Page:Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution of the United States (1st ed, 1833, vol I).djvu/303

 CH. II.] every state, which were distinctly marked, and which pursued distinct objects with systematic arrangement The one struggled with unabated zeal for the exact observance of public and private engagements. The distresses of individuals were, they thought, to be alleviated by industry and frugality, and not by a relaxation of the laws, or by a sacrifice of the rights of others. They were consequently uniform friends of a regular administration of justice, and of a vigorous course of taxation, which would enable the state to comply with its engagements. By a natural association of ideas, they were also, with very few exceptions, in favour of enlarging the powers of the federal government, and of enabling it to protect the dignity and character of the nation abroad, and its interests at home. The other party marked out for itself a more indulgent course. They were uniformly in favour of relaxing the administration of justice, of affording facilities for the payment of debts, or of suspending their collection, and of remitting taxes. The same course of opinion led them to resist every attempt to transfer from their own hands into those of congress powers, which were by others deemed essential to the preservation of the Union. In many of the states the party last mentioned constituted a decided majority of the people; and in all of them it was very powerful." Such is the language of one of our best historians in treating of the period immediately preceding the formation of the constitution of the United States.

§ 287. Without supposing, that the parties, here alluded to, were in all respects identified with those, of which we have already spoken, as contemporaneous with the confederation, it is easy to perceive, what