Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/539

 the document actually presented by him to the Convention. That document was no otherwise noticed in the proceedings of the Convention than by a reference of it, with Mr. Randolph’s plan, to a committee of the whole, and afterwards to a committee of detail, with others; and not being found among the papers left with President Washington, and finally deposited in the Department of State, Mr. Adams, charged with the publication of them, obtained from Mr. Pinckney the document in the printed Journals as a copy supplying the place of the missing one. In this there must be error, there being sufficient evidence, even on the face of the Journals, that the copy sent to Mr. Adams could not be the same with the document laid before the Convention. Take, for example, the article constituting the House of Representatives the corner-stone of the fabric, the identity, even verbal, of which, with the adopted Constitution, has attracted so much notice. In the first place, the details and phraseology of the Constitution appear to have been anticipated. In the next place, it appears that within a few days after Mr. Pinckney presented his plan to the Convention, he moved to strike out from the resolution of Mr. Randolph the provision for the election of the House of Representatives by the people, and to refer the choice of that House to the Legislatures of the States, and to this preference it appears he adhered in the subsequent proceedings of the Convention. Other discrepancies will be found in a source also within your reach, in a pamphlet published by Mr. Pinckney soon after the close of the Convention, in which he refers to parts of his plan which are at variance with the document in the printed Journal. A friend who had examined and compared the two documents has pointed out the discrepancies noted below. Discrepancies noted between the plan of Mr. C. Pinckney as furnished by him to Mr. Adams, and the plan presented to the Convention as described in his pamphlet. The pamphlet refers to the following provisions which are not found in the plan furnished to Mr. Adams as forming a part of the plan presented to the Convention: 1. The Executive term of service 7 years. 2. A council of revision. 3. A power to convene and prorogue the Legislature. 4. For the junction or division of States. 5. For enforcing the attendance of members of the Legislature. 6. For securing exclusive right of authors and discoverers. The plan, according to the pamphlet, provided for the appointment of all officers, except judges and ministers, by the Executive, omitting the consent of the Senate required in the plan sent to Mr. Adams. Article numbered 9, according to the pamphlet, refers the decision of disputes between the States to the mode prescribed under the Confederation. Article numbered 7, in the plan sent to Mr. Adams, gives to the senate the regulating of the mode. There is no numerical correspondence between the articles as placed in the plan sent to Mr. Adams, and as noted in the pamphlet, and the latter refers numerically to more than are contained in the former. It is remarkable, that although the plan furnished to Mr. Adams enumerates, with such close resemblance to the language of the Constitution as adopted, the following provisions, and among them the fundamental article relating to the constitution of the House of Representatives, they are unnoticed in his observations on the plan of Government submitted by him to the Convention, while minor provisions, as that enforcing the attendance of members of the Legislature are commented on. I cite the following, though others might be added: 3. To subdue a rebellion in any State on application of its Legislature. 2. To provide such dock-yards and arsenals, and erect such fortifications, as may be necessary for the U. States, and to exercise exclusive jurisdiction therein. 4. To establish post and military roads. 5. To declare the punishment of treason, which shall consist only in levying war against the United States, or any of them, or in adhering to their enemies. No person shall be convicted of treason but by the testimony of two witnesses. 6. No tax shall be laid on articles exported from the States. Not improbably unnoticed, because the plan presented by him to the Convention contained his favourite mode of electing the House of Representatives by the State Legislatures, so essentially different from that of an election by the people, as in the Constitution recommended for adoption. Further
 * 1) Election by the people of the House of Representatives.
 * 2) The Executive veto on the laws. See the succeeding numbers as above.