332 BURR— THE TREATY-MAKING POWER [April 20, 



In the debates in the State conventions which ratified the Con- 

 stitution, the same unanimous recognition of existing conditions is 

 manifest. In Connecticut, Oliver Ellsworth said: 



" Another ill consequence of this want of energy is, that treaties are not 

 performed. The treaty of peace with Great Britain was a very favorable 

 one for us. But it did not happen perfectly to please some of the States, and 

 they would not comply with it. The consequence is, Britain charges us with 

 the breach, and refuses to deliver up the forts on our northern quarter.'"" 



In Massachusetts, Samuel Adams rose to say of the Constitution, the 

 adoption of which he had long opposed : 



" Sir, there are many parts of it I esteem as highly valuable, the article 

 which empowers Congress to regulate commerce, to form treaties, etc. For 

 want of this power in our national head, our friends are grieved, and our 

 enemies insult us. Our embassador at the Court of London is considered 

 as a mere cipher, instead of the representative of the United States.""" 



The President of the Virginia Convention spoke as follows: 



" The moment of peace showed the imbecility of the Federal government : 

 Congress was empowered to make war and peace ; a peace they made, giving 

 us the great object independence, and yielding us a territory that exceeded 

 my most sanguine expectations. Unfortunately a single disagreeable clause, 

 not the object of the war, has retarded the performance of the treaty on our 

 part. Congress could only recommend its performance, not enforce it; our 

 last assembly (to their honor be it said) put this on its proper ground — on 

 honorable grounds — it was as much as they ought to have done. This single 

 instance shews the imbecility of the confederation ; the debts contracted by 

 the war were unpaid ; demands were made on congress ; all that congress was 

 able to do, was to make an estimate of debt, and proportion it among the 

 several states ; they sent on the requisitions from time to time, to the states 

 for their respective quotas. These were either complied with partially, or 

 not at all; repeated demands on congress distressed that honorable body; 

 but they were unable to fulfill those engagements which they so earnestly 

 wished. What was the idea of other nations respecting America? What 

 was the idea entertained of us by those nations to whom we were so much 

 indebted? The inefificacy of the general government warranted an idea that 

 we had no government at all.'"" 



The language of Governor Randolph answers these rhetorical 

 questions : 



"We become contemptible in the eyes of foreign nations; they discarded 



"^ Elliott's Debates, Vol. II., Ed. of 1854, P- 189. 

 "^ Elliott's Debates, Vol. I., p. 131. 

 Elliott's Debates, Vol. II., p. 58. 



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