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union, they ought readily to renounce a pretension, which, if not relinquished, would prove fatal to its duration.

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It may be objected to this, that not seven, but nine states, or two thirds of the whole number, must consent to the most important resolutions; and it may be thence inferred, that nine states would always comprehend a majority of the inhabitants of the union. But this does not obviate the impropriety of an equal vote between states of the most unequal dimensions and populousness; nor is the inference accurate in point of fact; for we can enumerate nine states which contain less than a majority of the people; and it is constitutionally possible, that these nine may give the vote. Besides there are matters of considerable moment determinable by a bare majority; and there are others, concerning which doubts have been entertained, which if interpreted in favor of the sufficiency of a vote of seven states, would extend its operation to interests of the first magnitude. In addition to this, it is to be observed that there is a probability of an increase in the number of states, and no provision for a proportional aug- 30 mentation of the ratio of votes.

But this is not all; what at first sight may seem a remedy, is in reality a poison. To give a minority a negative upon the majority, which is always the case where more than a majority is requisite to a decision, is in its tendency to subject the sense of the greater number to that of the lesser number. Congress, from the non-attendance of few states, has been frequently in the situation of a Polish diet, where a single veto has been sufficient to put a stop to all their movements. A sixtieth part of the union, which is about the proportion of Delaware and Rhode Island, has several times been able to oppose an entire bar to its operations. This is one of those refinements, which, in practice, has an effect the reverse of what is expected from it in theory. The

Add New York and Connecticut to the foregoing seven, and they will still be less than a majority. [Hamilton's note]

necessity of unanimity in public bodies, or of something approaching towards it, has been founded upon a supposition that it would contribute to security. But its real operation is to embarrass the administration, to destroy the energy of government, and to substitute the pleasure, caprice, or artifices of an insignificant, turbulent, or 10 corrupt junto, to the regular deliberations and decisions of a respectable majority. In those emergencies of a nation, in which the goodness or badness, the weakness or strength of its government is of the greatest importance, there is commonly a necessity for action. The public business must, in some way or other, go forward. If a pertinacious minority can control the opin20 ion of a majority respecting the best mode of conducting it, the majority, in order that something may be done, must conform to the views of the minority; and thus the sense of the smaller number will overrule that of the greater and give a tone to the national proceedings. Hence tedious delays; continual negotiation and intrigue; contemptible compromises of the public good. And yet, in such a system, it is even happy when such compromises can take place. For upon some occasions, things will not admit of accommodation; and then the measures of government must be injuriously suspended or fatally defeated. It is often, by the impracticability of obtaining the concurrence of the necessary number of votes, kept in a state of inaction. Its 40 situation must always savour of weakness; sometimes border upon anarchy.

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It is not difficult to discover that a principle of this kind gives greater scope to foreign corruption as well as to domestic faction, than that which permits the sense of the majority to decide; though the contrary of this has been presumed. The mistake has proceeded from not attending with due care to the mischiefs that may be occasioned by obstructing the progress of government at certain critical seasons. When the concurrence of a large number is required by the constitution to the do

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ing of any national act, we are apt to
rest satisfied that all is safe, because
nothing improper will be likely to be
done; but we forget how much good
may be prevented, and how much ill
may be produced, by the power of hin-
dering that which it is necessary to do,
and of keeping affairs in the same un-
favourable posture in which they may
happen to stand at particular periods.
Suppose for instance we were en-
gaged in a war, in conjunction with one
foreign nation against another. Sup-
pose the necessity of our situation de-
manded peace, and that the interest or
ambition of our ally led him to seek
the prosecution of the war, with views
that might justify us in making sepa-
rate terms. In such a state of things
this ally of ours would evidently find 20
it much easier by his bribes and his
intrigues to tie up the hands of gov-
ernment from making peace, where two
thirds of all the votes were requisite
to that object, than where a simple ma-
jority would suffice. In the first case
he would have to corrupt a smaller,
in the last a greater number. Upon
the same principle, it would be much
easier for a foreign power with which 30
we were at war, to perplex our councils
and embarrass our exertions. And in
a commercial view we may be sub-
jected to similar inconveniences. A
nation with which we might have a
treaty of commerce, could with much
greater facility prevent our forming a
connection with her competitor in
trade; though such a connection should
be ever so beneficial to ourselves.

been witness to few examples of this species of royal prostitution, though there have been abundant specimens of every other kind.

In republics, persons elevated from the mass of the community, by the suffrages of their fellow citizens, to stations of great preeminence and power, may find compensations for betraying their trust, which to any but minds actuated by superior virtue may appear to exceed the proportion of interest they have in the common stock, and to over-balance the obligations of duty. Hence it is, that history furnishes us with so many mortifying examples of the prevalency of foreign corruption in republican governments. How much this contributed to the ruin of the ancient commonwealths has been already disclosed. It is well known that the deputies of the United Provinces have, in various instances, been purchased by the emissaries of the neighbouring kingdoms. The earl of Chesterfield, if my memory serves me right, in a letter to his court, intimates that his success in an important negotiation, must depend on his obtaining a major's commission for one of those deputies. And in Sweden, the rival parties were alternately bought by France and England, in so barefaced and notorious a manner that it excited universal disgust in the nation, and was a principal cause that the most limited monarch in Europe, in a single day, without tumult, violence, or opposition, became one of the most absolute and uncon40 troled.

Evils of this description ought not to be regarded as imaginary. One of the weak sides of republics, among their numerous advantages, is that they afford too easy an inlet to foreign corruption. An hereditary monarch, though often disposed to sacrifice his subjects to his ambition, has so great a personal interest in the government, and in the external glory of the na- 50 tion, that it is not easy for a foreign power to give him an equivalent for what he would sacrifice by treachery to the state. The world has accordingly

A circumstance, which crowns the defects of the confederation, remains yet to be mentioned-the want of a judiciary power. Laws are a dead letter without courts to expound and define their true meaning and operation. The treaties of the United States, to have any force at all, must be considered as part of the law of the land. Their true import, as far as respects individuals, must, like all other laws, be ascertained by judicial determinations. To produce uniformity in these determinations, they ought to be sub

mitted in the last resort to one supreme
tribunal. And this tribunal ought to
be instituted under the same authority
which forms the treaties themselves.
These ingredients are both indispens-
able. If there is in each state a court
of final jurisdiction, there may be as
many different final determinations on
the same point, as there are courts.
There are endless diversities in the 10
opinions of men. We often see not
only different courts, but the judges
of the same court, differing from each
other. To avoid the confusion which
would unavoidably result from the con-
tradictory decisions of a number of in-
dependent judicatories, all nations have
found it necessary to establish one
court paramount to the rest, possessing
a general superintendence, and author- 20
ised to settle and declare in the last
resort an uniform rule of civil justice.

fide in such a government? Is it possible that the people of America will longer consent to trust their honour, their happiness, their safety, on so precarious a foundation?

In this review of the confederation, I have confined myself to the exhibition of its most material defects; passing over those imperfections in its details by which even a considerable part of the power intended to be conferred upon it has been in a great measure rendered abortive. It must be by this time evident to all men of reflection, who are either free from erroneous prepossessions or can divest themselves of them, that it is a system so radically vicious and unsound, as to admit not of amendment but by an entire change in its leading features and characters.

The organization of Congress is itself utterly improper for the exercise of those powers which are necessary to be deposited in the union. A single assembly may be a proper receptacle of those slender, or rather fettered authorities which have been heretofore delegated to the federal head; but it would be inconsistent with all the principles of good government, to intrust it with those additional powers which even the moderate and more rational adversaries of the proposed constitution admit ought to reside in the United States. If that plan should not be adopted; and if the necessity of union should be able to withstand the ambitious aims of those men, who may indulge magnificent schemes of personal aggrandize40 ment from its dissolution; the probability would be that we should run into the project of confering supplementary powers upon Congress as they are now constituted. And either the machine, from the intrinsic feebleness of its structure, will moulder into pieces in spite of our ill-judged efforts to prop it; or by successive augmentations of its force and energy, as necessity might prompt, we shall finally accumulate in a single body all the most important prerogatives of sovereignty; and thus entail upon our posterity one of the most execrable forms of government

This is the more necessary where the frame of the government is so compounded that the laws of the whole are in danger of being contravened by the laws of the parts. In this case, if the particular tribunals are invested with a right of ultimate jurisdiction, besides the contradictions to be ex-30 pected from difference of opinion, there will be much to fear from the bias of local views and prejudices, and from the interference of local regulations. As often as such an interference should happen, there would be reason to apprehend that the provisions of the particular laws might be preferred to those of the general laws, from the deference with which men in office naturally look up to that authority to which they owe their official existence. The treaties of the United States, under the present constitution, are liable to the infractions of thirteen different legislatures, and as many different courts of final jurisdiction, acting under the authority of those legislatures. The faith, the reputation, the peace, the whole union, are thus continually at the mercy of 50 the prejudices, the passions, and the interests of every member of which these are composed. Is it possible that foreign nations can either respect or con

that human infatuation ever contrived. Thus we should create in reality that very tyranny which the adversaries of the new constitution either are, or affect to be, solicitous to avert.

It has not a little contributed to the infirmities of the existing federal system, that it never had a ratification by the people. Resting on no better foundation than the consent of the several legislatures, it has been exposed to frequent and intricate questions concerning the validity of its powers; and has in some instances given birth to the enormous doctrine of a right of legislative repeal. Owing its ratification to the law of a state, it has been contended that the same authority might repeal the law by which it was ratified. However gross a heresy it may be to maintain that a party to a compact has a right to revoke that compact, the doctrine itself has had respectable advocates. The possibility of a question of this nature, proves the necessity of laying the foundations of our national government deeper than in the mere sanction of delegated authority. The fabric of American empire ought to rest on the solid basis of the consent of the people. The streams of national power ought to flow immediately from that pure original fountain of all legitimate authority.

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All bards should catch it, and all realms revere!

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Assist me first with pious toil to trace Through wrecks of time, thy lineage and thy race;

Declare what lovely squaw, in days of yore,

(Ere great Columbus sought thy native shore)

First gave thee to the world; her works

Muse,

of fame

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