Complete Works. Hamilton Alexander
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only perhaps amount to a fund to discharge the debt of the corporation. Let us take a review of the variety of important objects, which must necessarily engage the attention of a national government. You have to protect your rights against Canada on the north, Spain on the south, and your western frontier against savages. You have to adopt necessary plans for the settlement of your frontiers, and to institute the mode in which settlements and good government are to be made. How is the expense of supporting and regulating these important matters to be defrayed? By requisition on the States according to the Jersey plan? Will this do it? We have already found it ineffectual. Let one State prove delinquent, and it will encourage others to follow the example; and thus the whole will fail. And what is the standard to quota among the States their respective proportions? Can lands be the standard? How would that apply between Russia and Holland? Compare Pennsylvania with North Carolina; or Connecticut with New York. Does not commerce or industry in the one or other make a great disparity between these different countries, and may not the comparative value of the States from these circumstances make an unequal disproportion when the data is numbers? I therefore conclude that either system would ultimately destroy the Confederation or any other government which is established on such fallacious principles. Perhaps imposts, taxes on specific articles, would produce a more equal system of drawing a revenue. Another objection to the Jersey plan is the unequal representation. Can the great States consent to this? If they did, it would eventually work its own destruction. How are forces to be raised by the Jersey plan? By quotas? Will the States comply with the requisition? As much as they will with the taxes. Examine the present Confederation and it is evident they can raise no troops, nor equip vessels, before war is actually declared. They cannot, therefore, take any preparatory measure before an enemy is at your door. How unwise and inadequate their powers! And this must ever be the case when they attempt to define powers. Something will always be wanting. Congress, by being annually elected, and subject to recall, will ever come with the prejudices of their States, rather than the good of the Union. Add, therefore, additional powers to a body thus organized, and you establish a sovereignty of the worst kind, consisting of a single body. Where are the checks? None. They must either prevail over the State governments, or the prevalence of the State governments must end in their dissolution. This is a conclusive objection to the Jersey plan. Such are the insuperable objections to both plans; and what is to be done on this occasion? I confess I am at a loss. I foresee the difficulty, on a consolidated plan, of drawing a representation from so extensive a continent to one place. What can be the inducements for gentlemen to come six hundred miles to a national Legislature? The expense would at least amount to £100,000. This, however, can be no conclusive objection, if it eventuates in an extinction of State governments. The burden of the latter would be saved, and the expense then would not be great. State distinctions would be found unnecessary; and yet, I confess, to carry government to extremities, the State governments, reduced to corporations and with very limited powers, might be necessary, and the expense of the national government become less burdensome. Yet, I confess, I see great difficulty of drawing forth a good representation. What, for example, will be the inducements for gentlemen of fortune and abilities to leave their houses and business to attend annually and long? It cannot be the wages; for these, I presume, must be small. Will not the power, therefore, be thrown into the hands of the demagogue or middling politician, who, for the sake of a small stipend and hopes of advancement, will offer himself as a candidate, and the real men of weight and influence, by remaining at home, add strength to the State governments? I am at a loss to know what must be done; I despair that a republican form of government can remove the difficulties. Whatever may be my opinion, I would hold it, however, unwise to change that form of government. I believe the British government forms the best model the world ever produced, and such has been its progress in the minds of many, that this truth gradually gains ground. This government has for its object public strength and individual security. It is said with us to be unattainable. If it was once formed it would maintain itself.
All communities divide themselves into the few and the many. The first are the rich and well-born, the other the mass of the people. The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God; and, however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true in fact. The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge or determine right. Give, therefore, to the first class a distinct, permanent share in the government. They will check the unsteadiness of the second, and, as they cannot receive any advantage by a change, they therefore will ever maintain good government. Can a democratic Assembly, who annually revolve in the mass of the people, be supposed steadily to pursue the public good? Nothing but a permanent body can check the imprudence of democracy. Their turbulent and uncontrolling disposition requires checks. The Senate of New York, although chosen for four years, we have found to be inefficient. Will, on the Virginia plan, a continuance of seven years do it? It is admitted that you cannot have a good Executive upon a democratic plan. See the excellency of the British Executive. He is placed above temptation. He can have no distinct interests from the public welfare. Nothing short of such an executive can be efficient. The weak side of a republican government is the danger of foreign influence. This is unavoidable, unless it is so constructed as to bring forward its first characters in its support. I am, therefore, for a general government, yet would wish to go the full length of republican principles. Let one body of the Legislature be constituted during good behavior or life. Let one Executive be appointed who dares execute his powers. It may be asked: Is this a republican system? It is strictly so, as long as they remain elective. And let me observe, that an Executive is less dangerous to the liberties of the people when in office during life, than for seven years. It may be said, this constitutes an elective monarchy. Pray, what is a monarchy? May not the governors of the respective States be considered in that light? But, by making the Executive subject to impeachment, the term monarchy cannot apply. These elective monarchs have produced tumults in Rome, and are equally dangerous to peace in Poland; but this cannot apply to the mode in which I would propose the election. Let electors be appointed in each of the States to elect the Executive, [here Mr. H. produced his plan, a copy whereof is hereunto annexed,] to consist of two branches; and I would give them the unlimited power of passing all laws, without exception. The Assembly to be elected for three years, by the people in districts. The Senate to be elected by electors to be chosen for that purpose by the people, and to remain in office during life. The Executive to have the power of negativing all laws; to make war or peace, with their advice, but to have the sole direction of all military operations, and to send ambassadors, and appoint all military officers; and to pardon all offenders, treason excepted, unless by advice of the Senate. On his death or removal, the President of the Senate to officiate, with the same powers, until another is elected. Supreme judicial officers to be appointed by the Executive and the Senate. The Legislature to appoint courts in each State, so as to make the State governments unnecessary to it. All State laws which contravene the general laws to be absolutely void. An officer to be appointed in each State, to have a negative on all State laws. All the militia, and the appointment of officers, to be under the national government. I confess that this plan and that from Virginia are very remote from the idea of the people. Perhaps the Jersey plan is nearest their expectation. But the people are gradually ripening in their opinions of government; they begin to be tired of an excess of democracy; and what even is the Virginia plan, but “pork still, with a little change of sauce.”—Yates, “Secret Proceedings,” etc.
June 19th, Colonel Hamilton said: I agree to the proposition. I did not intend, yesterday, a total extinguishment of State governments; but my meaning was, that a national government ought to be able to support itself without aid or interference of the State governments, and that therefore it was necessary to have full sovereignty. Even with corporate rights, the States will be dangerous to the national government, and ought to be extinguished, new modified, or reduced to a smaller scale.—Yates.
June 19th, Colonel Hamilton said: That he coincided with the proposition as it stood in the report. He had not been understood yesterday. By an abolition of the States, he meant that no boundary could be drawn between the National and State Legislatures; that the former must therefore have indefinite authority. If it were limited at all the rivalship of the States would gradually subvert it. Even as corporations, the extent of some of them, as Virginia, Massachusetts, etc., would be formidable. As States, he thought they ought to be abolished. But he admitted the necessity, of leaving in them subordinate jurisdictions. The examples of Persia and the Roman empire,