Personal Sovereignty disclosed the remedy would follow close upon their footsteps. The causes of the evils he held to be, first, in the representative bodies, and second, in the people themselves; in the representative bodies because representative appointments are, he says, sought from three motives: "1. Ambition. 2. Personal interest. 3. Public good." And he felt obliged to state that "Unhappily, the two first are proved by experience to be most prevalent." But he regarded, and properly, the people to be more at fault, because if they wanted different representatives they could have them, and if they insisted upon just laws their representatives would frame them. He finds the chief fault to be in the fact that civilized societies are divided into different interests and factions, "creditors or debtors, rich or poor, husbandmen, merchants, or manufacturers, members of different religious sects, followers of different political leaders, inhabitants of different districts, owners of different kinds of property, &c., &c." He mentions three correctives, but finds them to be wanting whenever the interest of the individual seems to suggest their violation. They are: "1. A prudent regard to their own good, as involved in the general and permanent good of the community." As a result of experience Mr. Madison holds that this consideration lacks decisive weight, and he includes nations as well as individuals, saying, "It is too often forgotten, by nations as well as by individuals, that honesty is the best policy." The second is a respect for character, and here again he finds that this corrective does not prevent injustice, because, as he says, "In a multitude its efficacy is diminished in proportion to the number which is to share the praise or the blame," and even if it prevails within a society it is doubtful if it crosses the frontier and extends into adjoining provinces or States, inasmuch as actions are constantly committed within one State affecting strangers beyond its confines. The third is religion, which he mentions only to reject, saying, “The conduct of every popular assembly acting on oath, the strongest of religious ties, proves that individuals join without remorse in acts, against which their consciences would revolt if proposed to them under the like sanction, separately in their closets." As the result of his careful and prolonged study of this subject, he finds that "The great desideratum in Government is such a modification of the sovereignty as will render it sufficiently neutral between the different interests and factions to controul one part of the society from invading the rights of another, and, at the same time, sufficiently controuled itself from setting up an interest adverse to that of the whole society," and he concludes by considering the different forms of government and the extent to which they may be counted upon to meet his requirements. Thus he says: In absolute Monarchies the prince is sufficiently neutral towards his subjects, but frequently sacrifices their happiness to his ambition or his avarice. Mr. In small Republics, the sovereign will is sufficiently controuled from such a sacrifice of the entire Society, but is not sufficiently neutral towards the parts composing it. As a limited monarchy tempers the evils of an absolute one; so an extensive Republic meliorates the administration of a small Republic. The form of government which he himself felt necessary was later laid before the Federal Convention by Mr. Randolph in what has been called the Public Virginia plan, which not only bears the impress of his experienced and scholarly mind but is in his own handwriting as well. He was not, however, unconscious of the fact that something was needed above and beyond the form of government, and it is the conscious expression of this fact that gives point and value to his observations. Governors of the States must be worthy of the trust, and with this he aptly closes his observations: Officers faction An auxiliary desideratum for the melioration of the Republican form is such a process of elections as will most certainly extract from the mass of the society the purest and noblest characters which it contains; such as will at once feel most strongly the proper motives to pursue the end of their appointment, and be most capable to devise the proper means of attaining it. Before the ratification of the Articles of Confederation by the last of the Dissatisthirteen States on March 1, 1781, a movement had begun to amend the Articles in order to make them more adequate for governmental purposes, which, prolonged through a series of years, led to the call of the Constitutional Convention which met in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787, an assembly which replaced the Articles by a newer and more perfect instrument of government called the Constitution, under which the United States on the one hand and the States on the other have waxed great and have prospered. The Congress recognized that the work of its hands was imperfect, but its members felt that the Articles of Confederation embodied all of the concessions from the States which they could obtain at that time, and they did not recognize, perhaps, before experiencing them, the defects of that instrument of government which is known as the Articles of Confederation. Jonathan Elliot, to whom we are under the deepest obligation for his Debates in the State Conventions on the adoption of the Federal Constitution, and the debates in the Convention itself, entitled the section devoted to the period between the ratification of the Articles and the call of the Convention, Proceedings which led to the Adoption of the Constitution of the United States." And in this section he enumerates four proposals, which failed but they may be termed happy failures, for it is because of them that the call went out for a convention which framed the more perfect Union. These four 66 are: First, the proposal to amend the eighth of the Articles of Confederation, in 1 Jonathan Elliot, The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, 1836, Vol. i, pp. 92-120. Four Proposals that Failed Economic order to base the quotas upon population which the States should contribute to the government rather than upon the value of the realty in each of the States; Second, a proposal to authorize the Congress to levy a duty of five per cent. ad valorem upon all goods, wares, and merchandise of foreign growth and manufacture imported into the United States after the 1st day of May, 1781, and to authorize the United States to levy a like duty of five per cent. on all prizes and prize goods condemned in the court of admiralty of any of the States, in order that the revenues arising therefrom should be used to discharge the principal and interest of the debts contracted or which should be contracted on the faith of the United States during the "present war"; Third, a proposal to invest the United States with the power to levy duties. upon certain specified goods imported into the United States from any foreign port, island or plantation during a period of twenty-five years, to raise from the States for a period of twenty-five years a revenue of $1,500,000 annually to extinguish the debt contracted on the faith of the United States according to quotas specified in the resolution; Fourth, to amend the Articles of Confederation by investing the United States in Congress assembled, for a period of fifteen years, with the power to forbid the States to import or to export goods in vessels belonging to nations with which the United States did not have treaties of commerce, and to empower Congress, for a like period of fifteen years, to forbid the subjects of foreign States residing within the United States to export goods, wares or merchandise unless authorized so to do by treaty. Finance and commerce were the rocks upon which the little ship of state well nigh foundered, but the failure of the States to respond to the recommendations, indeed we might almost say the prayers, of the Congress led to private initiative, in the hope that it might succeed where public initiative had failed. The trouble, as we see today, was one that might be remedied without affecting the rights of the States, by investing the Congress, through its own agents, with the power of collecting revenue at the source, in accordance with the consent and the authorization of the States. In this way the general government would have been able to sue and to collect the revenue from the individual, whereas the government could not, under the law of nations, sue a sovereign, free and independent State to collect the quotas fixed by the Congress for the States in accordance with the Articles of Confederation; and the States were unwilling to invest the United States in Congress assembled with the right to sue the State, and to compel by force, if necessary, compliance with its obligations. The framers of the Confederation did not see, because they lacked experience, that a provision of this kind would not only provide the revenue needed by the general government, but would obviate quarrels and ill feeling between the States and their citizens, as the State would not need, for the purpose of the Union, to thrust its hand into the pockets of its citizens. 66 This matter has never been put more clearly than by Alexander Hamilton in his speech in the New York Convention advocating the ratification of the Constitution. "It has been observed," he said, that "to coerce the states is one of the maddest projects that was ever devised." And he asked, "can we believe that one state will ever suffer itself to be used as an instrument of coercion?" In his opinion, and Hamilton was no advocate of state rights, it could not be done, and it should not be tried. "The thing is a dream," he said, "it is impossible." On the theory of government which had been tried and found wanting, he added, "Then we are brought to this dilemma - either a federal standing army is to enforce the requisitions or the federal treasury is left without supplies, and the government without support." What was to be done, or as he expressed it in the language of debate: 'What, sir, is the cure for this great evil?" This question he answered, in such a way as to show not merely the nature of the solution but the solution itself: Nothing, but to enable the national laws to operate on individuals, in the same manner as those of the states do. This is the true reasoning upon the subject, sir." 1 But to return to the rôle of private initiative in the creation of the more perfect Union. The situation of the States in matters of commerce was that which would arise between sovereign, free and independent States in which there was not a customs union, such as the German States were wise enough to conclude in the middle of the 19th Century. As stated by a keeneyed observer of the period: "The states," Mr. Madison said, "having no convenient ports for foreign commerce, were subject to be taxed by their neighbors, thro' whose ports, their commerce was carried on. New Jersey, placed between Phil" & N. York, was likened to a cask tapped at both ends; and N. Carolina, between Virga & S. Carolina to a patient bleeding at both Arms." 2 The Congress foresaw the consequences of such a condition, and had already laid it before the States, but without avail, in the following impressive language: The situation of commerce at this time claims the attention of the several states, and few objects of greater importance can present themselves to their notice. The fortune of every citizen is interested in the success thereof; for it is the constant source of wealth and incentive to industry; and the value of our produce and our land must ever rise or fall in proportion to the prosperous or adverse state of trade.3 Coercion of States Initiative Private initiative supplied the remedy. Maryland and Virginia were in- Private terested in the navigation of Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries and they had come to a satisfactory working agreement in the matter. But Pennsylvania 1 Elliot, Debates, Vol. ii, pp. 232, 233. 2 Writings of Madison, Hunt ed., Vol. ii, p. 395. 3 Elliot, Debates, Vol. i, p. 107. Convention at Annapolis Another and Delaware were likewise interested parties, either as bordering on the Bay and its tributaries or as affected by their regulation. In a less degree all the States were interested in as far as they were affected, whereas the adjoining States were primarily concerned. Hence, it occurred to Mr. Madison to have Virginia propose a meeting of delegates of the States, in order to see what could be done or what could be proposed to better conditions in that matter of trade and commerce. Therefore, on January 21, 1786, the Virginia legislature appointed certain persons, among whom may be mentioned Edmund Randolph, James Madison and George Mason, as commissioners to "meet such commissioners as may be appointed by the other states in the Union, at a time and place to be agreed on, to take into consideration the trade of the United States; to examine the relative situation and trade of the said States; to consider how far a uniform system in their commercial regulations may be necessary to their common interest and their permanent harmony; and to report to the several states such an act relative to this great object as, when unanimously ratified by them, will enable the United States in Congress assembled effectually to provide for the same; that the said commissioners shall immediately transmit to the several states copies of the preceding resolution, with a circular letter requesting their concurrence therein, and proposing a time and place for the meeting aforesaid.” 1 In response to this invitation for which there was no authority in the Articles of Confederation, and indeed there had been no authorization for the action of Maryland and Virginia in regulating their interests in the Chesapeake and its tributaries - issued by the State of Virginia, nine States appointed delegates to meet at Annapolis on the first Monday in September, 1786. When the day came delegates had arrived only from the five States of New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware and Virginia; but among these delegates were well known names - Alexander Hamilton and Egbert Benson of New York, William Patterson of New Jersey, John Dickinson of Delaware, Edmund Randolph and James Madison of Virginia. The distinguished veteran and colonial statesman, John Dickinson, was elected chairman of the Convention, which met on September 11, 1786, but in the absence of the other States the members present wisely limited themselves to a recommendation drafted by Hamilton, stating it to be "their unanimous conviction, that it may essentially tend to advance the interests of the Union, if the states, by whom they have been respectively delegated, would themselves concur, and use their endeavors to procure the concurrence of the other states, in the appointment of commissioners, to meet at Philadelphia on the second Monday in May next [1787], to take into consideration the situation of the United States, to devise such further provisions as shall appear to them necessary to render 1 Elliot, Debates, Vol. i, pp. 115–6. |