Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v4.djvu/234

218 to act openly and aboveboard, adding that a contrary conduct, on this occasion, was extremely despicable. He came thither, he said, for the common cause of his country, and he knew no party, but wished the business to be conducted with candor and moderation. The previous question he thought irregular, and that it ought not to be put till the other question was called for; that it was evidently intended to preclude all further debate, and to precipitate the committee upon the resolution which it had been suggested was immediately to follow, which they were not then ready to enter upon; that he had not fully considered the consequences of a conditional ratification, but at present they appeared to him alarmingly dangerous, and perhaps equal to those of an absolute rejection.

Mr. WILLIE JONES observed, that he had not intended to take the house by surprise; that, though he had his motion ready, and had heard of the motion which was intended for ratification, he waited till that motion should be made, and had afterwards waited for some time, in expectation that the gentleman from Halifax, and the gentleman from Edenton, would both speak to it. He had no objection to adjourning, but his motion would be still before the house.

Here there was a great cry for the question.

Mr. IREDELL. [The cry for the question still continuing.] Mr. Chairman, I desire to be heard, notwithstanding the cry of "The question! the question!" Gentlemen have no right to prevent any member from speaking to it, if he thinks fit. [The house subsided into order.] Unimportant as I may be myself, my constituents are as respectable as those of any member in the house. It has, indeed, sir, been my misfortune to be under the necessity of troubling the house much oftener than I wished, owing to a circumstance which I have greatly regretted—that so few gentlemen take a share in our debates, though many are capable of doing so with propriety. I should have spoken to the question at large before, if I had not fully depended on some other gentleman doing it; and therefore I did not prepare myself by taking notes of what was said. However, I beg eave now to make a few observations. I think this Constitution safe. I have not heard a single objection which, in my opinion, showed that it was dangerous. Some particular parts have been objected to, and amendments pointed out.