Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/373

.] up. Why have we been told of the great importance of this valuable right? Every man knows it. No man has a greater regard for it than I have. But what is the question which the honorable gentleman ought to ask himself? Is this right better secured under the present Confederation than the new government? This is the sole question. I beg leave to draw the attention of the committee to this subject. It is objected, by my friend to my left, that two thirds of the Senate present may advise the President to give up this right by a treaty, by which five states may relinquish it. It is provided, in the first article, that a majority of each house shall constitute a quorum to do business; and then, in the second article, that the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall have power to make treaties. What part of the Senate? It adds, "Provided two thirds of the senators concur." What is the inference? That there must be a quorum, and two thirds of the whole must agree. I shall be told, perhaps, that this construction is not natural, not the positive construction of the clause. If the right construction be, that two thirds of a quorum, or ten senators, may, with the President, make a treaty,—to justify the conclusion, that the Mississippi may be given away by five states, two most improbable things must concur: first, that, on the important occasion of treaties, ten senators will neglect to attend; and in the next place, that the senators whose states are most interested in being fully represented, will be those who will fail to attend. I mean those from the Southern States. How natural this supposition is, I refer to the candor of the committee. But we are told that we have every things to fear from the Northern States, because they will prevent an accession of states to the south. The policy of states will sometimes change. This is the case with those states, if, indeed, they were enemies to the right; and therefore, as I am informed by very good authority. Congress has admitted Kentucky, as a state, into the Union. Then the law of nations will secure it to them, as the deprivation of territorial rights is obviously repugnant to that law.

But we are told that we may not trust them, because self-interest will govern them. To that interest I will appeal. You have been told that there was a difference between the states—that they were naturally divided into