Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v1.djvu/435

Rh and consist only of one branch, and each state in it has one vote. Inequality in representation poisons every government.

The English courts are hitherto pure, just, and incorrupt, while their legislature are base and venal. The one arises from unjust representation, the other from their independency of the legislature.

Lord Chesterfield remarks, that one of the states of the United Netherlands withheld its assent to a proposition until a major of their state was provided for. He needed not have added (for the conclusion was self-evident) that it was one of the lesser states. I mean no reflection, but I leave it to gentlemen to consider whether this has not also been the case in Congress. The argument in favor of the Jersey plan goes too far, as it cannot be completed unless Rhode Island assents. A single legislature is very dangerous: despotism may present itself in various shapes. May there not be legislative despotism, if, in the exercise of their power, they are unchecked or unrestrained by another branch? On the contrary, an executive, to be restrained, must be an individual. The first triumvirate of Rome, combined, without law, was fatal to its liberties; and the second, by the usurpation of Augustus, ended in despotism. The two kings of Sparta, and the consuls of Rome, by sharing the executive, distracted their governments.

Mr. C. C. PINCKNEY supposes that, if New Jersey was indulged with one vote out of thirteen, she would have no objection to a national government. He supposes that the Convention have already determined, virtually, that the federal government cannot be made efficient. A national government being therefore the object, this plan must be pursued, as our business is not to conclude, but to recommend.

Judge ELLSWORTH is of opinion that the first question on the new plan will decide nothing materially on principle, and therefore moved the postponement thereof, in order to bring on the second.

Gov. RANDOLPH. The question now is, which of the two plans is to be preferred. If the vote on the first resolve will determine it, and it is so generally understood he has no objection that it be put. The resolutions from Virginia must have been adopted on the supposition that a federal government was impracticable. And it is said that