Page:Inquiry into the Principles and Policy of the Government of the United States.djvu/121

Rh bestows that also upon his system of kings and lords. And not contented with depriving our policy of these defences, and bestowing them upon a rival policy, to vhich they do not belong, he even robs it of its name, by defining a repub- lick to be only "an equal subjection to law," and transfers that also to monarchy:— Leaving the policy of the United States, without principles, and without a name, by which it may be spoken of, or distinguished from the English system. Is this "a language of Babel," or one calculated to be understood? Is it calculated to furnish ambitious politicians "with false weights," or to come at truth?

In his effort to humour the publick opinion of the United States, in favour of "national sovereignty and representation," Mr. Adams lost sight of that, to prove the existence of "a natural aristocracy." One of these doctrines asserts "that the people are sovereign," or in Mr. Adams's words, " the fountain and original of the power of kings and lords;" the other, "that nature creates an order above and independently of the people." And to complete the confusion arising from thus confounding contradictory principles, Mr. Adams in the last quotation, has arranged kings and governorus, lords and senators, in the class of representatives, and thus after taking from us words, takes away objects also, by which we may know our system of government, from that of king, lords and commons.

If the system of balancing power and properly, contended for by Mr. Adams, would not be exploded by a disingenuous defence; an effort to convince the people of the United States, that their policy is the English system, ought to have no more influence upon the question, than an effort to convince the English nation, that their system was the policy of the United States. Considering such attempts as rather designed to ridicule, than mislead ignorance or prepossession, I will exhibit the essential difference between the two forms of government, in a view, heretofore transiently noticed, and hereafter to be impressed, as occasions occur.