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XIV

HOW THE FRAMERS OF THE CONSTITUTION TRAVELED

This is an advertisement from a Worcester, Massachusetts, paper. It explains itself.

Stages from Portsmouth in New Hampshire, to Savannah in Georgia :

There is now a line of stages established from New Hampshire to Georgia, which go and return regularly, and carry the several mails, by order and permission of Congress.

The stages from Boston to Hartford in Connecticut set out during the winter season from the house of Levi Pease, at the sign of the New York Stage, opposite the Mall, in Boston, every Monday and Thursday morning, precisely at 5 o'clock, go as far as Worcester on the evenings of those days, and on the days following proceed to Palmer, and on the third day reach Hartford; the first stage reaches the city of New York on Saturday evening following.

The stages from New York for Boston set out on the same days, and reach Hartford at the same time as the Boston stages.

The stages from Boston exchange passengers with the stages from Hartford at Spencer, and the Hartford stages exchange with those from New York at Hartford. Passengers are again exchanged at Stratford ferry, and not again until their arrival in New York.

By the present regulation of the stages it is certainly the most convenient and expeditious way of traveling that can possibly be had in America, and in order to make it the cheapest, the proprietors of the stages have lowered their prices from four pence to three pence a mile, with liberty to passengers to carry fourteen pounds baggage.

In the summer season the stages are to run with the

mail three times in a week instead of twice, as in the winter, by which means those who take passage at Boston, in the stage which sets off on Monday morning, may arrive at New York on the Thursday evening following, and all the mails during that season are to be but four days going from Boston to New York, and so from New York to Boston.

Those who intend taking passage in the stages must leave their names and baggage the evening preceding the morning that the stage sets off, at the several places where the stages put up, and pay one half of their passage to the place where the first exchange of passengers is made, if bound so far, and if not, one half of their passage so far as they are bound.

N. B. Way passengers will be accommodated when the stages are not full at the same rate, viz., 3 pence only per mile.

Said Pease keeps good lodging, etc., for gentlemen travelers, and stabling for horses.

Boston, January 2, 1786.- Massachusetts Spy, or the Worcester Gazette, January 5, 1786. Ad. reprinted in. A Century of Population Growth, Bureau of the Census, 1909, p. 22.

QUESTIONS

How many days did it require to travel from Boston to New York by stage? How much did it cost? What baggage were passengers permitted to carry?

XV

HOW THE DEFECTS OF THE FEDERAL UNION

MAY BE REMEDIED

We have in this selection portions of No. 15 of the Federalist, a number written by Alexander Hamilton. The Federalist is made up of a series of essays written in support of the Constitution, and published in various New York newspapers, while the Constitution was before the States for adoption or rejection.

John Jay wrote five of the essays; the rest were written by James Madison and Hamilton. They were prepared in accord with a carefully devised plan; they disclose an astonishing grasp of the principles of government and of human society; and they present, in a clear and simple style, the scope, meaning, and character of the Constitution. Though written for immediate political effect, they continue to constitute a commentary on the Constitution of immense value.

The extract here given considers the anarchy and confusion that prevailed under the Articles of Confederation, and traces it to defects in the government of the United States. The conclusion is that there can be no national government in the United States unless that government has the right to exercise control not on State governments but over the persons of individual citizens.

We may, indeed, with propriety be said to have reached almost the last stage of National humiliation. There is scarcely anything that can wound the pride or degrade the character of an independent nation, which we do not experience. Are there engagements, to the performance of which we are held by every tie respectable among men? These are the subjects of constant and unblushing violation. Do we owe debts to foreigners and to our own citizens, contracted in a time of imminent peril, for the preservation of our political existence? These remain without any proper or satisfactory provision for their discharge. Have we valuable territories and important posts in the possession of a foreign power, which, by express stipulations, ought long since to have been surrendered? These are still retained, to the prejudice of our interest not less than of our rights. Are we in a condition to resent or to repel the aggression? We have neither troops, nor treasury, nor government. Are we even in a condition to remonstrate with dignity? The just imputations on our own faith in respect to the same treaty ought first to be removed. Are we entitled, by nature and compact, to a free participation in the navigation of the Mississippi? Spain excludes us from it. Is public credit an indispens

able resource in time of public danger? We seem to have abandoned its cause as desperate and irretrievable. Is commerce of importance to national wealth? Ours is at the lowest point of declension. Is respectability in the eyes of foreign powers a safeguard against foreign encroachments? The imbecility of our Government even forbids them to treat with us: our ambassadors abroad are the mere pageants of mimic sovereignty. Is a violent and unnatural decrease in the value of land, a symptom of National distress? The price of improved land, in most parts of the country, is much lower than can be accounted for by the quantity of waste land at market, and can only be fully explained by that want of private and public confidence, which are so alarmingly prevalent among all ranks, and which have a direct tendency to depreciate property of every kind. Is private credit the friend and patron of industry? That most useful kind which relates to borrowing and lending is reduced within the narrowest limits, and this still more from an opinion of insecurity than from the scarcity of money. To shorten an enumeration of particulars which can afford neither pleasure nor instruction, it may in general be demanded, what indication is there of National disorder, poverty, and insignificance, that would befall a community so peculiarly blessed with natural advantages, as we are, which does not form a part of the dark catalogue of our public misfortunes?

This is the melancholy situation, to which we have been brought by those very maxims and councils, which would now deter us from adopting the proposed Constitution; and which, not content with having conducted us to the brink of a precipice, seem resolved to plunge us into the abyss that awaits us below. Here, my countrymen, impelled by every motive that ought to influence an enlightened people, let us make a firm stand for our safety, our tranquillity, our dignity, our reputation. Let us at last break the fatal charm which has too long seduced us from the paths of felicity and prosperity.

It is true, as has been before observed, that facts, too stubborn to be resisted, have produced a species of general assent to the abstract proposition, that there exist material defects in our National system; but the usefulness of the concession, on the part of the old adversaries of Federal measures, is destroyed by a strenuous opposition to a remedy, upon the only principles that can give it a chance of success. While they admit that the Government of the United States is destitute of energy, they contend against conferring upon it those powers which are requisite to supply that energy. They seem still to aim at things repugnant and irreconcilable; at an augmentation of Federal authority, without a diminution of State authority; at sovereignty in the Union, and complete independence in the members. . . . This renders a full display of the principal defects of the Confederation necessary, in order to show, that the evils we experience do not proceed from minute or partial imperfections, but from fundamental errors in the structure of the building, which cannot be amended otherwise than by an alteration of the first principles and main pillars of the fabric.

The great and radical vice in the construction of the existing Confederation, is in the principle of legislation for States or Governments, in their corporate or collective capacities, and as contradistinguished from the individuals of which they consist. Though this principle does not run through all the powers delegated to the Union, yet it pervades and governs those on which the efficacy of the rest depends. Except as to the rule of apportionment, the United States have an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money; but they have no authority to raise either, by regulations extending to the individual citizens of America. The consequence of this is that, though in theory their resolutions concerning those objects are laws, constitutionally binding on the members of the Union, yet in practice they are mere recommendations, which the States observe or disregard at their option. . .

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