Part 15 (1/2)
You will doubtless recollect the following state of facts-if you do not, every member of the convention will attest them-that almost the whole time during the setting of the convention, and until the const.i.tution had received its present form, no man was more plausible and conciliating upon every subject than Mr. Gerry-he was willing to sacrifice every private feeling and opinion-to concede every state interest that should be in the least incompatible with the most substantial and permanent system of general government-that mutual concession and unanimity were the whole burden of his song; and although he originated no idea himself, yet there was nothing in the system as it now stands to which he had the least objection-indeed, Mr. Gerry's conduct was agreeably surprising to all his acquaintance, and very unlike that turbulent obstinacy of spirit which they had formerly affixed to his character. Thus stood Mr. Gerry, till toward the close of the business, he introduced a motion respecting the redemption of the old Continental Money-that it should be placed upon a footing with other liquidated securities of the United States.(39) As Mr.
Gerry was supposed to be possessed of large quant.i.ties of this species of paper, his motion appeared to be founded in such barefaced selfishness and injustice, that it at once accounted for all his former plausibility and concession, while the rejection of it by the convention inspired its author with the utmost rage and intemperate opposition to the whole system he had formerly praised. His resentment could no more than embarra.s.s and delay the completion of the business for a few days; when he refused signing the const.i.tution and was called upon for his reasons. These reasons were committed to writing by one of his colleagues and likewise by the Secretary, as Mr. Gerry delivered them.(40) These reasons were totally different from those which he has published, neither was a single objection which is contained in his letter to the legislature of Ma.s.sachusetts ever offered by him in convention.
Now, Mr. Gerry, as this is generally known to be the state of facts, and as neither the reasons which you publish nor those retained on the Secretary's files can be supposed to have the least affinity to truth, or to contain the real motives which induced you to withhold your name from the const.i.tution, it appears to me that your plan was not judiciously contrived. When we act without principle, we ought to be prepared against embarra.s.sments. You might have expected some difficulties in realizing your continental money; indeed the chance was rather against your motion, even in the most artful shape in which it could have been proposed. An experienced hand would therefore have laid the whole plan beforehand, and have guarded against a disappointment. You should have begun the business with doubts, and expressed your sentiments with great ambiguity upon every subject as it pa.s.sed. This method would have secured you many advantages.
Your doubts and ambiguities, if artfully managed, might have pa.s.sed, like those of the Delphic Oracle, for wisdom and deliberation; and at the close of the business you might have acted either for or against the const.i.tution, according to the success of your motion, without appearing dishonest or inconsistent with yourself. One farther precaution would have brought you off clear.
Instead of waiting till the convention rose, before you consulted your friends at New York, you ought to have applied to them at an earlier period, to know what objections you should make. They could have instructed you as well in August as October.
With these advantages you might have past for a complete politician, and your duplicity might never have been detected.
The enemies of America have always been extremely unfortunate in concerting their measures. They have generally betrayed great ignorance of the true spirit and feeling of the country, and they have failed to act in concert with each other. This is uniformly conspicuous, from the first Bute Parliament in London to the last Shays Parliament at Pelham.
The conduct of the enemies of the new const.i.tution compares with that of the other enemies above mentioned only in two particulars, its object and its tendency.
Its object was self interest built on the ruins of the country, and its tendency is the disgrace of its authors and the final prosperity of the same country they meant to depress. Whether the const.i.tution will be adopted at the first trial in the conventions of nine states is at present doubtful. It is certain, however, that its enemies have great difficulties to encounter arising from their disunion: in the different states where the opposition rages the most, their principles are totally opposite to each other, and their objections discordant and irreconcilable, so that no regular system can be formed among you, and you will betray each other's motives.
In Ma.s.sachusetts the opposition began with you, and from motives most pitifully selfish and despicable, you addressed yourself to the feelings of the Shays faction, and that faction will be your only support. In New York the opposition is not to this const.i.tution in particular, but to the federal impost, it is confined wholly to salary-men and their connections, men whose salary is paid by the state impost. This cla.s.s of citizens are endeavoring to convince the ignorant part of the community that an annual income of fifty thousand pounds, extorted from the citizens of Ma.s.sachusetts, Connecticut and New Jersey, is a great blessing to the state of New York. And although the regulation of trade and other advantages of a federal government would secure more than five times that sum to the people of that state, yet, as this would not come through the same hands, these men find fault with the const.i.tution. In Pennsylvania the old quarrel respecting their state const.i.tution has thrown the state into parties for a number of years. One of these parties happened to declare for the new federal const.i.tution, and this was a sufficient motive for the other to oppose it; the dispute there is not upon the merits of the subject, but it is their old warfare carried on with different weapons, and it was an even chance that the parties had taken different sides from what they have taken, for there is no doubt but either party would sacrifice the whole country to the destruction of their enemies. In Virginia the opposition wholly originated in two principles; the madness of Mason, and the enemity of the Lee faction to General Was.h.i.+ngton. Had the General not attended the convention nor given his sentiments respecting the const.i.tution, the Lee party would undoubtedly have supported it, and Col. Mason would have vented his rage to his own negroes and to the winds. In Connecticut, our wrongheads are few in number and feeble in their influence. The opposition here is not one-half so great to the federal government as it was three years ago to the federal impost, and the faction, such as it is, is from the same blindfold party.
I thought it my duty to give you these articles of information, for the reasons above mentioned. Wis.h.i.+ng you more caution and better success in your future manuvers, I have the honor to be, Sir, with great respect, your very humble servant.
A LANDHOLDER.
The Landholder, IX.
The Connecticut Courant, (Number 1197)
MONDAY, DECEMBER 31, 1787.
TO THE HON. GENTLEMEN CHOSEN TO SERVE IN THE STATE CONVENTION.(41)
_Gentlemen_,
When the deputies of a free people are met to deliberate on a const.i.tution for their country; they must find themselves in a solemn situation. Few persons realize the greatness of this business, and none can certainly determine how it will terminate. A love of liberty in which we have all been educated, and which your country expects on you to preserve sacred, will doubtless make you careful not to lay such foundations as will terminate in despotism. Oppression and a loss of liberty arise from very different causes, and which at first blush appear totally different from another.
If you had only to guard against vesting an undue power in certain great officers of state your work would be comparatively easy. This some times occasions a loss of liberty, but the history of nations teacheth us that for one instance from this cause, there are ten from the contrary, a want of necessary power in some public department to protect and to preserve the true interests of the people. America is at this moment in ten-fold greater danger of slavery than ever she was from the councils of a British monarchy, or the triumph of British arms. She is in danger from herself and her own citizens, not from giving too much, but from denying all power to her rulers-not from a const.i.tution on despotic principles, but from having no const.i.tution at all. Should this great effort to organize the empire prove abortive, heaven only knows the situation in which we shall find ourselves; but there is reason to fear it will be troublesome enough.
It is awful to meet the pa.s.sions of a people who not only believe but feel themselves uncontrouled-who not finding from government the expected protection of their interests, tho' otherwise honest, become desperate, each man determining to share by the spoils of anarchy, what he would wish to acquire by industry under an efficient national protection. It becomes the deputies of the people to consider what will be the consequence of a miscarriage in this business. Ardent expectation is waiting for its issue-all allow something is necessary-thousands of sufferers have stifled their rights in reverence to the public effort-the industrious cla.s.ses of men are waiting with patience for better times, and should that be rejected on which they make dependance, will not the public convulsion be great? Or if the civil state should survive the first effects of disappointment, what will be the consequences of slower operations? The men who have done their best to give relief, will despair of success, and gloomily determine that greater sufferings must open the eyes of the deluded-the men who oppose, tho' they may claim a temporary triumph, will find themselves totally unable to propose, and much less to adopt a better system; the narrowness of policy that they have pursued will instantly appear more ridiculous than at present, and the triumph will spoil that importance, which nature designed them to receive not by succeeding, but by impeding national councils. These men cannot, therefore, be the saviours of their country. While those who have been foremost in the political contention disappear either thro' despondence or neglect, every man will do what is right in his own eyes and his hand will be against his neighbor-industry will cease-the states will be filled with jealousy-some opposing and others endeavoring to retaliate-a thousand existing factions, and acts of public injustice, thro' the temporary influence of parties, will prepare the way for chance to erect a government, which might now be established by deliberate wisdom. When government thus arises, it carries an iron hand.
Should the states reject a union upon solid and efficient principles, there needs but some daring genius to step forth, and impose an authority which future deliberation never can correct. Anarchy, or a want of such government as can protect the interests of the subjects against foreign and domestic injustice, is the worst of all conditions. It is a condition which mankind will not long endure. To avoid its distress they will resort to any standard which is erected, and bless the ambitious usurper as a messenger sent by heaven to save a miserable people. We must not depend too much on the enlightened state of the country; in deliberation this may preserve us, but when deliberation proves abortive, we are immediately to calculate on other principles, and enquire to what may the pa.s.sions of men lead them, when they have deliberated to the utmost extent of patience, and been foiled in every measure, by a set of men who think their emoluments more safe upon a partial system, than upon one which regards the national good.
Politics ought to be free from pa.s.sion-we ought to have patience for a certain time with those who oppose a federal system. But have they not been indulged until the state is on the brink of ruin, and they appear stubborn in error? Have they not been our scourge and the perplexers of our councils for many years? Is it not thro' their policy that the state of New York draws an annual tribute of forty thousand pounds from the citizens of Connecticut? Is it not by their means that our foreign trade is ruined, and the farmer unable to command a just price for his commodities? The enlightened part of the people have long seen their measures to be destructive, and it is only the ignorant and jealous who give them support. The men who oppose this const.i.tution are the same who have been unfederal from the beginning. They were as unfriendly to the old confederation as to the system now proposed, but bore it with more patience because it was wholly inefficacious. They talk of amendments-of dangerous articles which must be corrected-that they will heartily join in a safe plan of federal government; but when we look on their past conduct can we think them sincere? Doubtless their design is to procrastinate, and by this carry their own measures; but the artifice must not succeed. The people are now ripe for a government which will do justice to their interests, and if the honourable convention deny them, they will despair of help. They have shewn a n.o.ble spirit in appointing their first citizens for this business-when convened you will const.i.tute the most august a.s.sembly that were ever collected in the State, and your duty is the greatest that can be expected from men, the salvation of your country. If coolness and magnanimity of mind attend your deliberations, all little objections will vanish, and the world will be more astonished by your political wisdom than they were by the victory of your arms.
A LANDHOLDER.
The Landholder, X.
The Maryland Journal, (Number 1016)