Page:Debates in the Several State Conventions, v5.djvu/258

232, particularly within the gift of the legislature. He had witnessed the partiality of such bodies to their own members, as had been remarked of the Virginia Assembly by his colleague, (Col. Mason.) He appealed, however, to him in turn to vouch another fact not less notorious in Virginia,—that the backwardness of the best citizens to engage in the legislative service gave but too great success to unfit characters. The question was not to be viewed on one side only. The advantages and disadvantages on both ought to be fairly compared. The objects to be aimed at were, to fill all offices with the fittest characters, and to draw the wisest and most worthy citizens into the legislative service. If, on one hand, public bodies were partial to their own members, on the other, they were as apt to be misled by taking characters on report, or the authority of patrons and dependents. All who had been concerned in the appointment of strangers, on those recommendations, must be sensible of this truth. Nor would the partialities of such bodies be obviated by disqualifying their own members. Candidates for office would hover round the seat of government, or be found among the residents there, and practise all the means of courting the favor of the members. A great proportion of the appointments made by the states were evidently brought about in this way. In the general government, the evil must be still greater, the characters of distant states being much less known throughout the United States than those of the distant parts of the same state. The elections by Congress had generally turned on men living at the seat of the federal government, or in its neighborhood. As to the next object, the impulse to the legislative service was evinced by experience to be in general too feeble with those best qualified for it. This inconvenience would also be more felt in the national government than in the state governments, as the sacrifices required from the distant members would be much greater, and the pecuniary provisions, probably, more disproportionate. It would therefore be impolitic to add fresh objections to the legislative service by an absolute disqualification of its members. The point in question was, whether this would be an objection with the most capable citizens. Arguing from experience, he concluded that it would. The legislature of Virginia would probably have been without many of its best members, if in that situation they had been ineligible to Congress, to the government, and other honorable offices of the state.

Mr. BUTLER thought characters fit for office would never be unknown.

Col. MASON. If the members of the legislature are disqualified, still the honors of the state will induce those who aspire to them to enter that service, as the field in which they can best display and improve their talents, and lay the train for their subsequent advancement.

Mr. JENIFER remarked, that in Maryland the senators, chosen for five years, could hold no other office; and that this circumstance gained them the greatest confidence of the people.