Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v1.djvu/419

Rh branches, thus constituted, cannot agree, they having different views and different sentiments.

Mr. DICKINSON is of opinion that the mode by him proposed, like the British Houses of Lords and Commons, whose powers flow from different sources, are mutual checks on each other, and will thus promote the real happiness and security of the country. A government thus established would harmonize the whole, and, like the planetary system, the national council, like the sun, would illuminate the whole; the planets revolving round it in perfect order; or, like the union of several small streams, would at last form a respectable river, gently flowing to the sea.

Mr. WILSON. The state governments ought to be preserved. The freedom of the people, and their internal good police, depend on their existence in full vigor: but such a government can only answer local purposes—that it is not possible a general government, as despotic as even that of Roman emperors, could be adequate to the government of the whole without this distinction. He hoped that the national government would be independent of state governments, in order to make it vigorous, and therefore moved that the resolution might be postponed, and that the Convention, in its room, adopt the following resolve: "That the second branch of the national legislature be chosen by districts, to be formed for that purpose."

Mr. SHERMAN supposes the election of the national legislature will be better vested in the state legislatures than in the people; for, by pursuing different objects, persons may be returned who have not one tenth of the votes.

Mr. GERRY observed, that the great mercantile interest, and of stockholders, is not provided for in any mode of election—they will, however, be better represented if the state legislatures choose the second branch.

Question carried against the postponement—10 states against 1.

Mr. MASON then spoke to the general question—observing on the propriety, that the second branch of the national legislature should flow from the legislature of each state, to prevent the encroachments on each other, and to harmonize the whole.

The question put on the first motion, and carried unanimously. Adjourned to to-morrow morning.