous principles, and
can therefore furnish no other light than that of beacons, which give
warning of the course to be shunned, without pointing out that which
ought to be pursued. The most that the convention could do in such a
situation, was to avoid the errors suggested by the past experience of
other countries, as well as of our own; and to provide a convenient
mode of rectifying their own errors, as future experiences may unfold
them.
OOOOAmong the difficulties encountered
by the convention, a very important one must have lain in combining
the requisite stability and energy in government, with the inviolable
attention due to liberty and to the republican form. Without
substantially accomplishing this part of their undertaking, they would
have very imperfectly fulfilled the object of their appointment, or
the expectation of the public; yet that it could not be easily
accomplished, will be denied by no one who is unwilling to betray his
ignorance of the subject. Energy in government is essential to that
security against external and internal danger, and to that prompt and
salutary execution of the laws which enter into the very definition of
good government. Stability in government is essential to national
character and to the advantages annexed to it, as well as to that
repose and confidence in the minds of the people, which are among the
chief blessings of civil society. An irregular and mutable legislation
is not more an evil in itself than it is odious to the people; and it
may be pronounced with assurance that the people of this country,
enlightened as they are with regard to the nature, and interested, as
the great body of them are, in the effects of good government, will
never be satisfied till some remedy be applied to the vicissitudes and
uncertainties which characterize the State administrations. On
comparing, however, these valuable ingredients with the vital
principles of liberty, we must perceive at once the difficulty of
mingling them together in their due proportions. The genius of
republican liberty seems to demand on one side, not only that all
power should be derived from the people, but that those intrusted with
it should be kept in dependence on the people, by a short duration of
their appointments; and that even during this short period the trust
should be placed not in a few, but a number of hands. Stability, on
the contrary, requires that the hands in which power is lodged should
continue for a length of time the same. A frequent change of men will
result from a frequent return of elections; and a frequent change of
measures from a frequent change of men: whilst energy in government
requires not only a certain duration of power, but the execution of it
by a single hand.
OOOOHow far the convention may have
succeeded in this part of their work, will better appear on a more
accurate view of it. From the cursory view here taken, it must clearly
appear to have been an arduous part.
OOOONot less arduous must have been the
task of marking the proper line of partition between the authority of
the general and that of the State governments. Every man will be
sensible of this difficulty, in proportion as he has been accustomed
to contemplate and discriminate objects extensive and complicated in
their nature. The faculties of the mind itself have never yet been
distinguished and defined, with satisfactory precision, by all the
efforts of the most acute and metaphysical philosophers. Sense,
perception, judgment, desire, volition, memory, imagination, are found
to be separated by such delicate shades and minute gradations that
their boundaries have eluded the most subtle investigations, and
remain a pregnant source of ingenious disquisition and controversy.
The boundaries between the great kingdom of nature, and, still more,
between the various provinces, and lesser portions, into which they
are subdivided, afford another illustration of the same important
truth. The most sagacious and laborious naturalists have never yet
succeeded in tracing with certainty the line which separates the
district of vegetable life from the neighboring region of unorganized
matter, or which marks the ermination of the former and the
commencement of the animal empire. A still greater obscurity lies in
the distinctive characters by which the objects in each of these great
departments of nature have been arranged and assorted.
OOOOWhen we pass from the works of
nature, in which all the delineations are perfectly accurate, and
appear to be otherwise only from the imperfection of the eye which
surveys them, to the institutions of man, in which the obscurity
arises as well from the object itself as from the organ by which it is
contemplated, we must perceive the necessity of moderating still
further our expectations and hopes from the efforts of human sagacity.
Experience has instructed us that no skill in the science of
government has yet been able to discriminate and define, with
sufficient certainty, its three great provinces the legislative,
executive, and judiciary; or even the privileges and powers of the
different legislative branches. Questions daily occur in the course of
practice, which prove the obscurity which reins in these subjects, and
which puzzle the greatest adepts in political science.
OOOOThe experience of ages, with the
continued and combined labors of the most enlightened legislatures and
jurists, has been equally unsuccessful in delineating the several
objects and limits of different codes of laws and different tribunals
of justice. The precise extent of the common law, and the statute law,
the maritime law, the ecclesiastical law, the law of corporations, and
other local laws and customs, remains still to be clearly and finally
established in Great Britain, where accuracy in such subjects has been
more industriously pursued than in any other part of the world. The
jurisdiction of her several courts, general and local, of law, of
equity, of admiralty, etc., is not less a source of frequent and
intricate discussions, sufficiently denoting the indeterminate limits
by which they are respectively circumscribed. All new laws, though
penned with the greatest technical skill, and passed on the fullest
and most mature deliberation, are considered as more or less obscure
and equivocal, until their meaning be liquidated and ascertained by a
series of particular discussions and adjudications. Besides the
obscurity arising from the complexity of objects, and the imperfection
of the human faculties, the medium through which the conceptions of
men are conveyed to each other adds a fresh embarrassment. The use of
words is to express ideas. Perspicuity, therefore, requires not only
that the ideas should be distinctly formed, but that they should be
expressed by words distinctly and exclusively appropriate to them. But
no language is so copious as to supply words and phrases for every
complex idea, or so correct as not to include many equivocally
denoting different ideas. Hence it must happen that however accurately
objects may be discriminated in themselves, and however accurately the
discrimination may be considered, the definition of them may be
rendered inaccurate by the inaccuracy of the terms in which it is
delivered. And this unavoidable inaccuracy must be greater or less,
according to the complexity and novelty of the objects defined. When
the Almighty himself condescends to address mankind in their own
language, his meaning, luminous as it must be, is rendered dim and
doubtful by the cloudy medium through which it is communicated.
OOOOHere, then, are three sources of
vague and incorrect definitions: indistinctness of the object,
imperfection of the organ of conception, inadequateness of the vehicle
of ideas. Any one of these must produce a certain degree of obscurity.
The convention, in delineating the boundary between the federal and
State jurisdictions, must have experienced the full effect of them
all.
OOOOTo the difficulties already
mentioned may be added the interfering pretensions of the larger and
smaller States. We cannot err in supposing that the former would
contend for a participation in the government, fully proportioned to
their superior wealth and importance; and that the latter would not be
less tenacious of the equality at present enjoyed by them. We may well
suppose that neither side would entirely yield to the other, and
consequently that the struggle could be terminated only by compromise.
It is extremely probable, also, that after the ratio of representation
had been adjusted, this very compromise must have produced a fresh
struggle between the same parties, to give such a turn to the
organization of the government, and to the distribution of its powers,
as would increase the importance of the branches, in forming which
they had respectively obtained the greatest share of influence. There
are features in the Constitution which warrant each of these
suppositions; and as far as either of them is well founded, it shows
that the convention must have been compelled to sacrifice theoretical
propriety to the force of extraneous considerations.
OOOONor could it have been the large and
small States only, which would marshal themselves in opposition to
each other on various points. Other combinations, resulting from a
difference of local position and policy, must have created additional
difficulties. As every State may be divided into different districts,
and its citizens into different classes, which give birth to
contending interests and local jealousies, so the different parts of
the United States are distinguished from each other by a variety of
circumstances, which produce a like effect on a larger scale. And
although this variety of interests, for reasons sufficiently explained
in a former paper, may have a salutary influence on the administration
of the government when formed, yet every one must be sensible of the
contrary influence, which must have been experienced in the task of
forming it.
OOOOWould it be wonderful if, under the
pressure of all these difficulties, the convention should have been
forced into some deviations from that artificial structure and regular
symmetry which an abstract view of the subject might lead an ingenious
theorist to bestow on a Constitution planned in his closet or in his
imagination? The real wonder is that so many difficulties should have
been surmounted, and surmounted with a unanimity almost as
unprecedented as it must have been unexpected. It is impossible for
any man of candor to reflect on this circumstance without partaking of
the astonishment. It is impossible for the man of pious reflection not
to perceive in it a finger of that Almighty hand which has been so
frequently and signally extended to our relief in the critical stages
of the revolution.
OOOOWe had occasion, in a former paper,
to take notice of the repeated trials which have been unsuccessfully
made in the United Netherlands for reforming the baneful and notorious
vices of their constitution. The history of almost all the great
councils and consultations held among mankind for reconciling their
discordant opinions, assuaging their mutual jealousies, and adjusting
their respective interests, is a history of factions, contentions, and
disappointments, and may be classed among the most dark and degraded
pictures which display the infirmities and depravities of the human
character. If, in a few scattered instances, a brighter aspect is
presented, they serve only as exceptions to admonish us of the general
truth; and by their lustre to darken the gloom of the adverse prospect
to which they are contrasted. In revolving the causes from which these
exceptions result, and applying them to the particular instances
before us, we are necessarily led to two important conclusions. The
first is, that the convention must have enjoyed, in a very singular
degree, an exemption from the pestilential influence of party
animosities the disease most incident to deliberative bodies, and most
apt to contaminate their proceedings. The second conclusion is that
all the deputations composing the convention were satisfactorily
accommodated by the final act, or were induced to accede to it by a
deep conviction of the necessity of sacrificing private opinions and
partial interests to the public good, and by a despair of seeing this
necessity diminished by delays or by new experiments.
OOOOPUBLIUS.
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