had formed in his enlarged and comprehensive mind the clearest views of the means necessary to meet them, even before the Confederation had been practically tried. A reorganization of the government had engaged the attention of Hamilton, as early as 1780; and, with his characteristic penetration and power, he saw and suggested what should be the remedy.

He entertained the opinion, at this time, as he had always entertained it, that the discretionary powers originally vested in Congress for the safety of the States, and implied in the circumstances and objects of their assembling, were fully competent to the public exigencies. But their practice, from the time of the Declaration of Independence through all the period that preceded the establishment of the Confederation, had accustomed the country to doubts of their original authority, and had at last amounted to a surrender of the ground from which they might have exercised it. No remedy, therefore, remained, applicable to the circumstances, and capable of rescuing the affairs of the country from their deplorable situation, but to vest in Congress, expressly and by a direct grant, the powers necessary to constitute an efficient government and a solid, coercive union. The project then before the country, in the Articles of Confederation, had been designed to accomplish what the revolutionary government had failed to do. But it was manifestly destined to fail in its turn; for it left an uncontrollable sovereignty in the States, capable of defeating the beneficial exercise of the very powers which it undertook to confer upon Congress.

It made the army, not a unit, formed and organized by a central and supreme authority, and looking up to that authority alone, but a collection of several armies, raised by the several States. It gave to the State legislatures the effective power of the purse, by withholding all certain revenues from Congress. It proposed to introduce no method and energy of administration; and without an executive, it left every detail of government to be managed by a deliberative body, whose constitution rendered it fit for none but legislative functions.

Under these circumstances, it was Hamilton's advice, before the Confederation took effect, that Congress should plainly, frankly, and unanimously confess to the States their inability to carry on the contest with Great Britain, without more ample powers than those which they had for some time exercised, or those which they could exercise under the Confederation; and that a convention of all the States be immediately assembled, with full authority to agree upon a different system. He suggested that a complete sovereignty should be vested in Congress, except as to that part of internal police which relates to the rights of property and life among individuals, and to raising money by internal taxes, which he admitted should be regulated by the State legislatures. But in all that relates to war, peace, trade, and finance, he maintained that the sovereignty of Congress should be complete; that it should have the entire management of foreign affairs, and of raising and officering armies and navies; that it

should have the entire regulation of trade, determining with what countries it should be carried on, laying prohibitions and duties, and granting bounties and premiums; that it should have certain perpetual revenues of an internal character, in specific taxes; that it should be authorized to institute admiralty courts, coin money, establish banks, appropriate funds, and make alliances offensive and defensive, and treaties of commerce. He recommended also that Congress should immediately organize executive departments of foreign affairs, war, marine, finance, and trade, with great officers of state at the head of each of them.1

1 These suggestions were made by Hamilton, in a letter of great ability, written in 1780, while he was still in the army, to James Duane, a member of Congress from New York. It was not published until it appeared in his Life, I. 284. At its close, he says: "I am persuaded a solid confederation, a permanent army, a reasonable prospect of subsisting it, would give us treble consideration in Europe, and produce a peace this winter. If a convention is called, the minds of all the States and the people ought to be prepared to receive its determinations by sensible and popular writings, which should conform to the views of Congress. There are epochs in human affairs when novelty is useful. If a general opinion prevails that the old way is bad, whether true or false, and this obstructs or relaxes the

operations of the public service, a change is necessary, if it be but for the sake of change. This is exactly the case now. 'Tis an universal sentiment, that our present system is a bad one, and that things do not go right on this account. The measure of a convention would revive the hopes of the people, and give a new direction to their passions, which may be improved in carrying points of substantial utility. The Eastern States have already pointed out this mode to Congress they ought to take the hint, and anticipate the others." What is here said of the action of the Eastern States probably refers, not to any suggestion of a convention to revise the powers of the general government, but to a convention of committees of the Eastern States, which first assembled at Hartford, and afterwards at Boston, in No

Hamilton's entry into Congress in 1782 marks the commencement of his public efforts to develop the idea of a general government, whose organs should act directly, and without the intervention of any State machinery. He first publicly propounded this idea in the paper which he prepared, as chairman of a committee, to be addressed to the legislature of Rhode Island, in answer to the objections of that State to the revenue system proposed in 1781. One of these objections was, that the plan proposed to introduce into the State officers unknown and unaccountable to the State itself, and therefore that it was against its constitution. From the prevalence of this notion, we may see how difficult it was to create the idea of a national sovereignty, that would consist with the sovereignty of the States, and would work in its appropriate sphere harmoniously with the State institutions, because directed to a different class of objects. The nature of a federal constitution was little understood. It was apparent that the exercise of its powers must affect the internal police of its component members, to some extent; but it was not well understood that political sovereignty is capable of partition, according to the character of its subjects, so that powers of one class may be imparted to a federal, and powers of another class remain in a State

vember, 1779, and in August, 1780, for regulating the prices of commodities. Journals of Congress, V. 406; VI. 271, 331, 392. But the writer may have had in his mind the convention which had just as

I

sembled in Massachusetts to form
the constitution of that State.
am aware of no public proposal, as
early as 1780, of a general conven-
tion to remodel the Confederacy.

'constitution, without destroying the sovereignty of the latter. Hamilton presented this view, and at the same time pointed out, that, unless the constitution of a State expressly prohibited its legislature from granting to the federal government new power to appoint officers for a special purpose, to act within the State itself, it was competent to the legislative authority of the State to communicate such power, just as it was competent to it originally to enter into the Confederation.1