Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/195

.] follow from hence that I have forgotten my attachment to my native state? In all local matters I shall be a Virginian: in those of a general nature, I shall not forget that I am an American.

He has called on the house to expose the catalogue of evils which would justify this change of the government. I appeal to gentlemen's candor—has not a most mournful detail been unfolded here?

In the course of the debates, I have heard from those gentlemen who have advocated the new system, an enumeration which drew groans from my very soul, but which did not draw one sigh from the honorable gentleman over the way. Permit me to ask if there be an evil which can visit mankind so injurious and oppressive, in its consequence and operation, as a tender-law? If Pandora's box were on one side of me, and a tender-law on the other, I would rather submit to the box than to the tender-law. The principle, evil as it is, is not so base and pernicious as the application. It breaks down the moral character of your people, robs the widow of her maintenance, and defrauds the orphan of his food. The widow and orphan are reduced to misery, by receiving, in a depreciated value, money which the husband and father had lent out of friendship. This reverses the natural course of things. It robs the industrious of the fruits of their labor, and often enables the idle and rapacious to live in ease and comfort at the expense of the better part of the community.

Was there not another evil but the possibility of continuing such palpable injustice, I would object to the present system. But, sir, I will, out of many more, mention another. How are your domestic creditors situated? I will not go to the general creditors. I mean the military creditor—the man who, by the vices of your system, is urged to part with his money for a trivial consideration—the poor man, who has the paper in his pocket for which he can receive little or nothing. There is a greater number of these meritorious men than the honorable gentleman believes. These unfortunate men are compelled to receive paper instead of gold—paper which nominally represents something, but which in reality represents almost nothing. A proper government could do them justice, but the present one cannot do it. They are therefore forced to part from that paper which they