"IV. The supreme Executive authority of the United States to be vested in a Governor, to be elected to serve during good behaviour; the election to be made by Electors chosen by the people in the Election Districts aforesaid. The authorities and functions of the Executive to be as follows: to have a negative on all laws about to be passed, and the execution of all laws passed; to have the direction of war when authorized or begun; to have, with the advice and approbation of the Senate, the power of making all treaties; to have the sole appointment of the heads or chief officers of the Departments of Finance, War, and Foreign Affairs; to have the nomination of all other officers, (ambassadors to foreign nations included,) subject to the approbation or rejection of the Senate; to have the power of pardoning all offences except treason, which he shall not pardon without the approbation of the Senate.

"V. On the death, resignation, or removal of the Governor, his authorities to be exercised by the President of the Senate till a successor be appointed.

"VI. The Senate to have the sole power of declaring war; the power of advising and approving all treaties; the power of approving or rejecting all appointments of officers, except the heads or chiefs of the Departments of Finance, War, and Foreign Affairs.

"VII. The supreme Judicial authority to be vested in Judges, to hold their offices during good behaviour, with adequate and permanent salaries. This court to have original jurisdiction in all causes of capture, and an appellative jurisdiction in all causes in which the

revenues of the General Government, or the citizens of foreign nations, are concerned.

"VIII. The Legislature of the United States to have power to institute courts in each State for the determination of all matters of general concern.

"IX. The Governor, Senators, and all officers of the United States, to be liable to impeachment for mal-, and corrupt conduct; and upon conviction to be removed from office, and disqualified for holding any place of trust or profit; all impeachments to be tried by a Court to consist of the Chief

or Judge of the Superior Court of Law of each State, provided such Judge shall hold his place during good behaviour and have a permanent salary.

"X. All laws of the particular States contrary to the Constitution or laws of the United States to be utterly void; and the better to prevent such laws being passed, the Governor or President of each State shall be appointed by the General Government, and shall have a negative upon the laws about to be passed in the State of which he is the Governor or President.

"XI. No State to have any forces, land or naval; and the militia of all the States to be under the sole and exclusive direction of the United States, the officers of which to be appointed and commissioned by them."

On these several articles he entered into explanatory observations* corresponding with the principles of his introductory reasoning.214

The Committee rose, and the House adjourned.

* The speech introducing the plan, as above taken down and written out, was seen by Mr. HAMILTON, who approved its correctness, with one or two verbal changes, which were made as he suggested. The explanatory observations

TUESDAY, JUNE 19TH.

In Committee of the Whole, on the propositions of Mr. PATTERSON, - The substitute offered yesterday by Mr. DICKINSON being rejected by a vote now taken on it, ― Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, aye, -4; Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, no, -6; Maryland, divided, Mr. PATTERSON'S plan was again at large before the Committee.

Mr. MADISON. Much stress has been laid by some gentlemen on the want of power in the Convention to propose any other than a federal plan. To what had been answered by others, he would only add, that neither of the characteristics attached to a federal plan would support this objection. One characteristic was, that in a federal government the power was exercised not on the people individually, but on the people collectively, on the States. Yet in some instances, as in piracies, captures, &c., the existing Confederacy, and in many instances the amendments to it proposed by Mr. PATTERSON, must operate immediately on individuals. The other characteristic was, that a federal government derived its appointments not immediately from the people, but from

which did not immediately follow, were to have been furnished by Mr. H. who did not find leisure at the time to write them out, and they were not obtained. Judge Yates, in his notes, appears to have consolidated the explanatory with the introductory observations of Mr. HAMILTON (under date of June 19th, a typographical error). It was in the former, Mr. MADISON observed, that Mr. HAMILTON, in speaking of popular governments, however modified, made the remark attributed to him by Judge Yates, that they were "but pork still, with a little change of sauce."

the States which they respectively composed. Here, too, were facts on the other side. In two of the States, Connecticut and Rhode Island, the Delegates to Congress were chosen, not by the Legislatures, but by the people at large; and the plan of Mr. PATTERSON intended no change in this particular.

It had been alleged (by Mr. PATTERSON), that the Confederation, having been formed by unanimous consent, could be dissolved by unanimous consent only. Does this doctrine result from the nature of compacts? Does it arise from any particular stipulation in the Articles of Confederation? If we consider the Federal Union as analogous to the fundamental compact by which individuals compose one society, and which must, in its theoretic origin at least, have been the unanimous act of the component members, it cannot be said that no dissolution of the compact can be effected without unanimous consent. A breach of the fundamental principles of the compact by a part of the society, would certainly absolve the other part from their obligations to it. If the breach of any article by any of the parties, does not set the others at liberty, it is because the contrary is implied in the compact itself, and particularly by that law of it which gives an indefinite authority to the majority to bind the whole, in all cases. This latter circumstance shows, that we are not to consider the Federal Union as analogous to the social compact of individuals: for if it were so, a majority would have a right to bind the rest, and even to form a new Constitution for the whole; which the gentleman from New Jersey

would be among the last to admit. If we consider the Federal Union as analogous, not to the social compacts among individual men, but to the Conventions among individual States, what is the doctrine resulting from these Conventions? Clearly, according to the expositors of the law of nations, that a breach of any one article by any one party, leaves all the other parties at liberty to consider the whole convention as dissolved, unless they choose rather to compel the delinquent party to repair the breach. In some treaties, indeed, it is expressly stipulated, that a violation of particular articles shall not have this consequence, and even that particular articles shall remain in force during war, which is in general understood to dissolve all subsisting treaties. But are there any exceptions of this sort to the Articles of Confederation? So far from it, that there is not even an express stipulation, that force shall be used to compel an offending member of the Union to discharge its duty. He observed, that the violations of the Federal Articles had been numerous and notorious. Among the most notorious was an act of New Jersey herself; by which she expressly refused to comply with a constitutional requisition of Congress, and yielded no further to the expostulations of their Deputies, than barely to rescind her vote of refusal, without passing any positive act of compliance. He did not wish to draw any rigid inferences from these observations. He thought it proper, however, that the true nature of the existing Confederacy should be investigated, and he was not anxious to strengthen the foundations on which it now stands.