Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v3.djvu/641

.] appearance without us. Would he advise them to refuse us admission when we profess ourselves friends to the Union, and only solicit them to secure our rights? We do not reject a connection with them. We only declare that we will adopt it, if they will but consent to the security of rights essential to the general happiness.

He told you to confine yourselves to amendments which were indisputably true, as applying to several parts of the system proposed. Did you hear any thing like the admission of the want of such amendments from any one else? I will not insist on any that does not stand on the broad basis of human rights. He says there are forty. I say there is but one half the number, for the bill of rights is but one amendment.

He tells you of the important blessings which he imagines will result to us and mankind in general from the adoption of this system. I see the awful immensity of the dangers with which it is pregnant. I see it. I feel it. I see beings of a higher order anxious concerning our decision. When I see beyond the horizon that bounds human eyes, and look at the final consummation of all human things, and see those intelligent beings which inhabit the ethereal mansions reviewing the political decisions and revolutions which, in the progress of time, will happen in America, and the consequent happiness or misery of mankind, I am led to believe that much of the account, on one side or the other, will depend on what we now decide. Our own happiness alone is not affected by the event. All nations are interested in the determination. We have it in our power to secure the happiness of one half of the human race. Its adoption may involve the misery of the other hemisphere.

[Here a violent storm arose, which put the house in such disorder, that Mr. Henry was obliged to conclude.]

Mr. NICHOLAS proposed that the question should be put at nine o'clock next day.

He was opposed by Mr. CLAY.

Mr. RONALD also opposed the motion, and wished amendments to be prepared by a committee, before the question should be put.

Mr. NICHOLAS contended that the language of the proposed ratification would secure every thing which gentlemen desired, as it declared that all powers vested in the 7953