Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v4.djvu/504

488 is thus prostrated. The system is not extended, but is, in principle, destroyed; for thus does this increase open an avenue to a radical change in the highest functions of one great department of our government, and a department, too, of all others the most endangered by any change, because, in its very nature, designed for permanency, independence, and firmness, amidst those tempests which at times convulse most of the elements of society.

Gentlemen must perceive that I speak only of the general tendency and alarming character of such an increase, without reference to the motives which have now recommended it. They are doubtless pure. But its propriety is to be tried by the reasons for it, and not by motives. * * *

If this system is to be extended to the six new states, because most excellent, without regard to the effect of such an extension on the Supreme Court itself, and without regard to population or expense, then why not extend it to every part of the Union now destitute of it? When gentlemen talk of equality and broad American grounds,—when they, with indignation and justice, disdain sectional views and favoritism,—why create new circuits for the people in these new states, and not, at the same time, create them for more than three times as many people, now destitute of such circuits, in Western New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia? For, if the circuit system of itself be superior, and therefore, without regard to other circumstances, is to be extended to the west and south-west, for the safety and advantage of about half a million of people now destitute, then, surely, a million and a half of people, in the three great Atlantic states, are equally entitled to its security and blessings.



, May, 1826.

Mr. VAN BUREN said, the subject of the public lands was becoming daily more and more interesting, and would occupy much time in legislation. It extended the patronage of the government over the states in which they were situated to a great extent; it subjected them to an unwise and unprofitable dependence on the federal government. * * * No man could render the country a greater service than he who should devise some plan by which the United States might be relieved from the ownership of this property, by some equitable mode. He would vote for a proposition to vest the lands in the states in which they stood, on some just and equitable terms, as related to the other states in the confederacy. He hoped that, after having full information on the subject, they would be able to effect that great object. He believed that, if those lands were disposed of at once to the several states, it would be satisfactory to all.



, 1826.

Mr. VAN BUREN. Under the Articles of Confederation, the representation of each state in the general government was equal. The Union was in all respects purely federal, a league of sovereign states upon equal terms. To remedy certain defects, by supplying certain powers, the Convention which framed the present Constitution was called. That Convention, it is now well known, was immediately divided into parties, on the interesting question of the extent of power to be given to the new