Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/422

 debates of the convention existed—It was not until within a few years since when I found the fact known to others through yourself and Mr. Jefferson that I thought it unnecessary to impose on myself the same rigid silence—I should as a member of the community deeply deplore the loss of the paper as it contains proof clear as holy writ that the idol of the Federal party was not a Monarchist in Theory merely, but the open zealous and unreserved advocate for the adoption of the monarchical system in this Country—Your evidence however of the fact will be sufficient with posterity; and that you will find among the originals a paper headed in the way I mention containing his plan of Government as suggested to you I have no doubt—

ⅭⅭⅭⅩⅢ.

Morrisania, February 5th, 1811.

General Hamilton had little share in forming the Constitution. He disliked it, believing all Republican government to be radically defective. …

Those, who formed our Constitution, were not blind to its defects. They believed a monarchial form to be neither solid nor durable. They conceived it to be vigorous or feeble, active or slothful, wise or foolish, mild or cruel, just or unjust, according to the personal character of the Prince. …

Fond, however, as the framers of our national Constitution were of Republican government, they were not so much blinded by their attachment, as not to discern the difficulty, perhaps impracticability, of raising a durable edifice from crumbling materials. History, the parent of political science, had told them, that it was almost as vain to expect permanency from democracy, as to construct a palace on the surface of the sea.

But it would have been foolish to fold their arms, and sink into despondency, because they could neither form nor establish the best of all possible systems. They tell us in their President’s letter of the seventeenth of September, 1787; ‘The Constitution, which we now present, is the result of a spirit of amity, and of that mutual deference and concession, which the peculiarity of our political situation rendered indispensable.’ It is not easy to be wise for all times; not even for the present, much less for the future; and those, who judge of the past, must recollect that when it was present, the present was future.

… It is necessary here to anticipate one of your subsequent