Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/187

 advantages to those who possessed them. That wealth attracts respect and attention; superior strength would cause the weaker and more feeble to be cautious how they offended, and to put up with small injuries rather than to engage in an unequal contest; in like manner, superior understanding would give its possessor many opportunities of profiting at the expense of the more ignorant.

[] Having thus established these principles, with respect to the rights of individuals in a state of nature, and what is due to each, on entering into government, (principles established by every writer on liberty,) they proceeded to show, that States, when once formed, are considered, with respect to each other, as individuals in a state of nature; that, like individuals, each State is considered equally free and equally independent, the one having no right to exercise authority over the other, though more strong, more wealthy, or abounding with more inhabitants. That, when a number of States unite themselves under a federal government, the same principles apply to them, as when a number of individual men unite themselves under a State government. That every argument which shows one man ought not to have more votes than another, because he is wiser, stronger, or wealthier, proves that one State ought not to have more votes than another, because it is stronger, richer, or more populous. And, that by giving one State, or one or two States, more votes than the others, the others thereby are enslaved to such State or States, having the greater number of votes, in the same manner as in the case before put, of individuals, when one has more votes than the others. That the reason why each individual man in forming a State government should have an equal vote, is because each individual, before he enters into government, is equally free and independent. So each State, when States enter into a federal government, are entitled to an equal vote; because, before they entered into such federal government, each State was equally free and equally independent. That adequate representation of men formed into a State government, consists in each man having an equal voice, either personally, or, if by representatives, that he should have an equal voice in choosing the representatives. So, adequate representation of States in a federal government, consists in each State having an equal voice, either in person or by its representative, in every thing which relates to the federal government. That this adequacy of representation is more important in a federal, than in a State government, because the members of a State government, the district of which is not very large, have generally such a common interest, that laws can scarcely be made by one part, oppressive to the others, without their suffering in common; but the different States, composing an extensive federal empire, widely distant one from the other, may