Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/581

.] codes. They will be obliged to make one code. How will they make one code, without being contradictory to some of the laws of the different states?

It is said there is to be a court of equity. There is no such thing in Pennsylvania, or in some other states in the Union. A nation, in making a law, ought not to make it repugnant to the spirit of the Constitution or the genius of the people. This rule cannot be observed in forming a general code. I wish to know how the people of Connecticut would agree with the lordly pride of your Virginia nobility. Its operation will be as repugnant and contradictory, in this case, as in the establishment of a court of equity. They may inflict punishments where the state governments will give rewards. This is not probable; but still it is possible. It would be a droll sight, to see a man on one side of the street punished for a breach of the federal law, and on the other side another man rewarded by the state legislature for the same act. Or suppose it were the same person that should be thus rewarded and punished at one time for the same act; it would be a droll sight, to see a man laughing on one side of his face, and crying on the other. I wish only to put this matter in a clear point of view; and I think that if thirteen states, different in every thing, shall have to make laws for the government of the whole, they cannot harmonize, or suit the genius of the people; there being no such thing as a spirit of laws, or a pervading principle, applying to every state individually. The only promise, in this respect, is, that there shall be a republican government in each state. But it does not say whether it is to be aristocratical or democratical.

My next objection to the federal judiciary is, that it is not expressed in a definite manner. The jurisdiction of all cases arising under the Constitution and the laws of the Union is of stupendous magnitude.

It is impossible for human nature to trace its extent. It is so vaguely and indefinitely expressed, that its latitude cannot be ascertained. Citizens or subjects of foreign states may sue citizens of the different states in the federal courts. It is extremely impolitic to place foreigners in a better situation than our own citizens. This was never the policy of other nations. It was the policy, in England, to put foreigners on a secure footing. The statute merchant and statute staple were favorable to them. But in no country are the