instability of laws, as the most to be guarded against. On the other side there could be little danger. If one man in office will not consent where he ought, every fourth year another can be substituted." Mr. Pinckney "was warmly in opposition to three-fourths, as putting a dangerous power in the hands of a few senators, headed by the President." Mr. Madison said, "When three-fourths was agreed to, the President was to be elected by the Legislature, and for seven years. He is now elected by the people, and for four years. The object of the revisionary power is two-fold-first, to defend the Executive rights; secondly, to prevent popular or factious injustice. It was an important principle, in this and in the State constitutions, to check legislative injustice and encroachments. The experience of the States had demonstrated that their checks are insufficient. We must compare the danger from the weakness of twothirds with the danger from the strength of three-fourths. He thought, on the whole, the former was the greater. As to the difficulty of repeals, it was probable that, in doubtful cases, the policy would soon take place of limiting the duration of laws, so as to require renewal, instead of repeal."

The reconsideration being agreed to, two-thirds was inserted instead of three-fourths, by the following vote: Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, (Mr. McHenry, no,) North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, 6 yeas; Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Virginia, (Col. Mason and Mr. Randolph, yes, and Gen. Washington, Mr. Madison, and Mr. Blair, no,) 4 nays, and New Hampshire, divided. Ibid., 536.

CHAPTER XXXVI.

MODE OF AMENDING THE CONSTITUTION.

ANOTHER great conservative feature, not at all in accordance with the democratic notions of modern reformers, but in entire harmony with the republican system the framers of the Constitution sought to establish, is to be found in the provision for future amendments to the Constitution. The first proposition agreed to was, that "on the application of the Legislatures of two-thirds of the States in the Union, for an amendment of this Constitution, the Legislature of the United States shall call a Convention for that purpose;" but this was afterwards reconsidered, and on motion of Messrs. Madison and Hamilton, was amended so as to read as follows: "The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both houses shall deem necessary, or on the application of two-thirds of the Legislature

of the several States, shall propose amendments to this Constitution, which shall be valid to all intents and purposes as part thereof, when the same shall have been ratified by three-fourths at least of the Legislatures of the several States, or by conventions in three-fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress : Provided, that no amendment which may be made prior to the year 1808, shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of article 1." Ibid., 532.

Subsequently, Mr. Sherman "expressed his fears that three-fourths of the States might be brought to do things fatal to particular States; as abolishing them altogether, or depriving them of their equality in the Senate. He thought it reasonable that the proviso in favor of the States importing slaves should be extended, so as to provide that no State should be affected in its internal police, or deprived of its equality in the Senate." Col. Mason "thought the plan of amending the Constitution exceptionable and dangerous. As the proposing of amendments is in both the modes to depend, in the first immediately, and in the second ultimately, on Congress, no amendments of the proper kind would ever be obtained by the people, if the government should become oppressive, as he verily believed would be the case." Mr. Gouverneur Morris and Mr. Gerry moved to amend the article, so as to require a Convention on application of two-thirds of the States. Mr. Madison "did not see why Congress would not be as much bound to propose amendments applied for by two-thirds of the States, as to call a Convention on the like application. He saw no objection, however, against providing for a Convention for the purpose of amendments, except only that difficulties might arise as to the form, the quorum, &c., which in constitutional regulations ought to be as much as possible avoided." The motion of Gouverneur Morris and Mr. Gerry was agreed to, nem. con. Ibid., 551.

CHAPTER XXXVII.

ADDITIONAL SAFEGUARDS.

VARIOUS other features of the Federal Constitution, and of the State Constitutions then in existence, might be referred to, in further corroboration of the conservative views of our early statesmen, showing that they had no design to establish a pure democratic form of government, and showing also that, though they were the champions of religious as well as civil

liberty, they all acknowledged their dependence on God, and did not deem one of an irreligious character a proper person to be entrusted with important public duties. On this subject, the following extract from an article in the American Review for July, 1849, is to the point:

The pure principles of evangelical Christianity; of which nearly all the primary States made striking recognition, and even insisted upon it, as a condition of eligibility to office, that their servants in political life should do the same. The people required that evidence, along with others, that the men they voted for were honest and would be faithful. Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, seven States of the regularly constituted eleven, were imperative in this, and others went close to the mark. Sects and establishments were out of the question. Christianity in general, the religon of the country's morals, was the thing they wanted. The only doubt is, whether it was possible to make sure of the object in that way. Again, it was specially inserted in numbers of these early Constitutions, that persons selected to administer the government, must be "wise, virtuous, discreet” men, “men of experience," the best that could be found. The same object was in view here as before. And two things are, I think, implied: one, that of all safeguards against abuse, the solid worth of those who were to have the power of committing it, was most to be relied on; the other, that in taking such pains to bring men of great personal fitness and competency into public life, it was intended that they should use the power of their stations according to their own judgment and discretion, undisturbed from any quarter. Persons of such eminent qualities could not be wanted for electoral tools. Thirdly, various oaths were also required to be taken by the officers of the government, especially an oath of fidelity and an oath of allegiance to the State. To which in some cases was added an oath of abjuration, not only as to Great Britain, but as to "every other foreign power whatsoever, political or ecclesiastical."

The religious influences which operated upon the revolutionary patriots, and characterized all their acts, are forcibly portrayed, as well as the dangers to be apprehended from the influx of foreign infidels with which the land is now flooded, in an eloquent address delivered by the Rev. Dr. Tyng, at the anniversary of the American Sunday School Union, in May, 1848, from which the following extracts are made:

"What was it, Mr. Chairman, that led our glorious Revolution to its happy result; which has guarded that result in the confirmation of the happiness and prosperity of the country; that has established us as a people, able to maintain our hold against the thousand evils and wickedness upon every side, working, diverting, distracting and overturning, apparently every influence for good? I answer, sir, beyond all other causes com bined, was the deep and universal acquaintance with the Sacred Scriptures, scattered among the children of a former generation-the training of mind and heart and spirit, by which they were prepared and enabled to understand for what they must contend, and to contend successfully and triumphantly for the rights that they had established. It is not surprising that our Congress, in its very first assembling, should have ordered an edition of the Sacred Scriptures to be imported, I will not say printed. It is not surprising that a spirit like that should have governed in the minds of the men then gathered together; for every man of them had undoubtedly been taught from their very youth-from the beginning of their days-the power of those lively oracles. The land was inhabited by

a people that had gathered in with their mothers' milk the principles and influences of sacred instruction, and had learned from the very earliest period of their days that it is God's truth which makes men free with a liberty above the conflicts of earth. And it was that very spirit which carried them successfully through their early struggles, and it is the remnant of that very spirit which has maintained the republic in its influence and power up to the present time.

"It is wonderful to me when I see the flood of immorality from other lands which is constantly breaking upon our shores, the overwhelming imported infidelity-for the greatest portion of the popular infidelity of this land is of a foreign and imported origin —when I see the anarchy which is bursting in upon us like a flood, and the licentiousness which is casting up its steaming vapor in all parts of the land, it is wonderful that this country has maintained its ground, that every institution of public order and domestic peace and personal liberty has not been swept off the earth before the power of that deluge which it has appeared impossible to resist. Nothing has maintained the country but the abiding influences of the hereditary instruction conferred upon generation after generation by our Christian fathers; influences, sir, buried so deep that all the pickaxes of infidelity have not been able to break them up; influences which have been sent abroa so extensively, and have entered so deeply into the vitals and minds of the people, that no power of evil has been able to eradicate them. It is amazing to me, as alı observer of this country, not that our institutions have occasionally reeled and staggered, and presented the question whether they should stand or not, but that for these sixty years they have been able to stand under the overwhelming flood that has sapped their very foundations. Jesuitism, assuming every shape and form-from the polite dancing master who instructs your daughter, to the teacher of foreign languages who is educating your sons; laying aside the garb of the priestly office, and adopting the unsuspected and fanciful intercourse of common life-has endeavored to undermine public and private virtue and public and private liberty. It is amazing that this land has been able to endure against these stupendous influences which have been setting in upon it. It never would have endured, had not the fathers of the land done what your institution is trying to make the fathers of the present generation do for the generation which is to come.

“When I look, sir, at the amazing power of imported infidelity contained in foreign publications, which are republished here, and made to suit the tastes of our people, tempting them as the intoxicating demon tempts our nation, at the lowest price, it is amazing to me that our nation has not been swept away by a mob, and that it has been practicable for us to maintain ourselves beneath our own roofs, in the secure possession of our rights.

"I maintain, sir, that it has been nothing but the early irradiation of this country with the light of God's word—it has been nothing, sir, but the early salting down of the early population of this land with the savor of Divine knowledge inculcated in the early teachings of the New England fathers, which has preserved our country from being overwhelmed and destroyed.

“I hold it, sir, to be the duty of this republic to stand upon the conservative principles of liberty, which are sustained and upheld by the distinct recognition of the authority of the living God, and allow no new-born fraternity to be brought out upon principles anarchical and disorganizing, not recognizing that the Lord ruleth in the affairs of men. In such circumstances as these, then, are we to take a personal responsibility; and never since the generation that established the independence of "76, has there been a generation in this land over whom such responsibilities were cast—over whom there needed such an incubation of the spirit of the Most High, and around whom there

required such a wall of fire, to protect them from an influence that is attempting, in its power, to consummate their overthrow and prevent their being instruments of good to their fellow-men."

The features of the Constitution, and the views expressed by its framers, thus brought in review, show how different were the aims and purposes of our forefathers, compared with those which foreigners in our midst not only now proclaim as their own, but demand as a right to be carried out. The statesmen of the Revolution knew that liberty was a much-abused term, and that there is no word, as Montesquieu states, which had received more different significations. They knew that a democracy is not necessarily a free State, and were too sagacious not to distinguish the difference between the power of the people and the liberty of the people. They desired to avoid extremes, and, knowing it to be necessary that power should be confined by power to prevent its abuse, they sought to establish a form of government in which there was the least danger of the abuse of power. Hence not a single member expressed himself in favor of measures which are now urged by foreigners, who have not resided long enough in the country to understand the true principles of the government, and who are profoundly ignorant of the difficulties which environed its establishment. "Universal suffrage," nor "the elections of all the officers" of the General Government, were not dreamed of by the framers of the Constitution.

Nor did they suppose it to be any part of their duty to establish "a department of the government for the protection of immigration;" but, on the contrary, the question with them was whether immigrants should be at all admitted to citizenship, and under what restrictions. Nor would such propositions as the abolition of the Sabbath, of prayers in public bodies, and of oaths upon the Bible, have for a moment been countenanced by them; they, on the contrary, as has been shown, were believers in the Bible, and, while they recognized the great principle of religious freedom, and made provision therefor in the Constitution, they nevertheless, in most, if not all the States, insisted upon the recognition of religion as a condition of eligibility to office.