PRINTED BY JOSHUA CUSHING. -Sold by him at No. 79, State Street, and Thomas Wells, No. 3, Hanover Street. 1809. A PREFACE. THE legislature of Massachusetts having closed its session, the true friends of our country must forever recollect its publick measures with equal pride and gratitude. Before our last election, the fortunes of our country seemed desperate. The legislature had then sanctioned the destructive system of Mr. Jefferson, whose origin can be found but in treachery or folly, wrong feelings, or absurd theories, and whose result, if the experiment was fairly tried, would have been our ruin. The success of the federal ticket, in our counties and towns, gave new hopes to the patriots who had struggled so hard for it. Their hopes have been realized. On the convention of the legislature in May, the first object of the federalists was the revival and restoration of the government to energy and confidence. In the appointment to offices, and in the removal of incumbents, the publick interest was studied and has been secured. Their political opponents must confess, that in the selection of candidates, there was no sacrifice of duty to their love of party or of partizans. In their various answers to the communications of the executive, they have ever expressed just respect to the chief magistrate of the state, as well as exacted due regard to the rights of the people. And if the alarming doctrines and arbitrary measures of the lieutenant governour, have exposed him to merited censure, its suppression would have been an abandonment of the constitution, of the liberty of the citizen and the sovereignty of the state. The various reports and resolutions of the legislature on the system of policy adopted by Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Madison, towards France and England, were demanded by the ruinous experiments and delusive pretensions of our cabinet. The coolness, firmness, candour and dignity of these legislative declarations of our rights, In their discover great minds intent on great ends. memorial to Congress and address to the people, they exhibit none of that petty spirit of complaint, whose wrong's are satisfied by petulance and invective, but that sober sense of justice, which first measures its claims, and then insists on their unequivocal admission. It will be readily perceived by all discerning men, that the counsels of our legislature have already checked the mad career of a cabinet, which had no guide but its fears and prejudices, and a second time roused our country to a resistance against oppression, which we trust in God will secure our liberty. |