Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/118

 part of his Government it was considered proper. Are we now less a part of the Federal Government than we were then of the British? Shall we place less confidence in men appointed by ourselves, and subject to our recall, than we did in their executive? I hope not. Whatever views we may have of the importance or retained sovereignty of the States, be assured they are visionary and unfounded, and that their true interests consist in concentring as much as possible, the force and resources of the Union in one superintending Government, where alone they can be exercised with effect. In granting to the Federal Government certain exclusive national powers, you invest all their incidental rights. The term exclusive involves every right or authority necessary to their execution. This revision and negative of the laws is nothing more than giving a farther security to these rights. It is only authorizing Congress to protect the powers you delegate, and prevent any interference or opposition on the part of the States. It is not intended to deprive them of the power of making such laws as shall be confined to the proper objects of State legislation, but it is to prevent their annexing to laws of this kind, provisions which may in their nature interfere with the regulations of the Federal Authority. It will sometimes happen that a general regulation which is beneficial to the Confederacy, may be considered oppressive or injurious by a particular State. In a mixed Government, composed of so many various interests, it will be impossible to frame general systems, operating equally upon all its members. The common benefit must be the criterion, and each State must, in its turn, be obliged to yield some of its advantages. If it was possible, compleatly to draw the distinguishing line, so as to reserve to the States, the Legislative rights they ought to retain, and prevent their exceeding them, I should not object, but it will be found exceedingly difficult; for as I have already observed, leave them only a right to pass an act, without revision or controul, and they will certainly abuse it. The only mode that I can think of, for qualifying it, is to vest a power somewhere, in each State, capable of giving their acts a limited operation, until the sense of Congress can be known. To those who have not sufficiently examined the nature of our Federal System, and the causes of its present weakness and disorders, this curb upon the State Legislatures may perhaps appear an improper attempt to acquire a dangerous and unnecessary power. I am afraid the greater part of our Citizens are of this class, and that there are too few among them, either acquainted with the nature of their own Republic, or with those of the same tendency, which have preceded it. Though our present disorders must be attributed in