Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v4.djvu/510

494 from South Carolina, had been derived from the circumstance that the person coming within its operation had his bench ruptured or broken up. The bench of whom? Not of the farmer—not of the mechanic—but the bench of the money-dealer, and the bench, or counter, of the merchant. Grant that some persons, not strictly traders, may, at times have been included in the provisions of some laws on the subject of bankruptcies; yet this was where the power of legislation was unlimited—where all legislation, as to all creditors and debtors, was invested in one body. It has but seldom occurred any where, and existed nowhere at the time of this grant of power to Congress.

That laws on the subject of bankruptcies were then deemed commercial only, is further manifest from the fact that when, late in the session of the Convention which framed the Constitution, this clause was introduced, it was coupled with a clause regulating the rate of damages, &c., on bills of exchange. It was well known to our fathers, that, in thirteen distinct sovereignties, the laws as to debtors and creditors were, and must always be, in many respects, very various, to meet their different usages, pursuits, prejudices, and educations; but that the merchants, throughout the confederacy, must carry on their business in other and remote states from those where they resided; and hence, as to their debts, their failures, and their adjustment of their affairs, it might be highly convenient and salutary to have similar rules and laws. In a Constitution, therefore, created, in a great degree, throughout, to benefit commerce, it was natural to confer power to make uniformity, or uniform laws, on a commercial subject.

It was impossible that Congress could, constitutionally, bring farmers and mechanics, by their individual consent, within the provisions of this act, where they would not be compelled to come without consent. It was no question between Congress and those individuals; it was solely a question between the general government and the individual states. He was opposed to this feature of the act; because to pass it would be to bring subjects and citizens within the scope of the general government, never contemplated by our fathers.

The question lay in a very narrow compass. It was, whether Congress had been clothed with power to pass laws regulating the insolvencies of persons not traders, and making their operation upon such persons dependent on their consent. The solution of this question rested mainly on the meaning of the word bankruptcies, as used in the grant of power on this subject, by the states, to the general government, in the 8th section of the 1st article of the Constitution. It thus became a momentous question of state rights, and hence deserved most deliberate consideration.



, March, 1826.

Mr. DICKERSON. If, by our Constitution, the President of the United States was elected to hold his office during good behavior, our government would be, by whatever name it might be called, an elective monarchy, limited in its powers, but with sufficient inherent energy to break down, in time, any barriers that a written constitution could present against the encroachment of arbitrary power. If, under our Constitution, we adopt the practice of electing our Presidents from period to period until the infirmities of age admonish them to retire, our system will soon become that of an elective monarchy. That the want of the limitation