of New York city; John Williams, Gilbert Livingston, and Melancthon Smith, the latter called by James Kent, a daily spectator, "a man of metaphysical mind and embarrassing subtleties.' Of all the members of the convention the master of the Grange most feared Smith. The debates were of a high intellectual character, Hamilton and Smith leading in opposition to the opinions of each other.

The convention was in no humor to accept the Constitution without amendments. Governor Clinton was hostile to it even with amendments. It had been adopted under lock and key, and he and others regarded it as giving too much power to the agent of the principals. It suited most of the men who framed it, but was not the expression of the people.

During the last three weeks of the session, news arrived that New Hampshire had ratified the Constitution. That being the ninth State, the old Confederation was ipso facto dissolved, or would be when the first Congress under the new Constitution assembled.

Neither Lansing nor Smith nor Clinton were moved by the ninth ratification. The State of New York had a commanding commercial geography, and although the population was but 340,120, it could remain out of the new union

until a second convention amended the defective Constitution. So thought, also, the majority of the members.

In vain had Hamilton cried out with Cobham, "Oh, save my country, heaven!" In vain had his Scotch tenacity been warmed into compromise by the maternal blood of the creole of St. Nevis.

The express brought a letter to Hamilton from Madison, giving the information that Virginia, the most populous State, with a population of 747,610, had ratified the Constitution. The effect was electrical. Twelve members deserted the anti-Federal party. The Constitution was ratified, June 26th, by three votes-only three votes out of sixty-five. To the end George Clinton was a Roman. He refused to ratify. It is impossible not to admire a man who has the courage of his convictions. The convention adopted Melancthon Smith's resolution that the Constitution be ratified in full confidence that certain powers contained in the instrument should not be exercised until a general convention of the States had been called to propose amendments, and with the reservation, modelled after that of Virginia, in these strikingly explicit words: "We, the delegates of the people of the State of New York, duly elected and met in convention, having maturely considered the Constitution for the

United States of America, agreed to, on the 17th of September, 1787, by the convention then assembled at Philadelphia in the commonwealth of Pennsylvania (a copy whereof precedes these presents), and having also seriously and deliberately considered the present situation of the United States, do declare and make known that all power is originally vested in, and consequently derived from, the people, and that government is instituted by them for their common interests, protection, and security; that the powers of government may be reassumed by the people whenever it becomes necessary to their happiness; that every power, jurisdiction, and right which is not by the said Constitution clearly delegated to the Congress of the United States, or the departments of the government thereof, remains to the people of the several States, or to their respective State governments to whom they may have granted the same." Afterward Rhode Island made the same reservation.

It can scarcely be credited that during the ratification conflict there was a secret movement to divide the State of New York, said to have been approved by Washington and Hamilton. A new State was to have been formed in the southern portion of the State, whose citizens approved ratification, while the rest, if necessary,

were to be coerced into the Union. Hamilton in the convention and elsewhere hinted clearly at the eventuality of the coercion of stubborn States.

Washington signed the Constitution, but expressed to General Lafayette discontent with provisions which did not meet his approbation. The leader of the Revolution desired with Hamilton a stronger government. He did not believe in the capacity of the people for self-government, and thus wrote to Gen. Harry Lee: "It exhibits a melancholy verification of what our trans-Atlantic foes have predicted, and of another thing, to be still more regretted, and is yet more unaccountable, that mankind when left to themselves are unfit for self-goverment."

Can a State be constitutionally coerced?

No.

Hamilton and Madison made an effort to so amend the Articles of Confederation as to coerce a State when a debtor to the Confederation, as was New Hampshire. It signally failed. Edmund Randolph, in his draft of a new Constitution, submitted the following: "That the national legislature ought to be empowered to call forth the force of the Union on a State failing to fulfil its duty thereof." Not a deputy voted for it nor in any wise advocated it. In committee of the whole it fell dead. Madison

was now against coercion. Hamilton was not. Yet he dared not advocate a measure which destroyed free government.

Coercion of a State in peace or war is neither expressed nor implied in the Constitution. Why? Because if the Union was not consent it was tyranny. In fact, there was no implication in enumerated powers.

Was popular opposition to the Constitution widespread?

The Constitution unamended was overwhelmingly opposed by the people of six States: Virginia, North Carolina, New York, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. Deputies in these and other States, some from the best, others from unquestionable motives, were unfaithful to their constituents. The machinery of a government for the United States had been constructed; the rights of the States and the people overlooked.

A second convention for revision might have healed the differences quickly and fully. It might have saved posterity blood, treasure, and partisan and sectional conflict in politics.

Six States ratified unconditionally, namely, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, and Maryland. For some time the