Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v2.djvu/91

.] would enlarge upon this formidable clause; and I most sincerely wish that the effect of their reasoning may be my conviction. For, sir, I will not dishonor my constituents, by supposing that they expect me to resist that which is irresistible—the force of reason. No, sir; my constituents wish for a firm, efficient Continental government, but fear the operation of this which is now proposed. Let them be convinced that their fears are groundless, and I venture to declare in their name, that no town in the commonwealth will sooner approve the form, or be better subjects under it.

Mr. JONES (of Boston) enlarged on the various checks which the Constitution provides, and which, he said, formed a security for liberty, and prevention against power being abused; the frequency of elections of the democratic branch; representation apportioned to numbers; the publication of the journals of Congress, &c. Gentlemen, he said, had compared the people of this country to those of Rome but, he observed, the comparison was very erroneous: the Romans were divided into two classes, the nobility and plebeians; the nobility kept all kinds of knowledge to their own class; and the plebeians were, in general, very ignorant, and when unemployed, in time of peace, were ever ready for revolt, and to follow the dictates of any designing patrician. But, continued the worthy gentleman, the people of the United States are an enlightened, well-informed people, and are, therefore, not easily imposed on by designing men. Our right of representation, concluded Mr. J., is much more just and equitable than the boasted one of Great Britain, whose representatives are chosen by corporations or boroughs, and those boroughs, in general, are the property, or at the disposal, of the nobility and rich gentry of the kingdom.

[The vice-president having informed the Convention, in the forenoon, that he had received a long letter from the Hon. Mr. Gerry, the same was read as soon as the Convention proceeded to business in the afternoon. When the vice-president had read the letter, Mr. Gore rose, and objected to the reading a state of facts respecting the construction of the Senate in the federal Convention, which accompanied the letter; not, he said, "from a wish to preclude information from his own mind, or from the minds of the Convention, but from his duty to his constituents, and the desire he had to guard against infringements on the orders of the