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EDITED BY DAGOBERT D. RUNES
PHILOSOPHICAL LIBRARY
NEW YORK
COPYRIGHT, 1947, BY
THE PHILOSOPHICAL LIBRARY, INC.
15 East 40th Street
New York 16, N. Y.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
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ORIGINAL AT THE AMERICAN PHILOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, IN PHILADELPHIA.
EDITOR'S PREFACE
U!F A GREAT MAN DIES, there is a hole in the world." Time may do much to fill that hole; on the two hundredth anniversary of the birth of Benjamin Rush, for example, few memorials echoed his name in this great land. Yet few were as fiery as he, or more influential, in the vehemence of protest that brought this country into being; and few held the standards of its early learning and culture as high as he held them.
Only Thomas Paine — a close friend — could match Benjamin Rush in uncompromising revolutionary spirit. Rush, incidentally, suggested the title for Paine's historic pamphlet, "Common Sense." * Together, they ploughed the field for revolution in Colonial America. And only Benjamin Franklin, in the young United States, had the humane versatility, the many-sided in- terests, the wide learning, of Benjamin Rush.
The interests of Dr. Rush were varied, but their direction was unwaveringly toward the betterment of mankind. His scientific and medical investigations, as well as his social studies and en- deavors, were interfused with deeply religious and ethical feeling. In science and medicine, he sought along the frontiers of knowl- edge. In the quest for social and political justice, he fought on the side of the weak. [Alexander Hamilton blocked his appointment to the medical faculty of Columbia College, on the ground of his "too radical beliefs."]
He was considered by many the great physician of his coun- try and time. Perhaps he was not. Medicine, in his day, was still groping in the dark. The bacterial nature of diseases was as yet unknown; as yet undiscovered was the application of anaesthesia, the door to surgery.
Yet Benjamin Rush was the first in America to employ oc-
* See frontispiece (facsimile of Diary).
vi EDITOR'S PREFACE
cupational therapy in the treatment of mental ills, and to en- courage— anticipating modern methods — analytical conversation 'with the patient.
There can be no doubt as to the depth of Rush's burning patriotism, his hatred of the British oppression, of all tyranny. His signature on the Declaration of Independence was by no means a merely formal one. It signified not only his people's fight against British domination, but his continuing resolve to battle tyranny, intolerance, and suppression in his native America.
Benjamin Rush's pamphlets, articles, letters, and speeches mount into the thousands. He pleaded for the abolition of slavery. He urged the removal of the death penalty. He argued for the amelioration of the lot of civil prisoners, who, often jailed for no worse crime than debt, were sent to labor in city-streets chained down with heavy iron balls. He advocated the establishment of special hospitals for the insane, then confined in vermin-infested stables, at the mercy of ignorant and brutal guards. There was no current cause worthy of support that did not benefit from the warm heart, the outstretched hand, and the uplifted voice of Benjamin Rush.
It was inevitable that so staunch a fighter should rally around him many friends and supporters, but also unite against him many who preferred or profited by the status quo. Conscious of the great opportunities of the new country, Rush was equally aware of its failings and insufficiencies. In his national pride and his forthright directness, he became the conscience of the new-born republic.
Even before the birth of the new nation, during the events that led up to and that marked the American Revolution, this keen conscience of Benjamin Rush was a goad to his fellows. It must be remembered that a considerable body of business men and of politicians was at first entirely opposed to a War for Inde- pendence, and during the War clamored for a policy of appease- ment. In this struggle Benjamin Rush, along with his friend, Thomas Paine, was enlisted in the determined left. So strong were his political integrity and fervor, so rigid his devotion to the principles of political and social democracy, that he came into
EDITOR'S PREFACE vii
conflict with a number of the leaders of the day. Even George Washington — who, incidentally, Thomas Paine complained, de- serted him during his imprisonment at the time of the French Revolution — was brought into opposition by Rush's refusal to grant the merest iota of compromise. Such men as he, holding steadfast to the ideal, point to the peaks toward which civilization must painfully and tardily climb. In later years, Rush removed from his papers most of the references to these conflicts. We may never resolve some of the controversies of their mystery; but we may be confident that Benjamin Rush, though not always prac- tical, was always in the right.
Benjamin Rush was born on December 24, 1745, on his father's farm north of Philadelphia. At an early age he was sent to the Academy of his uncle, the Rev. Samuel Finley. Here he imbibed a deeply religious spirit. In 1759, he entered Princeton College, receiving the bachelor's degree before he had reached the age of fifteen.
For the next six years, he devoted himself to the study of medicine, under the direction of Dr. Redman of Philadelphia. He then enrolled at the University of Edinburgh where, in 1768, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
After his graduation, following a brief trip to France, Benja- min Rush returned to Philadelphia. In 1769 he was appointed Professor of Chemistry in the College of Philadelphia, the first medical school in America. When, in 1791, the College was ex- panded into a University, Rush was appointed Professor of the Institutes and Practices of Medicine.
In the meantime had come the struggle for independence, upon which Benjamin Rush embarked with equal energy and de- votion. He was a member of the Revolutionary Congress, which in 1776 passed the Declaration of Independence. He served in the War as Military Surgeon. Having little taste for routine politics or for professional politicians, Rush later sought to withdraw from political activity. In 1799, however, President Adams hon-
viii EDITOR'S PREFACE
ored him with the appointment as Treasurer of the National Mint. He held this office for his remaining fourteen years.
The medical and social concerns of Benjamin Rush had never lapsed. One of his basic characteristics as teacher and physician was his deep-set conviction that medical science was in its in- fancy. Although the great bacteriological discoveries in medicine did not bring their far-reaching changes until two generations later, Rush was outstanding for his rejection of medical ortho- doxy, for his emphasis on continuing sober research. His self- denial and personal fortitude during the Philadelphia yellow fever epidemic of 1795 belong to the annals of medical heroism.
Benjamin Rush was an indefatigable student of natural sci- ence. He was rarely without a book in hand. Even at mealtimes, he was in one way or another preoccupied with sttidy, research, or practice. In truly Socratic manner, he interrogated persons in all stations of life, and he frequently declared that he had received valuable information from laymen, quacks, even madmen. "The student," he said, "should always, like a plant, be in an absorbing state. Even his dreams should not be permitted to sport them- selves idly in his brain."
The writings of Rush show a wide range of interest and knowledge, embracing agriculture and the mechanical arts, chem- istry and medicine, political science and theology. Numerous art the letters and articles he wrote, anonymously as well as und^r his own name, in his constant endeavor to dispel prejudice, to fight oppression, to elevate the lot of the lowly.
Rush was continually active in the support of institutions and organizations for the advancement of human learning. Not only was he instrumental in establishing colleges and other schools of higher learning in his own state of Pennsylvania, but he advocated establishment of free public schools in every town- ship, in order to create unified systems of state education. He wanted his beloved American Republic to grow into one great and enlightened family.
In the field of public welfare, Rush was the founder of the Philadelphia Dispensary, the first institution of its kind in the
EDITOR'S PREFACE ix
United States. He also made searching examinations of the meth- ods of punishment of criminals. He protested against the vicious- ness of a penal law that chained convicts to wheelbarrows, dragging them through public streets on road jobs, dressed in conspicuous convict clothes, with shaven heads as a symbol of infamy. He vehemently maintained that such a system tended only to harden the criminals, not to improve them. In this field of penology, too, Rush was one of America's earliest reformers. Benjamin Rush's lifework in the social and scientific fields places him clearly at the head of the early American fighters for a more wholesome, a more secure, a happier way of living. He stands also among the early patriots who with clear eye and un- flagging zeal saw, and worked to achieve, the goals of human freedom. He himself sums up this aspect of his being: "My read- ing, observations, and reflections have tended more and more to show the absurdity of hereditary power and to prove that no form of government can be rational, but that which is derived from the suffrages of the people who are the subjects of it."
CONTENTS
PAGE
EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION v
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT
ON SLAVE-KEEPING [1773] 3 A PLAN OF A PEACE-OFFICE FOR THE UNITED STATES
[1799] 19 ON HELPING THE AFRICANS [date UllknOWll] 24 ON THE DEFECTS OF THE CONFEDERATION [1787] 2 6 ON SECURITIES FOR LIBERTY [1792] 32 ON PUNISHING MURDER BY DEATH [1792] 35 OBSERVATIONS ON THE GOVERNMENT OF PENN- SYLVANIA [1777] 54
ON EDUCATION
OF THE MODE OF EDUCATION PROPER IN A REPUBLIC
[I798] 87
EDUCATION AGREEABLE TO A REPUBLICAN FORM OF
GOVERNMENT [1786] 97
PLAN OF A FEDERAL UNIVERSITY [1788] I O I
THE AMUSEMENTS AND PUNISHMENTS WHICH ARE
PROPER FOR SCHOOLS [1790] IO6
THE BIBLE AS A SCHOOL BOOK [1791] 117
ON NATURAL AND MEDICAL SCIENCES
LECTURES ON ANIMAL LIFE [1799] 133
THE INFLUENCE OF PHYSICAL CAUSES UPON THE
MORAL FACULTY [1786] 1 8 1
zi
xii CONTENTS
PAGE
ON THE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF MANIA [date UllkllOWnJ 212
ON THE DIFFERENT SPECIES OF PHOBIA [date UnkllOWll] 22O
THE PROGRESS OF MEDICINE [l8oi] 2 27
OBSERVATIONS AND REASONING IN MEDICINE [1791] 245 MEDICINE AMONG THE INDIANS OF NORTH AMERICA
[1774] M4
THE VICES AND VIRTUES OF PHYSICIANS [l8oi] 293
DUTIES OF A PHYSICIAN [1789] 308
ON MISCELLANEOUS THINGS
INFLUENCE OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION [1789] 325
THE EFFECTS OF ARDENT SPIRITS UPON MAN [1805] 334
ON OLD AGE [1789] 342
SERMON ON EXERCISE [1772] 358
ON MANNERS [1769] 373
DIRECTIONS FOR CONDUCTING A NEWSPAPER [1788] 396
THE BENEFITS OF CHARITY [1788] 399
THE YELLOW FEVER [1792] 404
APPENDIX
LIST OF WRITINGS PUBLISHED DURING LIFETIME 419
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 423
INDEX 425
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT
ON SLAVE-KEEPING
So MUCH hath been said upon the subject of Slave-keeping, that an apology may be required for this paper. The only one I shall off er is, that the evil still continues. This may in part be owing to the great attachment we have to our own interest, and in part to the subject not being fully exhausted. The design of the fol- lowing paper is to sum up the leading arguments against it, sev- eral of which have not been urged by any of those authors who have written upon it.
Without entering into the history of the facts which relate to the slave-trade, I shall proceed immediately to combat the principal arguments which are used to support it.
And here I need hardly say any thing in favor of the Intellects of the Negroes, or of their capacities for virtue and happiness, although these have been supposed by some to be inferior to those of the inhabitants of Europe. The accounts which travellers give us of their ingenuity, humanity, and strong attachment to their parents, relations, friends and country, show us that they are equal to the Europeans, when we allow for the diversity of temper and genius which is occasioned by climate. We have many well attested anecdotes of as sublime and disinterested virtue among them as ever adorned a Roman or a Christian char- acter.* But we are to distinguish between an African in his own
* See SPECTATOR, Vol. I. No. 1 1 .
There is now in the town of Boston a Free Negro Girl, about 18 years of age, who has been but 9 years in the country, whose singular genius and accomplishments are such as not only do honor to her sex, but to human nature. Several of her poems have been printed, and read with pleasure by the public.
3
4 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
country, and an African in a state of slavery in America. Slavery is so foreign to the human mind, that the moral faculties, as well as those of the understanding are debased, 'and rendered torpid by it. All the vices which are charged upon the Negroes in the southern colonies and the West-Indies, such as Idleness, Treach- ery, Theft, and the like, are the genuine offspring of slavery, and serve as an argument to prove that they were not intended, by Providence for it.
Nor let it be said, in the present Age, that their black color (as it is commonly called), either subjects them to, or qualifies them for slavery.* The vulgar notion of their being descended from Cain, who was supposed to have been marked with this color, is too absurd to need a refutation. — Without enquiring into the Cause of this blackness, I shall only add upon this sub- ject, that so far from being a curse, it subjects the Negroes to no inconveniencies, but on the contrary qualifies them for that part of the Globe in which providence has placed them. The ravages of heat, diseases and time, appear less in their faces than in a white one; and when we exclude variety of color from our ideas of
* Montesquieu, in his Spirit of Laws, treats this argument with the ridicule it deserves.
"Were I to vindicate our right to make slaves of the Negroes, these should be my arguments.
The Europeans having extirpated the American Indians, were obliged to make slaves of the Africans, for clearing such vast tracts of land.
Sugar would be too dear, if the plants which produce it were culti- vated by any other than slaves.
These creatures are all over black, and with such a flat nose, that they can scarcely be pitied.
It is hardly to be believed that God, who is a wise being, should place a soul, especially a good soul, in such a black ugly body.
The Negroes prefer a glass necklace to that gold, which polite nations so highly value: can there be a greater proof of their wanting common sense.
It is impossible for us to suppose these creatures to be men, because, allowing them to be men, a suspicion would follow, that we ourselves are not Christians."
BOOK xv. CHAP. v.
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 5
Beauty, they may be said to possess every thing necessary to constitute it in common with the white people.f
It has been urged by the inhabitants of the Sugar Islands and South Carolina, that it would be impossible to carry on the manu- factories of Sugar, Rice, and Indigo, without Negro slaves. No manufactory can ever be of consequence enough to society, to admit the least violation of the laws of justice or humanity. But I am far from thinking the arguments used in favor of employ- ing Negroes for the cultivation of these articles, should have any weight.
M. Le Poivre, late envoy from the king of France, to the king of Cochin-China, and now intendant of the isles of Bour- bon and Mauritius, in his observations upon the manners and arts of the various nations in Africa and Asia, speaking of the culture of sugar in Cochin-China, has the following remarks — "It is worthy observation too, that the sugar cane is there cultivated by freemen, and all the process of preparation and refining, the work of free hands. Compare then the price of the Cochin- Chinese production with the same commodity which is culti- vated and prepared by the wretched slaves of our European colonies, and judge if, to procure sugar from our colonies, it was necessary to authorize by law the slavery of the unhappy Africans transported to America. From what I have observed at Cochin-China, I cannot entertain a doubt, but that our West- India colonies, had they been distributed without reservation amongst a free people, would have produced double the quan- tity that it now procured from the labor of the unfortunate Negroes.
What advantage, then, has accrued to Europe, civilized as it is, and thoroughly versed in the laws of nature, and the rights
t "Quamvis ille niger, quamvis tu candidus esses.
Nimium ne crede colori.
Alba Ligustra cadunt; Vaccinia nigra leguntur."
VIRGIL.
"I am black, but comely"
SONG OF SOLOMON.
6 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
of mankind, by legally authorizing in our colonies, the daily outrages against human nature, permitting them to debase man almost below the level of the beasts of the field? These slavish laws have proved as opposite to its interest, as they are to its honor, and to the laws of humanity. This remark I have often made.
Liberty and property form the basis of abundance, and good agriculture: I never observed it to flourish where those rights of mankind were not firmly established. The earth which mul- tiplies her productions with a kind of profusion, under the hands of the free-born laborer seems to shrink into barrenness under the sweat of the slave. Such is the will of the great Author of our Nature, who has created man free, and assigned to him the earth, that he might cultivate his possession witji the sweat of his brow; but still should enjoy his Liberty.
Now if the plantations in the islands and the southern colo- nies were more limited, and freemen only employed in working them, the general product would be greater, although the profits to individuals would be less, — a circumstance this, which by diminishing opulence in a few, would suppress luxury and vice, and promote that equal distribution of property, which appears
best calculated to promote the welfare of society. * I know
it has been said by some, that none but the natives of warm climates could undergo the excessive heat and labor of the West- India islands. But this argument is founded upon an error; for the reverse of this is true. I have been informed by good author- ity, that one European who escapes the first or second year,
* From this account of Le Poivre's, we may learn the futility of the argument, that the number of vessels in the sugar trade, serve as a nursery for seamen, and that the Negroes consume a large quantity of the manu- factures of Great Britain. If freemen only were employed in the islands, a double quantity of sugar would be made, and of course twice the num- ber of vessels and seamen would be made use of in the trade. One freeman consumes yearly four times the quantity of British goods that a Negro does. Slaves multiply in all countries slowly. Freemen multiply in pro- portion as slavery is discouraged. It is to be hoped therefore that motives of policy will at last induce Britons to give up a trade, which those of justice and humanity cannot prevail upon them to relinquish.
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 7
will do twice the work, and live twice the number of years that an ordinary Negro will do: nor need we be surprised at this, when we hear that such is the natural fertility of the soil, and so numerous the spontaneous fruits of the earth in the interior parts of Africa, that the natives live in plenty at the expence of little or no labor, which, in warm climates, has ever been found to be incompatible with long life and happiness. Future ages, therefore, when they read the accounts of the Slave Trade
( — if they do not regard them as fabulous) will be at a loss
which to condemn most, our folly or our guilt, in abetting this direct violation of the laws of nature and religion.
But there are some who have gone so far as to say that slavery is not repugnant to the genius of Christianity, and that it is not forbidden in any part of the Scriptures. Natural and revealed Religion always speak the same things, although the latter delivers its precepts with a louder, and more distinct voice than the former. If it could be proved that no testimony was to be found in the Bible against a practice so pregnant with evils of the most destructive tendency to society, it would be suffi- cient to overthrow its divine original. We read it is true of Abraham's having slaves born in his house; and we have reason to believe, that part of the riches of the patriarchs consisted in them: but we can no more infer the lawfulness of the practice, from the short account which the Jewish historian gives us of these facts, than we can vindicate telling a lie, because Rahab is not condemned for it in the account which is given of her deceiving the king of Jericho.* We read that some of the same
*3 And the king of Jericho sent unto Rahab, saying, Bring forth the men that are come to thee, which are entered into thine house: for they be come to search out all the country.
4 And the woman took the two men, and hid them, and said thus, There came men unto me, but I wist not whence they 'were.
5 And it came to pass about the time of shutting of the gate, when it was dark, that the men went out: whither the men went, I wot not: pursue after them quickly, for ye shall overtake them.
6 But she brought them up to the roof of the house, and hid them with the stalks of flax, which sne had laid in order upon the roof.
JOSHUA, Chap. II.
8 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
men indulged themselves in a plurality of wives, without any strictures being made upon their conduct for it; and yet no one will pretend to say, that this is not forbidden in many parts of the Old Testament. f But we are told the Jews kept the heathens in perpetual bondage.J The design of providence in permitting this evil, was probably to prevent the Jews from marrying among strangers, to which their intercourse with them upon any other footing than that of slaves, would naturally have inclined them.* Had this taken place — their Natural Religion would have been corrupted — they would have contracted all their vices,** and the intention of providence in keeping them a distinct people, in order to accomplish the promise made to Abraham, that "in his Seed all the Nations of the earth should be blessed," would have been defeated; so that the descent of the MESSIAH from ABRA- HAM, could not have been traced, and the divine commission of the Son of God, would have wanted one of its most powerful arguments to support it. But with regard to their own country- men, it is plain, perpetual slavery was not tolerated. Hence, at the end of seven years or in the year of the jubilee, all the
fProv. v. 18, 19, 20.
JLevit. xxv. 44, 45, 46.
* That marriage with strangers was looked upon as a crime among the Jews, we learn from Ezra ix. i to 6, also from the whole of Chapter x. ** May not this be the reason why swine's flesh was forbidden to the Jews, lest they should be tempted to eat with their heathen neighbours, who used it in diet? This appears more probable than the opinion of Doctor MEAD, who supposes that it has a physical tendency to produce the leprosy; or that of VOLTAIRE, who asserts that the Jews learned to abstain from this flesh from the Egyptians, who valued the Hog almost to a degree of idolatry for its great usefulness in rooting up the Ground. What makes this conjecture the more probable is, that the Jews abstained from several other kinds of flesh used by their heathen neighbours, which have never been accused of bringing on diseases of the skin, and which were used constantly in diet by the Egyptians. The account which Taci- tus gives of the diet and custom of the Jews, is directly to our purpose —
"Bos quoque immolantur, quern JEgyptii apin colunt. ^gyptii ple- raque animalia, Effigiesque compositas venerantur; Judaei mente sola, unumque numen intelligunt, Separati Epulis, discreti Cubilibus, Aliena- rum Concubitu Abstinent."
HISTOR. LIB. V.
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 9
Hebrew slaves were set at liberty,* and it was held unlawful to detain them in servitude longer than that time, except by their own consent.f But if, in the partial revelation which GOD made, of his will to the Jews, we find such testimonies against slavery, what may we not expect from the Gospel, the design of which was to abolish all distinctions of name and country. While the Jews thought they complied with the precepts of the law, in confining the love of their neighbour "to the children of tjieir own people," Christ commands us to look upon all mankind even our enemies J as our neighbours and brethren, and "in all things, to do unto them whatever we would wish they should do unto us.'' He tells us further that his "Kingdom is not of this World," and therefore constantly avoids saying any thing that might interfere directly with the Roman or Jewish governments: so that altho' he does not call upon masters to emancipate their slaves, or upon slaves to assert that liberty wherewith God and nature had made them free, yet there is scarcely a parable or a sermon in the whole history of his life, but what contains the strongest arguments against slavery. Every prohibition of cov- etousness — intemperance — pride — uncleanness — theft — and mur- der, which he delivered, — every lesson of meekness, humility, forbearance, charity, self-denial, and brotherly-love which he taugh't, are levelled against this evil; — for slavery, while it in- cludes all the former vices, necessarily excludes the practice of all the latter virtues, both from the master and the slave. — Let such, therefore, who vindicate the traffic of buying and selling souls, seek some modern system of religion to support it, and not presume to sanctify their crimes by attempting to reconcile it to the sublime and perfect Religion of the Great Author of Christianity.**
* Deuteronomy xxiv. 7.
fDeut. xv. 12.
t This is strongly inculcated in the story of the good Samaritan, Luke x. •
** The influence of Christianity in putting a stop to slavery, appears in the first Christian emperor Constantine, who commanded, under the severest penalties, all such as had slaves, to set them at liberty. He after-
io SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
There are some amongst us who cannot help allowing the force of our last argument, but plead as a motive for importing and keeping slaves, that they become acquainted with the prin- ciples of the religion of our country. — This is like justifying a highway robbery because part of the money acquired in this manner was appropriated to some religious use. — Christianity will never be propagated by any other methods than those em- ployed by Christ and his apostles. Slavery is an engine as little fitted for that purpose as fire or the sword. A Christian slave is a contradiction in terms.* But if we enquire into the methods
wards contrived to render the manumission of them much easier than formerly, for instead of recurring to the forms prescribed by the Roman laws, which were attended with great difficulties and a considerable ex- pence, he gave leave to masters to infranchise their slaves in the presence of a bishop, or a minister and a Christian assembly.
Universal History, vol. xv. p. 574, 577.
Dr. ROBERTSON, in treating of those causes which weakened the feudal system, and finally abolished slavery in Europe, in the i4th cen- tury, has the following observations
"The gentle spirit of the Christian religion, together with the doc- trines which it teaches, concerning the original equality of mankind, as well as the impartial eye with which the almighty regards men of every condition, and admits them to a participation of his benefits, are incon- sistent with servitude. But in this, as in many other instances, considera- tions of interest and the maxims of false policy, led men to a conduct inconsistent with their principles. They were so sensible, however, of the inconsistency, that to set their fellow Christians at liberty from servitude was deemed an act of piety highly meritorious, and acceptable to Heaven. The humane spirit of the Christian religion, struggled with the maxims and manners of the world, and contributed more than any other circum- stance, to introduce the practice of manumission. The formality of manumission was executed in a church or a religious assembly. — The person to be set free, was led round the great altar, with a torch in his hand, he took hold of the horns of the altar, and there the solemn words conferring liberty, were pronounced."
CHARLES V. Historical Illustrations. Note xx.
* St. Paul's letter to Philemon, in behalf of Onesimus, is said by some to contradict this assertion, but, if viewed properly, will rather support it. He desires Philemon to receive him "not as a servant, but as a brother beloved," "as his son — and part of himself." In other parts of his writings, he obliquely hints at the impossibility of uniting the duties of a Chris-
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 11
employed for converting the Negroes to Christianity, we shall find the means suited to the end proposed. In many places Sunday is appropriated to work for themselves. Reading and writing are discouraged among them. A belief is even inculcated among some, that they have no souls. In a word, — Every attempt to instruct or convert them, has been constantly opposed by their masters. Nor has the example of their Christian masters any tendency to prejudice them in favor of our religion. How; often do they betray, in their sudden transports of anger and resent- ment (against which there is no restraint provided towards their
Negroes) the most violent degrees of passion and fury!
What luxury — what ingratitude to the supreme being — what impiety in their ordinary conversation do some of them discover in the presence of their slaves; I say nothing of the dissolution of marriage vows, or the entire abolition of matrimony, which the frequent sale of them introduces, and which are directly contrary to the law of nature and the principles of Christianity. Would to heaven I could here conceal the shocking violations of chastity, which some of them are obliged to undergo without daring to complain. Husbands have been forced to prostitute their wives, and mothers their daughters, to gratify the brutal lust of a master. This — all — this is practised — blush — ye impure
and hardened monsters, while I repeat it by men who call
themselves Christians!
But further It has been said that we do a kindness to the
Negroes by bringing them to America, as we thereby save their lives, which had been forfeited by their being conquered in war.*
tian, with the offices of a slave. "Ye are bought with a price, be not there- fore the servants of men." i Corinth, vii. 23. Had he lived to see Chris- tianity established by Law, in the countries where he preached, with what a torrent of Christian eloquence may we not suppose he would have declaimed against slavery!
* "From the right of killing in case of conquest, politicians have drawn that of reducing to slavery; a consequence as ill grounded as the principle.
There is no such thing as a right of reducing people to slavery, but when it becomes necessary for the preservation of the conquest. Preserva-
ii SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
Let such as prefer or inflict slavery rather than death, disown their being descended from or connected with our mother countries. — But it will be found, upon enquiry, that many are stolen or seduced from their friends, who have never been con- quered; and it is plain, from the testimony of historians and travellers, that wars were uncommon among them, until the Christians who began the slave trade, stirred up the different nations to fight against each other. Sooner let them imbrue their hands in each others blood, or condemn one another to per- petual slavery, than the name of one Christian, or one American be stained by the perpetuation of such enormous crimes. -Nor let it be urged that by treating slaves well, we render their
situation happier in this country than it was in their own.
slavery and vice are connected together, and the latter is always a source of misery. Besides, by the greatest humanity we can show them, we only lessen, but do not remove the crime, for the injustice of it continues the same. The laws of retribution are so strongly inculcated by the moral governor of the world, that even the ox is entitled to his reward for "treading the corn." How great then must be the amount of that injustice which deprives so many of our fellow creatures of the just reward of their labor! *
tion, but not servitude, is the end of conquest; though servitude may happen sometimes to be a necessary means of preservation.
Even in that case it is contrary to the nature of things, that the slavery should be perpetual. The people enslaved ought to be rendered capable of becoming subjects."
Montesquieu's Spirit of Laws, Book x. Chap. 3
"Servi autem ex eo appellati sunt, quod Imperatores captivos vendere, ac per hoc servare, nee occidere solent. Servitus est constitutio Juris
Gentium, qua quis Dominio alieno CONTRA NATURAM subjicitur.
Justinian. Institut. L. i. Tit. 3.
* The debt of a master to a Negro man whose work is valued at ten pounds sterling a year, deducting forty shillings a year, which is the most that is laid out for their clothing in the West-Indies, amounts, in the course of 20 years, to £. 160 sterling. The victuals are included in the above wages. These^ consist chiefly of vegetables, and are very cheap.
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 13
But it will be asked here, What steps shall we take to remedy this evil, and what shall we do with those slaves we have akeady in this country? This is indeed a most difficult question. But let every man contrive to answer it for himself. If you possessed an estate which was bequeathed to you by your ancestors, and were afterwards convinced that it was the just property of another man, would you think it right to continue in the pos- session of it? would you not give it up immediately to the lawful owner? The voice of all mankind would mark him for a villain who would refuse to comply with this demand of justice. And is not keeping a slave after you are convinced of the unlawfulness of it — a crime of the same nature? All the money you save, or acquire by their labor is stolen from them; and however plausi- ble the excuse may be that you form to reconcile it to your consciences, yet be assured that your crime stands registered in the court of Heaven as a breach of the eighth commandment.
The first step to be taken to put a stop to slavery in this country, is to leave off importing slaves. For this purpose let our assemblies unite in petitioning the King and Parliament to dissolve the African Company.* It is by this incorporated band of robbers that the trade has been chiefly carried on to America. We have the more reason to expect relief from an application at this juncture, as, by a late decision in favor of a Virginia slave, at Westminster-Hall, the clamors of the whole nation are raised against them. Let such of our countrymen as engage in the slave trade, be shunned as the greatest enemies to our country, and, let the vessels which bring the slaves to us, be avoided as if they bore in them the seeds of that forbidden fruit, whose baneful
taste destroyed both the natural and moral world. As for the
Negroes among us, who, from having acquired all the low vices of slavery, or who, from age or infirmities are unfit to be set at
* The Virginia Assembly, which had the honor of being first on the continent in opposing the American Stamp Act by their Resolves, have lately set another laudable example to the colonies in being the first in petitioning for a redress of this grievance.
i4 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
liberty, I would propose, for the good of society, that they should continue the property of those with whom they grew old, or from whom they contracted those vices and infirmities. But let the young Negroes be educated in the principles of
virtue and religion — let them be taught to read and write and
afterwards instructed in some business, whereby they may be able to maintain themselves. Let laws be made to limit the time of their servitude, and to entitle them to all the privileges of free-born British subjects. At any rate let retribution be done to God and to society.*
* A worthy friend of mine has favored me with the following Ex- tract of a letter from GRANVILLE SHARP, Esq; of London.
"I am told of some regulations that have taken place in the Spanish Colonies, which do the Spaniards much honor, and are certainly worthy our imitation, in case we should not be so happy as to obtain an entire abolition of slavery and probably you wou'd find many American sub- jects that wou'd be willing to promote such regulations, tho' the same people wou'd strenuously oppose the scheme of a total abolition of slavery. I have never seen an account of the Spanish regulations in writing, but I understand that they are to the following effect: As soon as a slave is landed, his name, price, &c. are register'd in a public office, and the master is obliged to allow him one working day in every week to him- self, besides Sundays, so that if the slave chuses to work for his master on that day, he receives the wages of a freeman for it, and whatever he gains by his labor on that day, is so secured to him by law, that the master cannot deprive him of it. This is certainly a considerable step towards the abolishing absolute slavery. As soon as the slave is able to purchase another working day, the master is obliged to sell it to him at a proportionable price, viz. i -fifth part of his original cost: and so like- wise the remaining 4 days at the same rate, as soon as the slave is able to redeem them, after which he is absolutely free. This is such an en- couragement to industry, that even the most indolent are tempted to exert themselves. Men who have thus worked out their freedom are inured to the labor of the country and are certainly the most useful subjects that a colony can acquire. Regulations might be formed upon the same plan to encourage the industry of slaves that are already im- ported into the colonies, which would teach them how to maintain them- selves and be as useful, as well as less expensive to the planter. They would by such means become members or society and have an interest in the welfare of the community, which would add greatly to the strength and security of each colony; whereas, at present, many of the planters are in continual danger of being cut off by their slaves, — a fate which, they but too justly deserve!"
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 15
And now my countrymen, What shall I add more to rouse up your indignation against slave-keeping. Consider the many complicated crimes it involves in it. Think of the bloody wars which are fomented by it, among the African nations, or if these are too common to affect you, think of the pangs which attend the dissolution of the ties of nature in those who are stolen from their relations. Think of the many thousands who perish by sickness, melancholy and suicide, in their voyages to America. Pursue the poor devoted victims to one of the West India islands, and see them exposed there to public sale. Hear their cries, and see their looks of tenderness at each other upon being separated. — Mothers are torn from their daughters, and brothers from brothers, without the liberty of a parting embrace. Their master's name is now marked upon their breasts with a red hot iron. But let us pursue them into a sugar field, and behold a
scene still more affecting than this See! the poor wretches
with what reluctance they take their instruments of labor into their hands. — Some of them, overcome with heat and sickness,
seek to refresh themselves by a little rest, But, behold an
overseer approaches them. — In vain they sue for pity. He
lifts up his whip, while streams of blood follow every stroke. Neither age nor sex are spared. — Methinks one of them is a woman far advanced in her pregnancy. — At a little distance from these behold a man, who from his countenance and de- portment appears as if he was descended from illustrious an- cestors. Yes. — He is the son of a prince, and was torn, by a
stratagem, from an amiable wife and two young children — Mark his sullen looks! — now he bids defiance to the tyranny of his master, and in an instant plunges a knife into his heart. — But, let us return from this Scene, and see the various modes of arbitrary punishments inflicted upon them by their masters. Behold one covered with stripes, into which melted wax is poured — another tied down to a block or a stake — a third sus- pended in the air by his thumbs — a fourth obliged to set or stand
upon red hot iron a fifth, 1 cannot relate it.
Where now is law or justice? Let us fly to them to step in
i6 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
for their relief. Alas! The one is silent, and the other
denounces more terrible punishments upon them. Let us attend the place appointed for inflicting the penalties of the law. See here one without a limb, whose only crime was an attempt to regain his liberty — another led to a gallows for eating a morsel of bread, to which his labor gave him a better title than his
master — a third famishing on a gibbet a fourth, in a flame
of fire! — his shrieks pierce the heavens. O! God! Where
is thy vengeance ! O ! humanity — j ustice — liberty — reli- gion! Where, — where are ye fled.-
This is no exaggerated picture. It is taken from real life.
Before I conclude I shall take the liberty of addressing several classes of my countrymen in behalf of our brethren (for by that name may we now call them) who are in a state of slavery among us.
In the first place let MAGISTRATES both supreme and inferior, exert the authority they are invested with, in suppressing this evil. Let them discountenance it by their example, and show a readiness to concur in every measure proposed to remedy it.
Let LEGISLATORS, reflect upon the trust reposed in them. Let their laws be made after the spirit of religion — liberty — and our most excellent English Constitution. You cannot show your attachment to your King or your love to your country better than by suppressing an evil which endangers the dominions of the former, and will in time destroy the liberty of 'the latter.* Population, and the accession of strangers, in which the riches of all countries consist, can only flourish in proportion as slavery is discouraged. Extend the privileges we enjoy, to every human creature born among us, and let not the journals of our assemblies
* By a late calculation, it appears that there are eight hundred and fifty thousand Negro slaves in the British colonies and islands. From the number and burden of ships which are sent from England to Africa for slaves, we can with a good deal of certainty, conclude, that there are not less than one hundred thousand of them imported into America every year. By particular enquiry it was found, that one hundred and four thousand were imported in the year 1768.
"In moderate governments, it is a point of the highest importance,
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 17
be disgraced with the records of laws, which allow exclusive privileges to men of one color in preference to another.*
Ye men of sense and virtue Ye advocates for Ameri- can liberty, rouse up and espouse the cause of humanity and general liberty. Bear a testimony against a vice which degrades human nature, and dissolves that universal tie of benevolence which should connect all the children of men together in one
great family. The plant of liberty is of so tender a nature,
that it cannot thrive long in the neighbourhood of slavery. Re- member the eyes of all Europe are fixed upon you, to preserve an asylum for freedom in this country, after the last pillars of it are fallen in every other quarter of the globe.
But chiefly ye ministers of the gospel, whose dominion
over the principles and actions of men is so universally acknowl- edged and felt, Ye who estimate the worth of your fellow
creatures by their immortality, and therefore must look upon all mankind as equal; — let your zeal keep pace with your oppor- tunities to put a stop to slavery. While you inforce the duties of "tithe and cummin," neglect not the weightier laws of justice and humanity. Slavery is an Hydra sin, and includes in it every violation of the precepts of the Law and the Gospel. In vain will you command your flocks to offer up the incense of faith and
that there should not be a great number of slaves. The political liberty of those states adds to the value of civil liberty; and he who is deprived of the latter, is also deprived of the former. He sees the happiness of a society, of which he is not so much as a member; he sees the security of others fenced by laws, himself without so much protection. He sees his master has a soul, that can enlarge itself; while his own is constrained to submit to almost continual depression. Nothing more assimilates a man to a beast, than living among freemen, himself a slave. Such people as these are the natural enemies of a society, and their number must be dangerous."
Spirit of Laws, Book xv. Chap. 12.
* The alterations in the laws in favour of Negroes, should be gradual, — 'till the evil habits they have acquired by slavery, are eradicated. There are several privileges, however, which might be extended to them imme- diately, without the least risk to society, in particular that inestimable one of trial by juries.
1 8 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
charity, while they continue to mingle the sweat and blood of
Negro slaves with their sacrifices. If the blood of Abel cried
aloud for vengeance; — If, under the Jewish dispensation, cities of refuge could not screen the deliberate murderer — if even manslaughter required sacrifices to expiate it, — and if a single murder so seldom escapes with impunity in any civilized coun- try, what may you not say against that trade, or those manu- factures— or laws,* which destroy the lives of so many thousands
of our fellow-creatures every year? If in the Old Testament
"God swears by his holiness, and by the excellency of Jacob, that the earth shall tremble, and every one mourn that dwelleth therein for the iniquity of those who oppress the poor and crush the needy," "who buy the poor with silver, and the needy with a pair of shoes,"f what judgments may you not denounce upon those who continue to perpetrate these crimes, after the more full discovery wliich God has made of the law of equity in the New Testament. Put them in mind of the rod which was held over them a few years ago in the Stamp and Revenue Acts. Remember that national crimes require national punishments, and without declaring what punishment awaits this evil, you may venture to assure them, that it cannot pass with impunity, unless God shall cease to be just or merciful.
* "If any Negro or other slave under punishment by his master, or his order for running away, or any other crimes or misdemeanors towards his said master, unfortunately shall suffer in life or member, no person whatever shall be liable to any fine; But if any man shall of wantonness, or only of bloody mindedness, or cruel intention, wilfully kill a Negro, or other slave of his own, he shall deliver into the public treasury fifteen pounds sterling, and not be liable to any other punishment, or forfeiture for the same."
Laws of Barbadoes, Act 329.
t Amos iv. i, 2. viii. 6, 7.
A PLAN OF A PEACE-OFFICE FOR THE UNITED STATES
AMONG THE defects which have been pointed out in the Federal Constitution by its antifederal enemies, it is much to be lamented that no person has taken notice of its total silence upon the subject of an office of the utmost importance to the welfare of the United States, that is, an office for promoting and preserving perpetual peace in our country.
It is to be hoped that no objection will be made to the estab- lishment of such an office, while we are engaged in a war with the Indians, for as the War-Office of the United States was established in the time of peace, it is equally reasonable that a Peace-Office should be established in the time of ivar.
The plan of this office is as follows:
I. Let a Secretary of the Peace be appointed to preside in this office, who shall be perfectly free from all the present ab- surd and vulgar European prejudices upon the subject of gov- ernment; let him be a genuine republican and a sincere Christian, for the principles of republicanism and Christianity are no less friendly to universal and perpetual peace, than they are to uni- versal and equal liberty.
II. Let a power be given to this Secretary to establish and maintain free-schools in every city, village and township of the United States; and let him be made responsible for the talents, principles, and morals, of all his schoolmasters. Let the youth of our country be carefully instructed in reading, writing,
19
20 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
arithmetic, and in the doctrines of a religion of some kind: the Christian religion should be preferred to all others; for it belongs to this religion exclusively to teach us not only to cultivate peace with men, but to forgive, nay more — to love our very enemies. It belongs to it further to teach us that the Supreme Being alone possesses a power to take away human life, and that we rebel against his laws, whenever we undertake to execute death in any way whatever upon any of his creatures.
III. Let every family in the United States be furnished at the public expense, by the Secretary of this office, with a copy of an American edition of the BIBLE. This measure has become the more necessary in our country, since the banishment of the bible, as a school-book, from most of the schools in the United States. Unless the price of this book be paid for by the public, there is reason to fear that in a few years it will t>e met with only in courts of justice or in magistrates' offices; and should the absurd mode of establishing truth by kissing this sacred book fall into disuse, it may probably, in the course of the next generation, be seen only as a curiosity on a shelf in a public museum.
IV. Let the following sentence be inscribed in letters of gold over the doors of every State and Court house in the United States.
THE SON OF MAN CAME INTO THE WORLD, NOT TO DESTROY MEN'S LIVES, BUT TO SAVE THEM.
V. To inspire a veneration for human life, and an horror at the shedding of human blood, let all those laws be repealed which authorise juries, judges, sheriffs, or hangmen to assume the resentments of individuals and to commit murder in cold blood in any case whatever. Until this reformation in our code of penal jurisprudence takes place, it will be in vain to attempt to introduce universal and perpetual peace in our country.
VI. To subdue that passion for war, which education, added to human depravity, have made universal, a familiarity with the
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 21
I
instruments of death, as well as all military shows, should be carefully avoided. For which reason, militia laws should every where be repealed, and military dresses and military titles should be laid aside: reviews tend to lessen the horrors of a battle by connecting them with the charms of order; militia laws generate idleness and vice, and thereby produce the wars they are said to prevent; military dresses fascinate the minds of young men, and lead them from serious and useful professions; were there no imiforms, there would probably be no armies; lastly, military titles feed vanity, and keep up ideas in the mind which lessen a sense of the folly and miseries of war.
VII. In the last place, let a large room, adjoining the federal hall, be appropriated for transacting the business and preserving all the records of this office. Over the door of this room let there be a sign, on which the figures of a LAMB, a DOVE and an OLIVE BRANCH should be painted, together with the following inscrip- tions in letters of gold:
PEACE ON EARTH — GOOD-WILL TO MAN. AH! WHY WILL MEN FORGET THAT THEY ARE BRETHREN?
Within this apartment let there be a collection of plough- shares and pruning-hooks made out of swords and speaks; and on each of the walls of the apartment, the following pictures as large as the life:
1. A lion eating straw with an ox, and an adder playing upon the lips of a child.
2. An Indian boiling his venison in the same pot with a citizen of Kentucky.
3. Lord Cornwallis and Tippoo Saib, under the shade of a sycamore-tree in the East Indies, drinking Madeira wine together out of the same decanter.
4. A group of French and Austrian soldiers dancing arm and arm, under a bower erected in the neighbourhood of Mons.
22 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
5. A St. Domingo planter, a man of color, and a native of Africa, legislating together in the same colonial assembly.*
To complete the entertainment of this delightful apartment, let a group of young ladies, clad in white robes, assemble every day at a certain hour, in a gallery to be erected for the purpose, and sing odes, and hymns, and anthems in praise of the blessings of peace.
One of these songs should consist of the following lines.
Peace o'er the world her olive wand extends, And white-rob'd innocence from heaven descends; All crimes shall cease, and ancient frauds shall fail, Returning justice lifts aloft her scale.
In order more deeply to affect the minds of the citizens of the United States with the blessings of peace, by contrasting them with the evils of war, let the following inscriptions be painted upon the sign, which is placed over the door of the War Office.
1. An office for butchering the human species.
2. A Widow and Orphan making office.
3. A broken bone making office.
4. A Wooden leg making office.
5. An office for creating public and private vices.
6. An office for creating a public debt.
7. An office for creating speculators, stock jobbers, and bankrupts.
8. An office for creating famine.
9. An office for creating pestilential diseases.
10. An office for creating poverty, and the destruction of liberty, and national happiness.
In the lobby of this office let there be painted representations
* At the time of writing this, there existed wars between the United States and the American Indians, between the British nation and Tippoo Saib, between the planters of St Domingo and their African slaves, and between the French nation and the emperor of Germany.
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 23
of all the common military instruments of death, also human skulls, broken bones, unburied and putrefying dead bodies, hos- pitals crowded with sick and wounded soldiers, villages on fire, mothers in besieged towns eating the flesh of their children, ships sinking in the ocean, rivers dyed with blood, and extensive plains without a tree or fence, or any other object, but the ruins of deserted farm houses.
Above this group of woeful figures, — let the following words be inserted, in red characters to represent human blood,
'NATIONAL GLORY."
ON HELPING THE AFRICANS
From a Letter to Granville Sharp
SINCE OUR correspondence began, in the year 1771, what wonder- ful things have come to pass in favor of our friends the poor Africans! — In Pennsylvania our laws have exterminated domestic Slavery, and in Philadelphia the free blacks now compose near 3,000 souls. Their men are chiefly waiters — day-labourers — and traders in a small way. Their women are chiefly cooks and washer-women. Such is their integrity, and quiet deportment, that they are universally preferred to white people of similar occupations. But under these circumstances they are still in a state of depression, arising chiefly from their being deprived of the means of regular education, and religious instruction. To remedy these inconveniences, a few gentlemen in this city have assisted in forming them into a church, to be called The African Church of Philadelphia. As they consist of the scattered ap- pendages of most of the churches in the city, they have formed articles and a plan of church government so general as to em- brace all, and yet so orthodox in cardinal points as to offend none. They have already been assisted in purchasing a valuable lot, in a centrical part of our city, on which they propose this fall to build a frame school-house, and in the spring (if they are further assisted) they wish to erect a plain brick church. They have already began to worship God in a borrowed school-house, where they assemble on Sundays. Two or three of their own colour conduct the worship, by reading the Scriptures, praying, singing, and occasionally exhorting. Hereafter they propose to have a
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 25
regular minister: — in the meanwhile, the Rev. Mr. Pilmore, a worthy episcopal minister of this city, has promised to officiate for them occasionally. Much good may be expected from this institution. Indeed much good has already arisen from it; for it has produced a degree of order, and a spirit of inquiry and thoughtfulness in religion never evinced by them before.
I come now to the design of this long letter, which is to solicit your influence, among the friends of the Blacks in London, in obtaining a small contribution towards building the proposed African Church in our city. It may produce consequences far beyond our present expectations, or even comprehensions.
It is true the Blacks are not of your country. But what then? You have pleaded the cause of the Africans in their native coun- try.— By helping them here, you will only change the place, but not the objects of your benevolence. The favor I now solicit for them is more substantial than even freedom itself. It will place them in a condition to make their freedom a blessing to them here, and prepare them for happiness beyond the grave.
In spreading the blessings of liberty, and religion, our Divine Master forbids us, in many of his parables and precepts, to have either friends or country. The globe is the native country, and the whole human race, the fellow-citizens of a Christian. This sentiment, I am sure, will accord with the feelings of your heart —for you have long exemplified it by your life and conversation.
From, my dear friend,
Your affectionate fellow-labourer,
And sincere friend and servant,
BENJAMIN RUSH.
ON THE DEFECTS OF THE CONFEDERATION
THERE is nothing more common than to confound the terms of
the American Revolution with those of the late American War.
%
The American War is over: but this is far from being the case with the American Revolution. On the contrary, nothing but the first act of the great drama is closed. It remains yet to estab- lish and perfect our new forms of government; and to prepare the principles, morals, and manners of our citizens, for these forms of government, after they are established and brought to perfection.
The Confederation, together with most of our state constitu- tions, were formed under very unfavorable circumstances. We had just emerged from a corrupted monarchy. Although we un- derstood perfectly the principles of liberty, yet most of us were ignorant of the forms and combinations of power in republics. Add to this, the British army was in the heart of our country, spreading desolation wherever it went: our resentments, of course, were awakened. We detested the British name, and unfortunately refused to copy some things in the administration of justice and power, in the British government, which have made it the admiration and envy of the world. In our opposition to monarchy, we forgot that the temple of tyranny has two doors. We bolted one of them by proper restraints: but we left the other open, by neglecting to guard against the effects of our own ignorance and licentiousness.
26
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 27
Most of the present difficulties of this country arise from the weakness and other defects of our governments.
My business at present shall be only to suggest the defects of the Confederation. These consist, ist, In the deficiency of coercive power, zd, In a defect of exclusive power to issue paper money, and regulate commerce. 3d, In vesting the sovereign power of the United States in a single legislature: and 4th, In the too frequent rotation of its members.
A convention is to sit soon * for the purpose of devising means of obviating part of the two first defects that have been mentioned. But I wish they may add to their recommendations to each state, to surrender up to Congress their power of emit- ting money. In this way, uniform currency will be produced, that will facilitate trade, and help to bind the states together. Nor will the states be deprived of large sums of money by this means when sudden emergencies require it: for they may always borrow them as they did during the war, out of the treasury of Congress. Even a loan-office may be better instituted in this way in each state, than in any other.
The two last defects that have been mentioned, are not of less magnitude than the first. Indeed, the single legislature of Congress will become more dangerous from an increase of power than ever. To remedy this, let the supreme federal power be divided, like the legislatures of most of our states, into two dis- tinct, independent branches. Let one of them be styled the Council of the States, and the other the Assembly of the States. Let the first consist of a single delegate, — and the second, of two, three, or four delegates, chosen annually by each state. Let the president be chosen annually by the joint ballots of both houses, and let him possess certain powers in conjunction with a privy council, especially the power of appointing most of the officers of the United States. The officers will not only be better when appointed this way, but one of the principal causes of faction will be thereby removed from congress. I
* May 1787, in Philadelphia.
28 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
apprehend this division of the power of Congress will become more necessary, as soon as they are invested with more ample powers of levying and expending public money.
The custom of turning men out of power or office, as soon as they are qualified for it, has been found to be as absurd in practice, as it is virtuous in speculation. It contradicts our habits and opinions in every other transaction of life. Do we dismiss a general — a physician — or even a domestic as soon as they have acquired knowledge enough to be useful to us, for the sake of increasing the number of able generals — skilful physicians — and faithful servants? We do not. Government is a science; and can never be perfected in America, until we encourage men to de- vote not only three years, but their whole lives to it. I believe the principal reason why so many men of abilities object to serving in Congress, is owing to their not thinking it worth while to spend three years in acquiring a profession which their country immediately afterwards forbids them to fol- low.
There are two errors or prejudices on the subject of govern- ment in America, which lead to the most dangerous conse- quences.
It is often said that "the sovereign and all other power is seated in the people." This idea is unhappily expressed. It should be — "all power is derived from the people." They possess it only on the days of their elections. After this, it is the property of thek rulers, nor can they exercise or resume it, unless it is abused. It is of importance to circulate this idea, as it leads to order and good government.
The people of America have mistaken the meaning of the word sovereignty: hence each state pretends to be sovereign. In Europe it is applied only to those states which possess the power of making war and peace — of forming treaties, and the like. As this power belongs only to Congress, they are the only sovereign power in the United States.
We commit a similar mistake in our ideas of the word in- dependent.— No individual state as such has any claim to inde-
ON GOOD GOVERNMENT 29
pendence. She is independerjt only in a union with her sister states in Congress.
To conform the principles, morals, and manners of our citi- zens to our republican forms of government, it is absolutely necessary that knowledge of every kind, should be disseminated through every part of the United States.
For this purpose, let Congress, instead of laying out half a million of dollars in building a federal town, appropriate only a fourth part of that sum, in founding a federal university. In this university, let every thing connected with government, such as history — the law of nature and nations — the civil law — the mu- nicipal laws of our country — and the principles of commerce, be taught by competent professors. Let masters be employed like- wise to teach gunnery — fortification — and every thing con- nected with defensive and offensive war. — Above all, let a pro- fessor, of what is called in the European universities, economy, be established in this federal seminary. His business should be to unfold the principles and practice of agriculture and manu- factures of all kinds; and to enable him to make his lectures more extensively useful, Congress should support a travelling correspondent for him, who should visit all the nations of Europe, and transmit to him, from time to time, all the discoveries and improvements that are made in agriculture and manufactures. To this seminary young men should be encouraged to repair, after completing their academical studies in the colleges of their re- spective states. The honors and offices of the United States should, after a while, be confined to persons who had imbibed federal and republican ideas in this university.
For the purpose of diffusing knowledge, as well as extend- ing the living principle of government to every part of the United States; every state — city — county — village — and town- ship in the union, should be tied together by means of the post- office. — This is the true non-electric wire of government. It is the only means of conveying heat and light to every individual in the federal commonwealth. Sweden lost her liberties, says the Abbe Raynal, because her citizens were so scattered, that they
3o SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
had no means of acting in concert with each other. It should be a constant injunction to the postmasters to convey newspapers free of all charge for postage. — They are not only the vehicles of knowledge and intelligence, but the sentinels of the liberties of our country.
The conduct of some of those strangers who have visited our country, since the peace, and who fill the British papers with accounts of our distresses, shows as great a want of good sense, as it does of good nature. They fear nothing; but the foundations and walls of the temple of liberty, and yet they undertake to judge of the whole fabric.
Our own citizens act a still more absurd part, when they cry out, after the experience of three or four years, that we are not proper materials for republican government. Remem- ber, we assumed these forms of government in a hurry, before we were prepared for them. Let every man exert himself in promoting virtue and knowledge in our country, and we shall soon become good republicans. Look at the steps by which governments have been changed or rendered stable in Europe. Read the history of Great Britain. Her boasted government has risen out of wars — and rebellions that lasted above sixty years. The United States are travelling peaceably into order and good government. They know no strife — but what arises from the collision of opinions: and in three years, they have advanced further in the road to stability and happiness, than most of the nations in Europe have done, in as many centuries.
There is but one path that can lead the United States to destruction, and that is their extent of territory. It was probably to effect this, that Great Britain ceded to us so much waste land. But even this path may be avoided. Let but one new state be exposed to sale at a time; and let the land office be shut up till every part of this new state is settled.
I am extremely sorry to find a passion for retirement so uni- versal among the patriots and heroes of the war. They resemble skilful mariners, who, after exerting themselves to preserve a ship from sinking in a storm, in the middle of the ocean, drop
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asleep as soon as the waves subside, and leave the care of their lives and property, during the remainder of the voyage to sailors without knowledge or experience. Every man in a republic is public property. His time and talents — his youth — his manhood — his old age — nay more, life, all, belong to his country.
Patriots of 1774, 1775, 1776* — heroes of 1778, 1779, 1780! come forward! your country demands your services. — Philoso- phers and friends to mankind, come forward! your country demands your studies and speculations! Lovers of peace and order, who declined taking part in the late war, come forward! your country forgives your timidity, and demands your influ- ence and advice! — Hear her proclaiming in sighs and groans, in her governments, in her finances, in her trade, in her manu- factures, in her morals, and in her manners, "The revolution is not over!"
ON SECURITIES FOR LIBERTY
Letter from Dr. Rush, to Dr. Ramsay
DEAR SIR,
I presume, before this time, you have heard, and rejoiced in the auspicious event of the ratification of the Federal Govern- ment by six of the United States.
The objections, which have been urged against the Federal Constitution, from its wanting a Bill of Rights, have been reasoned and ridiculed out of credit in every state that has adopted it. There can be only two securities for liberty in any government, viz. representation and checks. By the first, the rights of the people, and by the second, the rights of representa- tion are effectually secured. Every part of a free constitution hangs upon these two points; and these form the two capital features of the proposed Constitution of the United States. With- out them, a volume of rights would avail nothing; and with them, a declaration of rights is absurd and unnecessary: for the people, where their liberties are committed to an equal representation, and to a compound legislature, such as we observe in the new gov- ernment, will always be the sovereigns of their rulers, and hold all their rights in their own hands. To hold them at the mercy of their servants, is disgraceful to the dignity of freemen. Men, who call for a Bill of Rights, have not recovered from the habits they acquired under the monarchical government of Great Britain.
I have the same opinion with the Antif ederalists, of the danger of trusting arbitrary power to any single body of men: but no such power will be committed to our new rulers. Neither the
3*
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House of Representatives, the Senate, or the President, can per- form a single legislative act by themselves. An hundred principles in man will lead them to watch, to check, and to oppose each other, should an attempt be made by either of them upon the liberties of the people. If we may judge of their conduct, by what we have so often observed in all the state-governments, the mem- bers of the Federal legislature will much oftener injure their constituents, by voting agreeably to their inclinations, than against them.
But are we to consider men entrusted with power, as the receptacles of all the depravity of human nature? by no means. The people do not part with their full proportions of it. Reason and revelation both deceive us, if they are all wise and virtuous. Is not history as full of the vices of the people, as it is of the cymes of the kings? what is the present moral character of the citizens of the United States? I need not describe it. It proves too plainly that the people are as much disposed to vice as their rulers; and that nothing but a vigorous and efficient government can prevent their degenerating into savages, or devouring each other like beasts of prey.
A simple democracy has been very aptly compared by Mr. Ames, of Massachusetts, to a volcano that contained within its bowels the fiery materials of its own destruction. A citizen of one of the cantons of Switzerland, in the year 1776, refused in my presence to drink "the commonwealth of America" as a toast, and gave as a reason for it, "that a simple democracy was the devil's own government." The experience of the American states, under the present Confederation, has, in too many instances, justified these two accounts of a simple popular government.
It would have been a truth, if Mr. Locke had not said it, that where there is no law, there can be no liberty; and nothing de- serves the name of law but that which is certain, and universal in its operation, upon all the members of the community.
To look up to a government that establishes justice, insures order, cherishes virtue, secures property, and protects from every species of violence, affords a pleasure that can only be exceeded
34 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
by looking up, in all circumstances, to an over-ruling Providence. Such a pleasure, I hope, is before us and our posterity, under the influence of the new government.
The dimensions of the human mind are apt to be regulated by the extent and objects of the government under which it is formed. Think then, my friend, of the expansion and dignity the American mind will acquire, by having its powers transferred from the contracted objects of a state, to the more unbounded objects of a national government? — A citizen and a legislator of the free and United States of America, will be one of the first characters in the world.
I would not have you suppose, after what I have written, that I believe the new government to be without fault. I can see them — yet not in any of the writings or speeches of the persons who are opposed to it. But who ever saw any thing perfect come from the hands of man? it realises, notwithstanding, in a great degree, every wish I ever entertained, in every stage of the Revo- lution, for the happiness of my country; for you know, that I have acquired no new opinions or principles, upon the subject of republics, by the sorrowful events we have lately witnessed in America. In the year 1776, I lost the confidence of the people of Pennsylvania, by openly exposing the dangers of a simple democracy, and declaring myself an advocate for a government composed of three legislative branches.
ON PUNISHING MURDER BY DEATH
IN AN ESSAY upon the effects of public punishments upon crimi- nals and upon society, published in the second volume of the American Museitm, I hinted, in a short paragraph, at the injustice of punishing murder by death. I shall attempt in the following essay, to support that opinion, and to answer all the objections that have been urged against it.
I. Every man possesses an absolute power over his own lib- erty and property, but not over his own life. When he becomes a member of political society, he commits the disposal of his liberty and property to his fellow citizens; but as he has no right to dispose of his life, he cannot commit the power over it to any body of men. To take away life, therefore, for any crime, is a violation of the first political compact.
II. The punishment of murder by death, is contrary to reason, and to the order and happiness of society.
1. It lessens the horror of taking away human life, and thereby tends to multiply murders.
2. It produces murder, by its influence upon people who are tired of life, and who, from a supposition, that murder is a less crime than suicide, destroy a life (and often that of a near con- nexion) and afterwards deliver themselves up to justice, that they may escape from their misery by means of a halter.
3. The punishment of murder by death, multiplies murders, from the difficulty it creates of convicting persons who are guilty of it. Humanity, revolting at the idea of the severity and certainty
35
36 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
of a capital punishment, often steps in, and collects such evidence in favour of a murderer, as screens him from justice altogether, or palliates his crime into manslaughter. If the punishment of murder consisted in long confinement, and hard labor, it would be proportioned by the measure of our feelings of justice, and every member of society would be a watchman or a magistrate, to apprehend a destroyer of human life, and to bring him to punishment.
4. The punishment of murder by death, checks the opera- tions of universal justice, by preventing the punishment of every species of murder. Quack doctors — frauds of various kinds — and a licentious press, often destroy life, and sometimes with malice of the most propense nature. If murder were punished by con- finement and hard labour, the authors of the numerous murders that have been mentioned, would be dragged forth, and punished according to their deserts. How much order and happiness would arise to society from such a change in human affairs! But who will attempt to define these species of murder, or to prosecute offenders of this stamp, if death is to be the punishment of the crime after it is admitted, and proved to be wilful murder? — only alter the punishment of murder, and these crimes will soon assume their proper names, and probably soon become as rare as murder from common acts of violence.
5. The punishment of murder by death, has been proved to be contrary to the order and happiness of society by the experi- ments of some of the wisest legislators in Europe. The Empress of Russia, the King of Sweden, and the Duke of Tuscany, have nearly extirpated murder from their dominions, by converting its punishment into the means of benefiting society, and reform- ing the criminals who perpetrate it.
III. The punishment of murder by death, is contrary to divine revelation. A religion which commands us to forgive and even to do good to our enemies, can never authorise the punishment of murder by death. "Vengeance is mine," said the Lord; "I will repay." It is to no purpose to say here, that this vengeance is taken out of the hands of an individual, and directed against the
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criminal by the hand of government. It is equally an usurpation of the prerogative of heaven, whether it be inflicted by a single person, or by a whole community.
Here I expect to meet with an appeal from the letter and spirit of the gospel, to the law of Moses, which declares, that "he that killeth a man shall surely be put to death." Forgive, indulgent heaven! the ignorance and cruelty of man, which by the misapplication of this text of scripture, has so long and so often stained the religion of Jesus Christ with folly and revenge.
The following considerations, I hope, will prove that no argu- ment can be deduced from this law, to justify the punishment of murder by death. On the contrary, that several arguments against it, may be derived from a just and rational explanation of that part of the levitical institutions.
1. There are many things in scripture above, but nothing contrary to reason. Now, the punishment of murder by death, is contrary to reason. It cannot, therefore, be agreeable to the will of God.
2. The order and happiness of society cannot fail of being agreeable to the will of God. But the punishment of murder by death, destroys the order and happiness of society. It must therefore be contrary to the will of God.
3. Many of the laws given by Moses, were accommodated to the ignorance and "hardness of heart" of the ancient Jews. Hence their divine legislator expressly says, "I gave them statutes that were not good, and judgments whereby they should not live" Of this, the law which respects divorces, and the law of retaliation, which required "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth," are remarkable instances.
But we are told, that the punishment of murder by death, is founded not only on the law of Moses, but upon a positive precept given to Noah and his posterity, that "whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." In order to show that this text does not militate against my proposition, I shall beg leave to transcribe a passage from an essay on crimes and punishments, published by the Reverend Mr. Turner, in the
38 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
second volume of the Manchester memoirs. "I hope," says this ingenious author, "that I shall not offend any one, by taking the liberty to put my own sense upon this celebrated passage, and to inquire, why it should be deemed a precept at all. To me, I confess, it appears to contain nothing more than a declaration of what will generally happen; and in this view, to stand ex- actly upon the same ground with such passages as the follow- ing: "He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity." "He that taketh up the sword, shall perish by the sword." * — The form of expression is exactly the same in each of the texts; why, then, may they not all be interpreted in the same manner, and considered, not as commands, but as denunciations, and if so, the magistrate will be no more bound by the text in Genesis, to punish murder with death, than he will by the text in the Revelations, to sell every Guinea captain to our West India planters; and yet, however just and proper such a proceeding might be, I suppose no one will assert that the magistrate is bound to it by that, or any other text in the scriptures, or that that alone would be admitted as a sufficient reason for so extraor- dinary a measure."
If this explanation of the precept given to Noah, be not satisfactory, I shall mention another. Soon after the flood, the infancy and weakness of society rendered it impossible to punish murder by confinement. There was therefore no medium be- tween inflicting death upon a murderer, and suffering him to escape with impunity, and thereby to perpetrate more acts of violence against his fellow creatures. It pleased God in this con- dition of the world to permit a less in order to prevent a greater evil. He therefore commits for a while his exclusive power over human life, to his creatures for the safety and preservation of an* infant society, which might otherwise have perished, and with it, the only stock of the human race. The command in- directly implies that the crime of murder was not punished by death in the mature state of society which existed before the flood. Nor is this the only instance upon record in the scriptures
* Rev. xv, 10.
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in which God has delegated his power over human life to his creatures. Abraham expresses no surprise at the command which God gave him to sacrifice his son. He submits to it as a precept founded in reason and natural justice, for nothing could be more obvious than that the giver of life had a right to claim it when and in such manner as he pleased. 'Till men are able to give life, it becomes them to tremble at the thought of taking it away. Will a man rob God? — Yes — he robs him of what is infinitely dear to him — of his darling attribute of mercy , every time he deprives a fellow creature of life.
4. If the Mosaic law with respect to murder, be obligatory upon Christians, it follows that it is equally obligatory upon them to punish adultery, blasphemy, and other capital crimes that are mentioned in the levitical law, by death. Nor is this all: it justifies the extirpation of the Indians, and the enslaving of the Africans; for the command to the Jews to destroy the Canaan- ites, and to make slaves of their heathen neighbours, is as positive as the command which declares, "that he that killeth a man, shall surely be put to death."
5. Every part of the levitical law, is full of types of the Messiah. May not the punishment of death, inflicted by it, be in- tended to represent the demerit and consequences of sin, as the cities of refuge were the offices of the Messiah?
6. The imperfection and severity of these laws were prob- ably intended farther — to illustrate the perfection and mildness of the gospel dispensation. It is in this manner that God has manifested himself in many of his acts. He created darkness first, to illustrate by comparison the beauty of light; and he permits sin, misery, and death in the moral world, that he may hereafter display more illustriously the transcendent glories of righteous- ness, happiness, and immortal life. This opinion is favoured by St. Paul, who says, "the law made nothing perfect," and that "it was a shadow of good things to come."
How delightful to discover such an exact harmony between the dictates of reason, the order and happiness of society, and the precepts of the gospel! There is a perfect unity in truth.
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Upon all subjects — in all ages — and in all countries — truths of every kind agree with each other.
It has been said, that the common sense of all nations, and particularly of savages, is in favour of punishing murder by death.
The common sense of all nations is in favor of the commerce and slavery of their fellow creatures. But this does not take away from their immorality. Could it be proved that the Indians punish murder by death, it would not establish the right of man over the life of a fellow creature, for revenge we know in its utmost extent is the universal and darling passion of all savage nations. The practice moreover, (if it exist) must have originated in necessity; for a people who have no settled place of residence, and who are averse from all labour, could restrain murder in no other way. But I am disposed to doubt whether the Indians punish murder by death among their own tribes. In all those cases where a life is taken away by an Indian of a foreign tribe, they always demand the satisfaction of life for life. But this practice is founded on a desire of preserving a balance in their numbers and power; for among nations which consist of only a few warriors, the loss of an individual often destroys this bal- ance, and thereby exposes them to war or extermination. It is for the same purpose of keeping up an equality in numbers and power, that they often adopt captive children into their nations and families. What makes this explanation of the practice of punishing murder by death among the Indians more probable, is, that we find the same bloody and vindictive satisfaction is re- quired of a foreign nation, whether the person lost, be killed by an accident, or by premeditated violence. Many facts might be mentioned from travellers to prove that the Indians do not punish murder by death within the jurisdiction of their own tribes. I shall mention only one which is taken from the Rev. Mr. John Megapolensis's account of the Mohawk Indians, lately published in Mr. Hazard's historical collection of state papers. — "There is no punishment, (says our author) here for murder, but every one is his own avenger. The friends of the deceased
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revenge themselves upon the murderer until peace is made with the next akin. But although they are so cruel, yet there are not half so many murders committed among them as among Chris- tians, notwithstanding their severe laws, and heavy penalties."
It has been said, that the horrors of a guilty conscience pro- claim the justice and necessity of death, as a punishment for murder. I draw an argument of another nature from this fact. Are the horrors of conscience the punishment that God inflicts upon murder? why, then, should we shorten or destroy them by death, especially as we are taught to direct the most atrocious murderers to expect pardon in the future world? no, let us not counteract the government of God in the human breast: let the murderer live — but let it be to suffer the reproaches of a guilty conscience: let him live, to make compensation to society for the injury he has done it, by robbing it of a citizen: let him live to maintain the family of the man whom he has murdered: let him live, that the punishment of his crime may become universal: and lastly let him live — that murder may be extirpated from the list of human crimes!
Let us examine the conduct of the moral ruler of the world towards the first murderer: see Cain returning from his field, with his hands reeking with the blood of his brother! Do the heavens gather blackness, and does a flash of lightning blast him to the earth? no. Does his father Adam, the natural legislator and judge of the world, inflict upon him the punishment of death? — No; the infinitely wise God becomes his judge and executioner. He expels him from the society of which he was a member. H^fixes in his conscience a never-dying worm. He subjects him to the necessity of labor; and to secure a duration of his punishment, proportioned to his crime, he puts a mark or prohibition upon him, to prevent his being put to death, by weak and angry men; declaring, at the same time, that " whoso- ever slayeth Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him seven- fold."
Judges, attorneys, witnesses, juries and sheriffs, whose office it is to Dunish murder bv death. I beseech vou to cause, and
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listen to the voice of reason and religion, before you convict or execute another fellow-creature for murder!
But I despair of making such an impression upon the present citizens of the United States, as shall abolish the absurd and un-Christian practice. From the connection of this essay with the valuable documents of the late revolution contained in the Ameri- can Museum, it will probably descend to posterity. To you, therefore, the unborn generations of the next century, I conse- crate this humble tribute to justice. You will enjoy in point of knowledge, the meridian of a day, of which we only perceive the twilight. You will often review with equal contempt and horror, the indolence, ignorance and cruelty of your ancestors. The grossest crimes shall not exclude the perpetrators of them from your pity. You will pdly comprehend the extent of the discoveries and precepts of the gospel, and you will be actuated, I hope, by its gentle and forgiving spirit. You will see many modern opinions in religion and government turned upside downwards, and many new connexions established between cause and effect. From the importance and destiny of every human soul, you will acquire new ideas of the dignity of human nature, and of the infinite value of every act of benevolence that has for its object, the bodies, the souls, and the lives of your fellow-creatures. You will love the whole human race, for you will perceive that you have a common Father, and you will learn to imitate him by converting those punishments to which their folly or wickedness have exposed them, into the means of their reformation and happiness.
6
Soon after the above enquiry was published in the American Museum, a reply to it made its appearance in the Pennsyl- vania Mercury, under the signature of Philochoras; which produced the following answer. The principal arguments in favour of punishing mwrder by death, contained in the reply, are mentioned in the answer, for which reason it was not thought necessary to re-publish the whole of the reply in the order in which it appeared in the news paper.
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I have read a reply subscribed Philochoras, to an enquiry into the justice and policy of punishing murder by death, published some time ago in the Museum. The author of it has attempted to justify public and capital punishments, as well as war, by the precepts of the gospel. — Let not my readers suppose that this author is a sceptic — or a heathen — or that he is in any degree unfriendly to Christianity. Far from it — he is a minister of the gospel — and a man of a worthy private as well as public char- acter.
Our author begins his reply by asserting, that the objection to the punishment of death for murder, proceeded originally from the socinian objection to the great doctrine of the atone- ment. Here I must acknowledge my obligations to our author for having furnished me with a new argument in favor of my principles. I believe in the doctrine of the atonement, not only because it is clearly revealed in the Old and New Testaments, but because it is agreeable to nature, and reason. Life is the prod- uct of death, throughout every part of the animal creation. Reason likewise establishes the necessity of the atonement, for it has lately taught us in the writings of the Marquis of Beccaria, that in a perfect human government there should be no pardon- ing power: and experience has taught us that where certainty has taken the place of severity of punishment, crimes have evi- dently and rapidly diminished in every country. The demands of the divine law which made the shedding of blood necessary to the remission of sin, is a sublime illustration of the perfection of the divine government, and of the love of the Supreme Being to his intelligent creatures. But in the demand of life for dis- obedience, let the divine law stand alone. Men stand in a very different relation to each other, from that which God sustains to men. They are all fallible, and deficient in a thousand duties which they owe to each other. They are bound, therefore, by the precept of doing to others, as they would have them do them, to forgive, without a satisfaction, inasmuch as they con- stantly require the same forgiveness to be exercised towards themselves. To punish murder, therefore, or any other crime, by
44 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
death, under the gospel dispensation, is to exalt the angry and vindictive passions of men to an equality with the perfect law of God. It is to place imperfect individuals and corrupted human governments, upon the throne of the righteous judge of the universe: nay, more — it is to make the death of Christ of no effect; for every time we punish murder by death, we practi- cally deny that it was a full expiation for every sin, and thereby exclude ourselves from deriving any benefit from it, for he has made the forgiveness of injuries, without any exceptions, whether committed against us in our private capacities, or as members of a community, the express condition of our title to the forgive- ness which he has purchased for us by his death.
The arguments against the punishment of murder by death, from reason, remain on an immoveable foundation. Our author has contradicted — but has not refuted one of them. I affirmed in my former essay, that the punishment of murder by death had been abolished in several of the European nations. I wish for the honor of our author's profession, he had doubted of this asser- tion with more of the meek and gentle spirit of a Christian. To satisfy him upon this subject, I shall subjoin the following ex- tracts from authorities which are now before me. — In the in- structions to the commissioners appointed to frame a new code of laws for the Russian Empire, by Catharine II. the present empress of Russia, I find the following passage. I take great pleasure in transcribing it, as the sentiments it contains do so much honor not only to the female understanding, but to the human mind.
"Proofs from facts demonstrate to us, that the frequent use of capital punishments, never mended the morals of a people. Therefore, if I prove the death of a citizen to be neither useful nor necessary to society in general, I shall confute those who rise up against humanity. In a reign of peace and tranquillity, under a government established with the united wishes of a whole people, in a state well fortified against external enemies, and pro- tected within by strong supports; that is, by its own internal strength, and virtuous sentiments, rooted in the minds of the
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citizens, there can be no necessity for taking away the life of a citizen. It is not the excess of severity, nor the destruction of the human species, that produces a powerful effect upon the hearts of the citizens, but the continued duration of the punishment. The death of a malefactor is not so efficacious a method of de- terring from wickedness, as the example continually remaining, of a man who is deprived of his liberty, that he might repair, during a life of labour, the injury he has done to the community. The terror of death excited by the imagination may be more strong, but has not force enough to resist that oblivion which is so natural to mankind. It is a general rule, that rapid and violent impressions upon the human mind, disturb and give pain, but do not operate long upon the memory. That a punishment, therefore, might be conformable with justice, it ought to have such a degree of severity as might be sufficient to deter people from committing the crime. Hence I presume to affirm, that there is no man who, upon the least degree of reflexion, would put the greatest possible advantages, he might flatter himself from a crime, on the one side, into the balance against a life protracted under a total privation of liberty, on the other"
In a British review for the present year, I find a short account of the code of penal laws lately enacted by the emperor of Ger- many. This enlightened monarch has divided imprisonment into mild — severe — and rigorous. For the crime of murder, he inflicts the punishment of rigorous imprisonment — which from its dura- tion, and other terrifying circumstances that attend it, is calcu- lated to produce more beneficial effects in preventing murders, than all the executions that have ever taken place in any age or country.
I derived my information of the abolition of capital punish- ment in Sweden and Tuscany, from two foreigners of distinc- tion, who lately visited the United States. The one was an Italian nobleman, the other was a captain in the Swedish navy — both of whom commanded every where respect and attachment for their abilities and virtues.
It is true, this happy revolution in favour of justice and hu-
46 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
manity, in the instances that have been mentioned, did not origi- nate in a convocation or a synod. It may either be ascribed to the light of the gospel shining in "darkness, which comprehended it not" — or to the influence of sound and cultivated reason — for reason and religion have the same objects. They are in no one instance opposed to each other. On the contrary, reason is noth- ing but imperfect religion, and religion is nothing but perfect reason.
It becomes Christians to beware how far they condemn the popular virtue of humanity, because it is recommended by Deists, or by persons who do not profess to be bound by the strict obligations of Christianity. — Voltaire first taught the princes of Europe the duty of religious toleration. The Duke of Sully has demonstrated the extreme folly of war, and has proved that when it has been conducted with the most glory, it never added an atom to national happiness. The Marquis of Beccaria has estab- lished a connexion between the abolition of capital punishments, and the order and happiness of society. Should any thing be found in the Scriptures, contrary to these discoveries, it is easy to foresee that the principles of the deists and the laws of mod- ern legislators will soon have a just preference to the principles and precepts of the gospel.
Our author attempts to support his sanguinary tenets by an appeal to revelation. And here I shall make two preliminary remarks.
1. There is no opinion so absurd or impious, that may not be supported by solitary texts of scripture. To collect the sense of the bible upon any subject, we must be governed by its whole spirit and tenor.
2. The design of Christianity at its first promulgation was to reform the world by its spirit rather than by its positive precepts.
Our Saviour does not forbid slavery in direct terms — but he indirectly bears a testimony against it, by commanding us to do to others what we would have them in like circumstances to do to us. He did not aim to produce a sudden revolution in the
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affairs of men. He knew too well the power and efficacy of his religion for that purpose. It was unnecessary, therefore, to sub- ject it to additional opposition, by a direct attack upon the prejudices and interests of mankind, both of which were closely interwoven with the texture of their civil governments.
After these remarks, I shall only add, that the declaration of St. Paul before Festus, respecting the punishment of death * and the speech of the dying thief on the cross, f only prove that the punishment of death was agreeable to the Roman law, but they by no means prove that they were sanctioned by the gospel. — Human life was extremely cheap under the Roman government. Of this we need no further proof than the head of John the Baptist forming a part of a royal entertainment. From the fre- quency of public executions, among those people, the sword was considered as an emblem of public justice — but to suppose from this appeal to a sign of justice, or from our Saviour's para- ble of the destruction of the husbandmen, that capital punish- ments are approved of in the New Testament, is as absurd as it would be to suppose that horseracing was a Christian exercise, from St. Paul's frequent allusions to the Olympic games.
The declaration of the barbarians upon seeing the snake fasten upon St. Paul's hand proves nothing but the ignorance of those uncivilized people. I deny the consent of all nations to the punishment of death for murder — but if it were true — it only proves the universality of the ignorance and depravity of man. Revenge, dissimulation, and even theft, prevail among all the nations in the world, — and yet who will dare to assert, that these vices are just, or necessary to the order or happiness of society.
Our author does not distinguish between the sense of justice so universal among all nations, and an approbation of death as a punishment for murder. The former is written by the finger
* "For if I be an offender, and have committed any thing worthy of death, I refuse not to die." Acts 25 and 11.
t "We indeed" suffer "justly, for we receive the due reward of our deeds." Luke 23 and 41.
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of God upon every human heart, but like his own attribute of justice, it has the happiness of individuals and of society for its objects. It is always misled, when it seeks for satisfaction in punishments that are injurious to society, or that are dispropor- tioned to crimes. The satisfaction of this universal sense of jus- tice by the punishments of imprisonment and labor, would far exceed that which is derived from the punishment of death; for it would be of longer duration, and it would more frequently occur, for, upon a principle laid down in the first essay upon this subject, scarcely any species of murder would escape with im- punity.*
The conduct and discourses of our Saviour should outweigh every argument that has been or can be offered in favour of capital punishment for any crime. When the woman caught in adultery was brought to him, he evaded inflicting the bloody sentence of the Jewish law upon her. Even the maiming of the body appears to be offensive in his sight, for when Peter drew his sword and smote off the ear of the servant of the high priest, he replaced it by miracle, and at the same time declared, that "all they who take the sword, shall perish with the sword." He forgave the crime of murder, on his cross; and after his resur- rection, he commanded his disciples to preach the gospel of forgiveness first at Jerusalem, where he well knew his murderers still resided. These striking facts are recorded for our imitation, and seem intended to show that the Son of God died, not only to reconcile God to man, but to reconcile men to each other. There is one passage more, in the history of our Saviour's life, which would of itself overset the justice of the punishment of death for murder, if every other part of the Bible had been silent
* A scale of punishments by means of imprisonment and labor might easily be contrived, so as to be accommodated to the different degrees of atrocity in murder. For example — for the first or highest degree of guilt, let the punishment be solitude and darkness, and a total want of employment. For the second, solitude and labour, with the benefit of light. For the third, confinement and labor. The duration of these punish- ments should likewise be governed by the atrocity of the murder, and by the signs of contrition and amendment in the criminal.
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upon the subject. When two of his disciples, actuated by the spirit of vindictive legislators, requested permission of him to call down fire from heaven to consume the inhospitable Samari- tans, he answered them "the Son of Man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." I wish these words composed the motto of the arms of every nation upon the face of the earth. They inculcate every duty that is calculated to preserve — restore — or prolong human life. They militate alike against war — and capital punishments — the objects of which are the unprofitable destruction of the lives of men. How precious does a human life appear from these words, in the sight of heaven! Pause, legis- lators, when you give your votes for inflicting the punishment of death for any crime. You frustrate, in one instance, the design of the mission of the Son of God into the world, and thereby either deny his appearance in the flesh, or reject the truth of his gospel. You moreover strengthen by your conduct the argu- ments of the Deists and Socinians against the particular doctrines of the Christian revelation. You do more — you preserve a bloody fragment of the ancient institution. "The Son of Man came not to destroy men's lives, but to save them." Excellent words! I require no others to satisfy me of the truth and divine original of the Christian religion, and while I am able to place a finger upon this text of scripture, I will not believe an angel from heaven, should he declare that the punishment of death for any crime was inculcated, or permitted by the spirit of the gospel. It has been said, that a man who has committed a murder, has discovered a malignity of heart, that renders him ever after- wards unfit to live in human society. This is by no means true in many, and perhaps in most of the cases of murder. It is most frequently the effect of a sudden gust of passion, and has some- times been the only stain of a well spent or inoffensive life. There are many crimes which unfit a man much more for human society, than a single murder, and there have been instances of murderers who have escaped or bribed the laws of their country, who have afterwards become peaceable, and useful members of society. Let it not be supposed that I wish to palliate by this
5o SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
remark, the enormity of murder. Far from it. It is only because I view murder with such superlative horror, that I wish to de- prive our laws of the power of perpetrating and encouraging it.
Our author has furnished us with a number of tales to show that the providence of God is concerned in a peculiar manner in detecting murder, and that the confessions of murderers have in many instances sanctified the justice of their punishment. I do not wish to lessen the influence of such vulgar errors as tend to prevent crimes, but I will venture to declare, that many more murderers escape discovery, than are detected, or punished. Were I not afraid of trespassing upon the patience of my readers, I might mention a number of facts, in which circum- stances of the most trifling nature have become the means of detecting theft and forgery, from which I could draw as strong proofs of the watchfulness of providence over the property of individuals, and the order of society, as our author has drawn from the detection of murder. I might mention instances, like- wise, of persons in whom conscience has produced restitution for stolen goods, or confession of the justice of the punishment which was inflicted for theft. Conscience and knowledge always keep pace with each other, both with respect to divine and human laws. A party of soldiers in the Duke of Alva's army, murdered a man and his wife with six children. They roasted the youngest child, and dined upon it. One of them after din- ner clapped his hands together, and with great agitation of mind cried out "good God — what have I done?" — What? said one of his companions — uwhy" said the other "I have eaten flesh in Lent time." Here conscience kept pace with his degrees of knowledge. The same thing occurs upon different occasions every day. The acquiescence of murderers in the justice of their execution, is the effect of prejudice and education. It cannot flow from a conscience acting in concert with reason or re- ligion— for they both speak a very different language.
The world has certainly undergone a material change for the better within the last two hundred years. This change has been produced chiefly, by the secret and unacknowledged influence
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of Christianity upon the hearts of men. It is agreeable to trace the effects of the Christian religion in the extirpation of slavery — in the diminution of the number of capital punishments, and in the mitigation of the horrors of war. There was a time when masters possessed a power over the lives of their slaves. But Christianity has deposed this power, and mankind begins to see every where that slavery is alike contrary to the interests of society, and the spirit of the gospel. There was a time when torture was part of the punishment of death, and when the num- ber of capital crimes amounted to one hundred and sixty-one. Christianity has abolished the former, and reduced the latter to not more than six or seven. It has done more. It has confined in some instances capital punishments to the crime of murder only — and in some countries it has abolished it altogether. The in- fluence of Christianity upon the modes of war has been still more remarkable. It is agreeable to trace its progress.
i st. In rescuing women and children from being the objects of the desolations of war in common with men.
adly. In preventing the destruction of captives taken in battle, in cold blood.
3dly. In protecting the peaceable husbandman from sharing in the carnage of war.
4thly. In producing an exchange of prisoners, instead of dooming them to perpetual slavery.
5thly. In avoiding the invasion or destruction, in certain cases, of private property.
6thly. In declaring all wars to be unlawful but such as are purely defensive.
This is the only tenure by which war now holds its place among Christians. It requires but little ingenuity to prove that a defensive war cannot be carried on successfully without offen- sive operations. If this be true, then this last degree of it, upon our author's principles, must be contrary t6 the spirit of the gospel. Already the princes and nations of the world discover the struggles of opinion or conscience in their preparations for war. Witness, the many national disputes which have been lately
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terminated in Europe by negotiation, or mediation. Witness, too, the establishment of the Constitution of the United States without force or bloodshed. These events indicate an improving state of human affairs. They lead us to look forward with ex- pectation to the time, when the weapons of war shall be changed into implements of husbandry, and when rapine and violence shall be no more. These events are the promised fruits of the gospel. If they do not come to pass, the prophets have deceived us. But if they do — war must be as contrary to the spirit of the gospel, as fraud, or murder, or any other of the vices which are reproved or extirpated by it.*
I cannot take leave of this subject without remarking that capital punishments are the natural offspring of monarchical gov- ernments. Kings believe that they possess their crowns by a divine right: no wonder, therefore, they assume the divine power of taking away human life. Kings consider their subjects as their property: no wonder, therefore, they shed their blood with as little emotion as men shed the blood of their sheep or cattle. But the principles of republican governments speak a very different language. They teach us the absurdity of the divine origin of kingly power. They approximate the extreme ranks of men to each other. They restore man to his God — to society — and to himself. They revive and establish the relations of fellow-citizen, friend, and brother. They appreciate human life, and increase public and private obligations to preserve it. They consider human sacrifices as no less offensive to the sovereignty of the people, than they are to the majesty of heaven. They view the attributes of government, like the attributes of the Deity, as infinitely more honoured by destroying evil by means of merci- ful than by exterminating punishments. The United States have
* The spirit of Christianity which our author describes as a vulgar deistical species of humanity, has found its way into schools and families, and has abolished, in both, corporal and ignominious punishments. In the instructions to the masters and mistresses of the sundry schools, I observe with great pleasure a direction "to use corporal punishments as seldom as possible."
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adopted these peaceful and benevolent forms of government. It becomes them therefore to adopt their mild and benevolent prin- ciples. An execution in a republic is like a human sacrifice in religion. It is an offering to monarchy, and to that malignant being, who has been styled a murderer from the beginning, and who delights equally in murder, whether it be perpetrated by the cold, but vindictive arm of the law, or by the angry hand of private revenge.
OBSERVATIONS ON THE GOVERNMENT OF PENNSYLVANIA
Letter 1
EVERY FREE government should consist of three parts, viz. I. A BILL OF RIGHTS. II. A CONSTITUTION. And III. LAWS.
I. The BILL OF RIGHTS should contain the great principles of natural and civil liberty. It should be unalterable by any human power.
II. The CONSTITUTION is the executive part of the Bill of Rights. It should contain the division and distribution of the power of the people. — The modes and forms of making laws, of executing justice, and of transacting business: Also the limitation of power, as to time and jurisdiction. It should be unalterable by the legislature, and should be changed only by a representation of the people, chosen for that purpose.
III. LAWS are the executive part of a constitution. They cease to be binding whenever they transgress the principles of Liberty, as laid down in the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Let us now apply these principles to the Bill of Rights, Con- stitution and Laws of Pennsylvania. But previous to my entering upon this task, I beg leave to declare, that I am not led to it by a single party or personal prejudice; on the contrary, I honour most of the friends of the present government as the warmest Whigs among us, and I am proud of numbering several of the gentlemen who were concerned in making, and in attempting to execute the government, among my particular friends.
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I. The Bill of Rights has confounded natural and civil rights in such a manner as to produce endless confusion in society.
II. The Constitution in the gross is exceptionable in the fol- lowing particulars:
1. No regard is paid in it to the ancient habits and customs of the people of Pennsylvania in the distribution of the supreme power of the state, nor in the forms of business, or in the style of the Constitution. The suddenness of the late revolution, the attachment of a large body of the people to the old Constitution of the state, and the general principles of human nature made an attention to ancient forms and prejudices a matter of the utmost importance to this state in the present controversy with Great Britain. Of so much consequence did the wise Athenians view the force of ancient habits and customs in their laws and government, that they punished all strangers with death who interfered in their politics. They well knew the effects of novelty upon the minds of the people, and that a more fatal stab could not be given to the peace and safety of their state than by expos- ing its laws and government to frequent or unnecessary inno- vations.
2. The Constitution is wholly repugnant to the principles of action in man, and has a direct tendency to check the progress of genius and virtue in human nature. It supposes perfect equal- ity, and an equal distribution of property, wisdom and virtue, among the inhabitants of the state.
3. It comprehends many things which belong to a Bill of Rights, and to Laws, and which form no part of a Constitution.
4. It is contrary, in an important article, to the Bill of Rights. By the second article of the Bill of Rights, "no man can be abridged of any civil right, who acknowledges the being of a GOD;" but by the Constitution, no man can take his seat in the Assembly, who does not "acknowledge the Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration."
5. It is deficient in point of perspicuity and method. Instead of reducing the legislative, executive and judicial parts of the constitution, with their several powers and forms of business,
56 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
to distinct heads, the whole of them are jumbled together in a most unsystematic manner.
6. It fixes all these imperfections upon the people for seven years, by precluding them from the exercise of their own power to remove them at any other time, or in any other manner than by a septennial convention, called by a Council of Censors.
III. The laws and proceedings of the Assembly of Pennsyl- vania are in many particulars contrary to the Constitution. Only one half of the Members took the oath of allegiance, prescribed in the tenth section of the Constitution. The Speaker of the House issued writs for the election of Members of Assembly and of Counsellors, notwithstanding this power is lodged, by the i pth section of the Constitution, only in the President and Coun- cil. Two gentlemen were appointed Members of ^Congress, who held offices under the Congress, which is expressly forbidden in the nth section of the Constitution. The Constitution re- quires further in the 4oth section, that every military officer should take the oath of allegiance, before he enters upon the execution of his office; but the Assembly have dispensed with this oath in their Militia Law. The ijth section of the Constitu- tion declares, that no law shall be passed, unless it be previously published for the consideration of the People; but the Assembly passed all the laws of their late session, without giving the People an opportunity of seeing them, till they were called upon to obey them. These proceedings of the Assembly lead to one, and perhaps to all the three following conclusions: First, That the Assembly have violated the principles of the Constitution; secondly, that the Constitution is so formed, that it could not be executed by the Assembly, consistent with the safety of the State; lastly, that none of their laws are binding, inasmuch as they are contrary to the superior and radical laws of the Con- stitution. These considerations are all of a most alarming nature. Farewell to Liberty, when the sacred bulwarks of a Constitution can be invaded by a legislature! And if the Constitution cannot be executed in all its parts, without endangering the safety of the State, and if all our late laws must be set aside in a court of
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justice, because they were not assented to by the People, previous to their being enacted, is it not high time for the People to unite and form a more effectual, and more practicable system of gov- ernment? . . .
If strict justice should poise the scale in the trial of Tory property, I can easily foresee from the virtue of the People, on which side the beam would turn; but it becomes us to reflect, that all trials for forfeited property must be held in courts of ivritten law, and the flaws of our Constitution and laws are so wide, that the most gigantic Tory criminal might escape through them.
Letter II
I shall now proceed to say a few words upon particular parts of the Constitution.
In the second section, "the supreme legislature is vested in a 'single' House of Representatives of the Freemen of the Com- monwealth." By this section we find, that the supreme, absolute, and uncontrolled power of the whole State is lodged in the hands of one body of men. Had it been lodged in the hands of one man, it would have been less dangerous to the safety and liberties of the community. Absolute power should never be trusted to man. It has perverted the wisest heads, and corrupted the best hearts in the world. I should be afraid to commit my property, liberty and life to a body of angels for one whole year. The Supreme Being alone is qualified to possess supreme power over his crea- tures. It requires the wisdom and goodness of a Deity to control, and direct it properly.
In order to show the extreme danger of trusting all the legis- lative power of a State *o a single representation, I shall beg leave to transcribe a few sentences from a letter, written by Mr. JOHN ADAMS, to one of his friends in North Carolina, who requested him to favour him with a plan of government for that State above a twelve-month ago. This illustrious Citizen, who is second to no man in America, in an inflexible attachment to the liberties
58 SELECTED WRITINGS OF BENJAMIN RUSH
of this country, and to republican forms of government, writes as follows,
"I think a people cannot be long free, nor ever happy, whose government is in one Assembly. My reasons for this opinion are as follow,
1. "A single Assembly is liable to all the vices, follies and frailties of an individual, — subject to fits of humour, — starts of passions,* flights of enthusiasm, — partialities of prejudice, and consequently productive of hasty results and absurd judgments. All these errors ought to be corrected, and defects supplied by some controlling power.
2. "A single Assembly is apt to be avaricious, and in time will not scruple to exempt itself from burdens, which it will lay, without compunction, upon its constituents.
3. "A single Assembly is apt to grow ambitious, and after a time will not hesitate to vote itself perpetual. This was one fault of the Long Parliament, but more remarkably of Holland, whose Assembly first voted themselves from annual to septennial, then for life, and after a course of years, that all vacancies happening by death or otherwise, should be filled by themselves, without any application to constituents at all.
4. "Because a single Assembly possessed of all the powers of government would make arbitrary laws for their own interest, and adjudge all controversies in their own favor." f
If any thing could be necessary upon this subject, after such an authority, I might here add, that Montesquieu — Harrington
* A Committee of the Convention, which formed the Constitution of Pennsylvania, published in the Pennsylvania Packet of October 15, 1776, as an apology for one of their Ordinances, that was thought to be arbitrary and unjust, that it was passed when "the minds of the Convention were agitated, and their passions inflamed."
t These reasons are given by our author for not lodging all power legislative, executive and judicial, in one body of men. This has been done, as will be shown hereafter in the Constitution of Pennsylvania: But, supposing it had been otherwise, our author adds, "shall the whole power of legislation rest in one Assembly? Most of the foregoing reasons (one is omitted) apply equally to prove, that the whole legislative power ought to be more complex."
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— Milton — Addison — Price — Bolingbroke, and others, the wisest statesmen, and the greatest friends to Liberty in the world, have left testimonies upon record of the extreme folly and danger of a people's being governed by a single legislature. I shall content myself with the following extract from the last of those authors. The sentiments correspond exactly with those of our country- man before-mentioned.
"By simple forms of government, I mean such as lodge the whole supreme power, absolutely and without control, either in a single person, or in the principal persons of the community, or in the whole body of the people. Such governments are gov- ernments of arbitrary will, and therefore of all imaginable ab- surdities the most absurd. They stand in direct opposition to the sole motive of submission to any government whatsoever; for if men quit the State, and renounce the rights of nature, (one of which is, to be sure, that of being governed by their own will) they do this, that they may not remain exposed to the arbitrary will of other men, the weakest to that of the strongest, the few to that of the many. Now, in submitting to any single form of government whatever, they establish what they mean to avoid, and for fear of being exposed to arbitrary will sometimes, they choose to be governed by it always. These governments do not only degenerate into tyranny; they are tyranny in their very institution; and they who submit to them, are slaves, not subjects, however the supreme power may be exercised; for tyranny and slavery do not so properly consist in the stripes that are given and received, as in the power of giving them at pleasure, and the necessity of receiving them, whenever and for whatever they are inflicted."
I might go on further and show, that all the dissentions of Athens and Rome, so dreadful in their nature, and so fatal in their consequences, originated in single Assemblies possessing all the power of those commonwealths; but this would be the business of a volume, and not of a single essay. — I shall therefore pass on, to answer the various arguments that have been used in Pennsylvania, in support of a single legislature.'
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1. We are told, that the perfection of every thing consists in its simplicity, — that all mixtures in government are impurities, and that a single legislature is perfect, because it is simple. — To this I answer, that we should distinguish between simplicity in principles, and simplicity in the application of principles to prac- tice. What can be more simple than the principles of mechanics, and yet into how many thousand forms have they been tortured by the ingenuity of man. A few simple elementary bodies com- pose all the matter of the universe, and yet how infinitely are they combined in the various forms and substances which they assume in the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms. In like manner a few simple principles enter into the composition of all free governments. These principles are perfect security for prop- erty, liberty and life; but these principles admit of extensive combinations, when reduced to practice: — Nay more, they re- quire them. A despotic government is the most simple govern- ment in the world, but instead of affording security to property, liberty or life, it obliges us to hold them all on the simple will of a capricious sovereign. I maintain therefore, that all govern- ments are safe and free in proportion as they are compounded in a certain degree, and on the contrary, that all governments are dangerous and tyrannical in proportion as they approach to simplicity.
2. We are told by the friends of a single legislature, that there can be no danger of their becoming tyrannical, since they must partake of all the burdens they lay upon their constituents. Here we forget the changes that are made upon the head and heart by arbitrary power, and the cases that are recorded in history of annual Assemblies having refused to share with their constituents in the burdens which they had imposed upon them. If every elector in Pennsylvania is capable of being elected an assembly-man, then agreeably to the sixth section of the Con- stitution, it is possible for an Assembly to exist who do not possess a single foot of property in the State, and who can give no other evidence of a common interest in, or attachment to, the community than having paid "public taxes," which may mean
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poor-taxes. Should this be the case, (and there is no obstacle in the Constitution to prevent it) surely it will be in the power of such an Assembly to draw from the State the whole of its wealth ih a few years, without contributing any thing further towards it than their proportion of the trifling tax necessary to support the poor. — But I shall show in another place equal dangers from another class of men, becoming a majority in the Assembly.
3. We are told of instances of the House of Lords, in Eng- land, checking the most salutary laws, after they had passed the House of Commons, as a proof of the inconvenience of a com- pound legislature. I believed the fact to be true, but I deny its application in the present controversy. The House of Lords, in England, possess privileges and interests, which do not belong to the House of Commons. Moreover they derive their power from the crown and not from the people. No wonder therefore they consult their own interests, in preference to those of the People. In the State of Pennsylvania we wish for a council, with no one exclusive privilege, and we disclaim every idea of their possessing the smallest degree of power, but what is derived from the annwl suffrages of the People. A body thus chosen could have no object in view but the happiness of their con- stituents. It is remarkable in Connecticut, that the legislative council of that State has in no one instance made amendments, or put a negative upon the acts of their Assembly, in the course of above one hundred years, in which both have not appeared to the people in a few months to have been calculated to pro- mote their liberty and happiness.
4. We are told, that the Congress is a single legislature, there- fore a single legislature is to be preferred to a compound one. — The objects of legislation in the Congress relate only to peace and war, alliances, trade, the Post-Office, and the government of the army and navy. They never touch the liberty, property, nor life of the individuals of any State in their resolutions, and even in their ordinary subjects of legislation, they are liable to be checked by each of the Thirteen States.
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5. We have been told, that a legislative council or governor lays the foundation for aristocratical and monarchical power in a community. However ridiculous this objection to a compound legislature may appear, I have more than once heard "it men- tioned by the advocates for a single Assembly. Who would believe, that the same fountain of pure water should send forth, at the same time, wholesome and deadly streams? Are not the Council and Assembly both formed alike by the annual breath of the people? But I will suppose, that a legislative Council as- pired after the honors of hereditary titles and power, would they not be effectually checked by the Assembly?
I cannot help commending the zeal that appears in my countrymen against the power of a King or a House of Lords. I concur with them in all their prejudices against hereditary titles, honour and power. History is little else than a recital of the follies and vices of kings and noblemen, and it is because I dread so much from them, that I wish to exclude them for ever from Pennsylvania, for notwithstanding our government has been called a simple democracy, I maintain, that a foundation is laid in it for the most complete aristocracy that ever existed in the world.
In order to prove this assertion, I shall premise two propo- sitions, which have never been controverted: First, where there is wealth, there will be power; and, secondly, the rich have always been an over-match for the poor in all contests for power.
These truths being admitted, I desire to know what can pre- vent our single representation being filled, in the course of a few years, with a majority of rich men? Say not, the people will not choose such men to represent them. The influence of wealth at elections is irresistible. It has been seen and felt in Pennsyl- vania, and I am obliged in justice to my subject to say, that there are poor men among us as prepared to be influenced, as the rich are prepared to influence them. The fault must be laid in both cases upon human nature. The consequence of a major- ity of rich men getting into the legislature is plain. Their wealth will administer fuel to the love of arbitrary power that is com-
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mon to all men. The present Assembly have furnished them with precedents for breaking the Constitution. Farewell now to annual elections! Public emergencies will sanctify the most dar- ing measures. The clamours of their constituents will be silenced with offices, bribes or punishments. An aristocracy will be estab- lished, and Pennsylvania will be inhabited like most of the countries in Europe, with only two sorts of animals, tyrants and slaves.
It has often been said, that there is but one rank of men in America, and therefore, that there should be only one repre- sentation of them in a government. I agree, that we have no artificial distinctions of men into noblemen and commoners among us, but it ought to be remarked, that superior degrees of industry and capacity, and above all, commerce, have intro- duced inequality of property among us, and these have intro- duced natural distinctions of rank in Pennsylvania, as certain and general as the artificial distinctions of men in Europe. This will ever be the case while commerce exists in this country. The men of middling property and poor men can never be safe in a mixed representation with the men of over-grown property. Their liberties can only be secured by having exact bounds pre- scribed to their power, in the fundamental principles of the Con- stitution. By a representation of the men of middling fortunes in one house, their whole strength is collected against the influence of wealth. Without such a representation, the most violent efforts of individuals to oppose it would be divided and broken, and would want that system, which alone would enable them to check that lust for dominion which is always connected with opulence. The government of Pennsylvania therefore has been called most improperly a government for poor men. It carries in every part of it a poison to their liberties. It is impossible to form a government more suited to the passions and interests of rich men.
6. But says the advocate for a single legislature, if one of the advantages of having a Legislative Council arises from the Coun- sellors possessing more wisdom than the Assembly, why may not
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the members of the Council be thrown into the Assembly, in order to instruct and enlighten them? If sound reasoning always prevailed in popular Assemblies, this objection to a Legislative Council might have some weight. The danger in this case would be, that the Counsellors would partake of the passions and preju- dices of the Assembly, by taking part in their debates; or, if they did not, that they would be so inconsiderable in point of num- bers, that they would be constantly out-voted by the members of the Assembly.
7. But would you suffer twenty or thirty men in a Legisla- tive Council to control seventy or eighty in an Assembly? Yes, and that for two reasons: First, I shall suppose that they will consist of men of the most knowledge and experience in the State: Secondly, that their obligations to wisdom and integrity will be much stronger than the Assembly's can be, because fewer men will be answerable for unjust or improper proceed- ings at the bar of the public. But I beg pardon of my readers for introducing an answer to an objection to a small number of men controlling the proceedings of a greater. The friends of the present Constitution of Pennsylvania cannot urge this ob- jection with any force, for in the 47 th section of the Constitution I find twenty-four men called a COUNCIL of CENSORS, invested with a supreme and uncontrolled power to revise and to censure all the laws and proceedings of not a single Assembly, but of all the Assemblies that shall exist for seven years, which Assemblies may contain the united wisdom of five hundred and four Assem- bly-men. They are moreover, invested with more wisdom than the Convention that is to be chosen by their recommendation; for this Convention, which is to consist of seventy-two men, is to make no one alteration in the Constitution but what was suggested to them by the Council of Censors. I can easily con- ceive that two houses consisting of an unequal number of mem- bers, both viewing objects through the same medium of time and place, may agree in every thing essential, and disagree in matters only of doubtful issue to the welfare of the state; but I am sure, a body of twenty-four men sitting in judgment upon the pro-
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ceedings of a body of men defunct in their public capacity seven years before them, cannot fail of committing the most egregious mistakes from the obscurity which time, and their ignorance of a thousand facts and reasonings must throw upon all their de- liberations. But more of the arbitrary power of the Censors hereafter.
8. We are told that the State of Pennsylvania has always been governed by a single legislature, and therefore, that part of our Constitution is not an innovation. There is a short way of confuting this assertion by pronouncing it without any foun- dation. The Governor always had a negative power upon our laws, and was a distinct branch of our legislature. It is true, he sometimes exercised his power to the disadvantage of the people; for he was the servant of a King who possessed an interest dis- tinct from that of his people, and in some cases the Governor him- self possessed an interest incompatible with the rights of the people. God forbid that ever we should see a resurrection of his power in Pennsylvania, but I am obliged to own, that I have known instances in which the whole state have thanked him for the interposition of his negative and amendments upon the acts of the Assembly. Even the Assembly-men themselves have ac- knowledged the justice of his conduct upon these occasions, by condemning in their cooler hours their own hasty, and ill- digested resolutions.
9. But why all these arguments in favor of checks for the Assembly. The Constitution (says the single legislative-man) has provided no less than four for them. First, Elections will be annual. Secondly, The doors of the Assembly are to be always open. Thirdly, All laws are to be published for the consideration and assent of the people: And, Fourthly, The Council of Cen- sors will punish, by their censures, all violations of the Constitu- tion, and the authors of bad laws. I shall examine the efficacy of each of these checks separately.
I hope, for the peace of the state, that we shall never see a body of men in power more attached to the present Constitution than the present Assembly, and if, with all their affection for it,
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they have broken it in many articles, it is reasonable to suppose that future Assemblies will use the same freedoms with it. They may, if they chuse, abolish annual elections. J They may tell their constituents that elections draw off the minds of the people from necessary labour; or, if a war should exist, they may show the im- possibility of holding elections when there is a chance of the militia being called into the field to oppose a common enemy: Or lastly, they may fetter elections with oaths in such a manner as to exclude nine-tenths of the electors from voting. Such stratagems for perpetual power will never want men nor a society of men to support them; for the Assembly possesses such a pleni- tude of power from the influence of the many offices of profit and honour * that are in their gift, that they may always promise themselves support from a great part of the state. But I will suppose that no infringement is ever made upon annual elections. In the course of even one year a single Assembly may do the most irreparable mischief to a state. Socrates and Barnevelt were both put to death by Assemblies that held their powers at the election of the people. The same Assemblies would have shed oceans of tears to have recalled those illustrious citizens to life again, in less than half a year after they imbrued their hands in their blood.
I am highly pleased with having the doors of our Assembly kept constantly open; but how can this check the proceedings of the Assembly, when none but a few citizens of the town or county, where the Assembly sits, or a few travelling strangers, can ever attend or watch them?
£ The late Convention was chosen for the sole purpose of making a government, and was composed of honest, well-meaning men, and yet, I have good authority to say, that several of them proposed to their friends forming themselves into an Assembly, to execute the government.
* The President is appointed chiefly by the Assembly. His salary, together with the salaries of the Judges, are fixed by the Assembly. Dele- gates in Congress, the Lieutenants and Sub-Lieutenants of counties, Proton- otaries, Registers of Wills, Money-Signers, &c. &c. are all appointed solely by the Assembly. Each of these officers brings with him the influence of his friends and family-connections. When collected together, they make a little army of placemen.
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I shall take no notice of the delays of business, which must arise from publishing all laws for the consideration and assent of the people; but I beg to be informed bow long they must be published before they are passed? For I take it for granted, that each county has a right to equal degrees of time to consider of the laws. In what manner are they to be circulated? How are the sentiments of the people, scattered over a county fifty or sixty miles in extent, to be collected? Whether by ballot, or by voting in a tumultuary manner? These are insurmountable difficulties in the way of the people at large acting as a check upon the Assembly. But supposing an attempt should be made to restrain the single legislature in this manner, are we sure the disapproba- tion of the people would be sufficient to put a negative upon improper or arbitrary laws? Would not the Assembly, from their partiality to their own proceedings, be apt to pass over the com- plaints of the people in silence? to neglect or refuse to enter their petitions or remonstrances upon their Journals? or to raise the hue and cry of a fostered junto upon them, as "Tories" or "apostate Whigs" or "an aristocratic faction?"
To talk of the Councils of Censors, as a check upon the Assembly, is to forget that a man or a body of men may deceive, rob, and enslave the public for seven years, and then may escape the intended efficacy of the censures of the Council by death, or by flying into a neighbouring state.
10. We are informed that a single legislature was supported in the Convention by Dr. Franklin, and assented to by Mr. Rit- tenhouse; gentlemen distinguished for their uncommon abilities, and deservedly dear for their virtues to every lover of human nature. The only answer, after what has been said, that I shall give to this argument, is, that Divine Providence seems to have permitted them to err upon this subject, in order to console the world for the very great superiority they both possess over the rest of mankind in every thing else, except the science of gov- ernment.
Thus have I answered all the arguments that ever I have heard offered in favour of a single legislature, and I hope, silenced all
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the objections that have been made to a double representation of the people. I might here appeal further to the practice of our courts of law in favour of repeated deliberations and divi- sions. In a free government, the most inconsiderable portion of our liberty and property cannot be taken from us, without the judgment of two or three courts; but, by the Constitution of Pennsylvania, the whole of our liberty and property, and even our lives, may be taken from us, by the hasty and passionate de- cision of a single Assembly.
I shall conclude my observations upon this part of the Con- stitution, by summing up the advantages of a compound or double legislature.
1. There is the utmost freedom in a compound legislature. The decisions of two legislative bodies cannot fail of coinciding with the wills of a great majority of the community.
2. There is safety in such a government, in as much as each body possesses a free and independent power, so that they mutu- ally check ambition and usurpation in each other.
3. There is the greatest 'wisdom in such a government. Every act being obliged to undergo the revision and amendments of two bodies of men, is necessarily strained of every mixture of folly, passion, and prejudice.f
4. There is the longest duration of freedom in such a govern- ment.*
5. There is the most order in such a government. By order, I mean obedience to laws, subordination to magistrates, civility
fThe Militia Law of the Delaware State received twenty-four amendments from the Council after it had had three readings in the Assembly; all of which were adopted at once by the Assembly. I grant, the wisdom of men collected in any way that can be devised, cannot make a perfect law; but I am sure a Legislative Council would not have overlooked many inaccuracies in the laws passed in the last session of the present Assembly of Pennsylvania.
* Sparta, which possessed a compound legislature, preserved her liberties above five hundred years. The fatal dissentions of Athens and Rome ceased as soon as their Senates, which were filled only with rich men, were checked by another Representation of the people.
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and decency of behaviour, and the contrary of every thing like mobs and factions.
6. Compound governments are most agreeable to hitman nature, inasmuch as they afford the greatest scope for the ex- pansion of the powers and virtues of the mind. Wisdom, learn- ing, experience, with the most extensive benevolence, the most unshaken firmness, and the utmost elevation of soul, are all called into exercise by the opposite and different duties of the different representations of the people.
Letter III
The powers of government have been very justly divided into legislative, executive and judicial. Having discussed the legislative power of the government of Pennsylvania, I shall proceed now to consider the executive and judicial.
It is agreed on all hands that the executive and judicial powers of government should be wholly independant of the legislative. The authors of the Pennsylvania Constitution seem to have given their sanction to this opinion, by separating those powers from the powers of the Assembly. — It becomes us to enquire whether they have made them so independant of the Assembly as to give them the free exercise of their own judgments.
The insignificant figure the President and Council make in the Constitution from not having a negative upon the laws of the Assembly, alone would soon have destroyed their authority and influence in the State. But the authors of the Constitution have taken pains to throw the whole power of the Council at once into the hands of the Assembly, by rendering the former dependant upon the latter in the two following particulars.
1. The President is chosen by the joint ballot of the Assembly and Council. The Assembly being to the Council, in point of numbers, as five are to one, of course chuse the President. Each member will expect in his turn to fill the first chair in the State, and hence the whole Council will yield themselves up to the will of the Assembly.
2. The salaries of the President and of each of the Counsellors
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are fixed by the Assembly. This will necessarily render them de- pendant upon them. It is worthy of notice here, that a rotation is established in the ipth section of the Constitution, to "prevent the danger of an inconvenient aristocracy." — From what abuse of power can this aristocracy arise? Are they not the creatures of the Assembly? But there is a magic terror in the sound of a Counsellor. Call a man an Assemblyman, or a Censor, and he becomes an innocent creature, though you invest him with the despotism of an Eastern monarch. If the Council are dependant upon the Assembly, it follows of course that the Judges, who are appointed by the Council, are likewise dependant upon them. But in order more fully to secure their dependance upon the will of the Assembly, they are obliged to hold their salaries upon the tenure of their will. In vain do they hold tjieir commissions for seven years. This is but the shadow of independance. They cannot live upon the air, and their absolute dependance upon the Assembly gives that body a transcendent influence over all the courts of law in the State. Here then we have discovered the legislative, executive and judicial powers of the State all blended together. — The liberty, the property and life of every individual in the State are laid prostrate by the Constitution at the feet of the Assembly. This combination of powers in one body has in all ages been pronounced a tyranny. To live by one man's will became the cause of all men's misery; but better, far better, would it be to live by the will of one man, than to live, or rather to die, by the will of a body of men. Unhappy Pennsyl- vania! Methinks I see the scales of justice broken in thy courts. — I see the dowry of the widow and the portion of the orphans unjustly taken from them, in order to gratify the avarice of some demagogue who rules the Assembly by his eloquence and arts. — I see the scaffolds streaming with the blood of the wisest and best men in the State. — I see the offices of government . . . But the prospect is too painful, I shall proceed to take notice of some other parts of the Constitution.
It was not sufficient to contaminate justice at its fountain, but its smallest streams are made to partake of impurity by the Con-
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vention. In the 30th section of the Constitution "all Justices of the Peace are to be elected by the freeholders of each city and county." The best observations that can be made on this part of the Constitution is to inform the public, that not above one half the people of the State chose magistrates agreeable to the laws of the Assembly for that purpose; that more than one half of those that were chosen have refused to accept of commissions, and that many of those who act are totally disqualified from the want of education or leisure for the office. — It has been said often, and I wish the saying was engraven over the doors of every statehouse on the Continent, that "all power is derived from the people," but it has never yet been said that all power is seated in the people. Government supposes and requires a delegation of power: It cannot exist without it. And the idea of making the people at large judges of the qualifications necessary for magistrates, or judges of laws, or checks for Assemblies pro- ceeds upon the supposition that mankind are all alike wise, and just, and have equal leisure. It moreover destroys the necessity for all government. What man ever made himself his own attor- ney? And yet this would not be more absurd than for the people at large to pretend to give up their power to a set of rulers, and afterwards reserve the right of making and of judging of all their laws themselves. Such a government is a monster in nature. It contains as many Governors, Assemblymen, Judges and Magis- trates as there are freemen in the State, all exercising the same powers and at the same time. Happy would it be for us, if this monster was remarkable only for his absurdity; but, alas! he contains a tyrant in his bowels. All history shows us that the people soon grow weary of the folly and tyranny of one another. They prefer one to many masters, and stability to instability of slavery. They prefer a Julius Caesar to a Senate, and a Cromwell to a perpetual Parliament.
I cannot help thinking a mistake lays rather in words than ideas when we talk of the rights of the people. Where is the difference between my choosing a Justice of Peace, and my choosing an Assemblyman and a Counsellor, by whose joint
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suffrages a Governor is chosen, who appoints a Justice for me? I am still the first link of the sacred chain of the power of the State. But are there no cases in which I may be bound by acts of a single, or of a body of magistrates in the State, whom I have had no hand in choosing? Yes, there are. Here then I am bound contrary to the principles of liberty (which consist in a man being governed by men chosen by himself), whereas if all the magistrates in the State were appointed by the Governor, or executive part of the State, it would be impossible for me to appear before the bar of a magistrate any where who did not derive his power originally from me.
By the 5th section all militia officers below the rank of a Brigadier General are to be chosen by the people. Most of the objections that have been mentioned against magistrates being chosen by the people, apply with equal force against the people's choosing their military officers. By the militia law of this State we find the soldier ceases to be commanded by the officer of his choice as soon as he comes in the field. He might as well be commanded by an officer of another State as by one of his own States, for whom he did not vote. Had he been appointed by the executive power of the government, he might have looked upon him originally as the creature of his own power, and might have claimed his care in the camp, from his influence at elections, in moving those springs in government, from which he derived his commission. But the unsuitableness of this part of the Constitu- tion to the genius of the people of Pennsylvania, will appear in the strongest point of light, from attending to the two fol- lowing facts: ist: Most of the irregularities committed by the militia, that were in service last year, were occasioned by that laxity of discipline, which was introduced and kept up by officers holding their commissions by the breath of the people: And idly, Above one half of the State have refused or neglected to choose officers, agreeably to the recommendation of the Assem- bly.— And even in many of those places, where elections for officers have been held, Colonels have been chosen by forty and Captains and Subalterns by only four or five votes.
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In the 22d section of the Constitution it is said, "every officer of the state, whether judicial or executive, shall be liable to be impeached by the General Assembly, before the President and Council, either when in office or after his resignation or removal for maladministration." Why is a man in this case to be deprived of a trial by jury? and what is the reason that no time is fixed for the commencement of this impeachment after resignation or removal for maladministration? A judicial or military officer may be innocent, and yet, from the delay of his trial for six or seven years, he may be deprived by death or other ways of the vouchers of his innocence. Woe to the man that ever holds one of the high offices of the State of Pennsylvania! He must ever, after his resignation, hold his life at the pleasure of the orator who rules the Assembly. The least mark of disrespect shown to him, or to any of the Assembly, rouses the Constitution and laws of his country against him; and perhaps, after an interval of twenty or thirty years conscious integrity, his grey hairs are dragged with sorrow to the grave. Let not this be thought to be too high a picture of this part of the Constitution of Pennsyl- vania. It is a picture of human nature in similar circumstances, in every age and country. Men possessed of unlimited and un- controlled power are beasts of prey.
But is there no power lodged in the Constitution to alter these imperfections? Has our Convention monopolized all the wisdom of succeeding years, so as to preclude any improvements being made in the infant science of government? Must we groan away our lives in a patient submission to all the evils in the Con- stitution which have been described? Let the 47th and last section of the Constitution answer these questions. By this section it is declared, that after the expiration of seven years, there shall "be chosen two men from each city and county, (a majority of whom shall be a quorum in every case, except as to calling a Conven- tion) who shall be called a Council of Censors, and who shall have power to call a Convention within two years after their sitting, if there appears to them an absolute necessity of amend- ing any article of the Constitution which may be defective, ex-
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plaining such as may be thought not clearly expressed, and of -adding such as are necessary for the preservation of the rights and happiness of the people." From this paragraph it is evident, that the Constitution was thought to be the perfection of human wisdom, and that the authors of it intended that it should last for ever. Every section of the Constitutional believe, was de- termined by a majority of the Members of the Convention, and in the nth section of the Constitution we find, that if only two- thirds of the people concur in the execution of it, the members of Assembly chosen by them, are to "possess all the powers of the General Assembly as fully and amply as if the whole were present." This is strictly agreeable to the principles of good government; but, why are these principles to be trampled upon, when the great question is to be agitated, whether the Constitu- tion shall be altered? For, unless every county and city in the State concur in electing Censors, and unless tnjoo thirds of them agree in calling a Convention, there is no possibility of obtaining an alteration of a single article of the Constitution. If the Assem- bly had not taught us that it was neither treason nor perjury to break the Constitution, I am sure it would havex remained in- violate for ever; for I am persuaded that several of the counties would have refused to have chosen Censors. But suppose they had, if only one short of two thirds of them refused to agree in the measure, we could have no Convention. The minority would give laws to a majority. A solecism in government! But there is no end to the tyranny 'and absurdity of our Constitution.
But the Council of Censors have not yet finished their business. They are empowered by the Constitution "to enquire, whether the Constitution has been preserved inviolate in every part? and whether the legislative and executive branches of gov- ernment have performed their duty, as guardians of the people; or assumed to themselves, or exercised other or greater powers than they are entitled to by the Constitution: They are also to enquire, whether the public taxes have been justly laid and col- lected in all parts of this commonwealth; — in what manner the public monies have been disposed of, and whether the laws
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have been duly executed: For these purposes they shall have power to send for persons, papers and records; they shall have authority to pass public censures, and to recommend to the legis- lature, the repealing such laws as appear to them to have been enacted contrary to the principles of the Constitution: These powers they shall continue to have for, and during the space of one year, from the day of their election, and no longer."
Is this the commission of the Grand Turk? or is it an extract from an act of the British Parliament, teeming with vengeance against the liberties of America? — No. — It is an epitome of the powers of the Council of Censors established by the late Con- vention of Pennsylvania. Innocence has nothing to fear from justice, when it flows through the regular channels of law; but where is the man who can ensure himself a moment's safety from a body of men invested with absolute power for one whole year to censure and condemn, without judge or jury, every in- dividual in the State. I shall suppose the Council to consist of a majority of those Members of Assembly, who took the oath of allegiance to the Constitution, and who voted, that no officer should be excused from taking it, who accepted of a militia- commission under the authority of this State. I shall suppose them assembled for the business of their office. The work of an age is to be performed in a single year. — Methinks I see such of those worthy gentlemen as are living, who, for the sake of union, consented to dispense with the oath of allegiance to the Con- stitution, led like criminals to their bar. — I hear peals of wrath denounced against them. I see those virtuous gentlemen, who composed the Executive Council in the year 1777, summoned to appear at their tribunal, to answer for their having abdicated the duties of their office, by an adjournment, at a time when the State was threatened with an invasion. In vain they plead, that the Constitution had invested them with no power for the defence of the State. Their names and their families are branded with infamy by a "public censure." I see hundreds and thousands coming, one after another, before the Council, to be censured for refusing to choose magistrates and militia-officers, agreeably
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to the laws of the Assembly. But who are they who are dragged with so much violence to the inquisitorial tribunal? They are a number of citizens who prayed for some alterations to be made in the Constitution. In vain they plead the obligations of reason and conscience against submitting to the government. In vain they plead their zeal and services in the common cause of America. It is all to no purpose. They recommend to the Assem- bly to impeach them for high treason. They are condemned as traitors, and the streets swim with their blood. — Good heavens! where was the mild genius of Pennsylvania, when this part of the Constitution obtained the assent of the Convention? . . . Spirit of liberty, whither wast thou fled? . . .
But perhaps the Constitution has provided a remedy for its defects, without the aid of the Council of Censors? No — this cannot be done; for every Member of Assembly, before he takes his seat, is obliged, by the loth section of the Constitution, to swear that he will not "do nor consent to any act whatever, that shall have a tendency to lessen or abridge their rights and privi- leges as declared in the Constitution of this State" as also, "that he will not directly or indirectly do or consent to any act or thing prejudicial or injurious to the Constitution or Government thereof, as established by the Convention" agreeably to the 40th section of the Constitution. These oaths of infallibility and pas- sive obedience to the form of the Constitution, effectually pre- clude every man, who holds an office under it, from attempting to procure the least amendment in any part of it.* It is a mere quibble upon words to say, that a man may mend the Constitu-
* That it was the design of the Convention, that the Constitution should not be touched by any power but a Convention to be called by the Council of Censors, appears from the oath contained in the 40th section, being required by one of their ordinances as the only condition upon which an Elector could vote for an Assemblyman. Strange! that men should call God to witness their determination to support a govern- ment, which a majority of them had not seen, and which even the minority of them did not understand or disliked! But, for the honour of the State it should be recorded, that not above 1500 of the 2500, who voted for the Assembly, took the oath required by the ordinance of the Convention.
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tion, without "doing any thing prejudicial or injurious to it." The Convention did not intend any such construction to be put upon their oaths, and hence we find in the introduction to the Constitution, they "declare the frame of government to be the Constitution of this commonwealth, and to remain in force therein forever, unaltered, except in such articles as shall here- after, upon experience, be found to require improvement, and which shall, by the same authority of the people fairly delegated, as this frame of government directs, be amended and improved." Now we know, that the frame of government forbids the least amendment being made in the Constitution in any other than by the recommendation of a Council of Censors.
Had the Constitution appeared to me to have been unexcep- tionable in every part, and had it been the result of the united wisdom of men and angels, I would not have taken an oath of passive obedience to it, for seven or nine years. The constant changes in human affairs, and in the dispositions of a people, might render occasional alterations, in that time, necessary in the most perfect Constitution. But to take an oath of allegiance to a Constitution, — full of experiments, — a Constitution that was indeed a new thing under the sun, — that had never been tried in some of its parts in any country, — and that had produced misery in other of its parts in every country. — I say to swear to support or even to submit, for seven or nine years, to such a Constitution,' is to trifle with all morality, and to dishonour the sacred name of God himself.
What would you think of a man, who would consent to shut his eyes, and swallow a quantity of food that had never before been tasted by a human creature, and swear at the same time, that if it should disorder him in ever so great a degree, he would take nothing to relieve him for eight and forty hours? Such a man would be wise, compared with the man who takes an oath of allegiance to the Constitution of Pennsylvania.
It is to no purpose to talk here of the many excellent articles in the Bill of Rights; such as religious toleration, — the habeas corpus act, — trials by juries, — the rotation of office, &c. None
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of them can flourish long in the neighbourhood of a single As- sembly, and a Council of Censors possessing all the powers of the State. . . . These inestimable privileges in the Constitution of Pennsylvania resemble a tree loaded with the most luscious fruit, but surrounded with thorns, in such a manner, as to be for ever inaccessible to the hungry traveller.
Perhaps, while the government is upon its good behaviour, and while the passions of the State are directed against a cruel and common enemy, we may not experience all the calamities that have been demonstrated to flow from the Constitution. . . . But the revolution of a few years, and the return of peace, will most certainly render Pennsylvania, under her present Constitu- tion, the most miserable spot upon the surface of the globe.
I believe all the Members of the late Convention were true Whigs, and aimed sincerely at forming a free and happy gov- ernment: But, I am sure, that if Filmar and Hobbes had sat among them, they could not have formed a government more destructive of human happiness; nor could Lord North or Gen- eral Howe have formed one more destructive of union and vigour, in our public affairs, than the present Constitution of Pennsylvania.
It is one thing to understand the principles, and another thing to understand the forms of government. The former are simple; the latter are difficult and complicated. There is the same differ- ence between principles and forms in all other sciences. Who understood the principles of mechanics and optics better than Sir Isaac Newton? and yet Sir Isaac could not for his life have made a watch or a microscope. Mr. Locke is an oracle as to the principles, Harrington and Montesquieu are oracles as to the forms of government.
Letter IV
A question very naturally arises from taking a review of the tyranny of the government of Pennsylvania, What measures
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shall be taken to amend them? There can be but two answers to this question, ist. To submit to the Constitution for the pres- ent, till a peace with Great Britain will give us leisure to make a better; or, idly, to call a Convention immediately for the pur- pose of making a new Constitution. I believe the State is divided only about these two things; for the party who believe the gov- ernment to be a good one, is too inconsiderable to be noticed in this place.
I. I beg leave to offer a few objections to our submitting to the Constitution, and shall endeavour, II. to obviate the objections that have been made to the immediate calling of a Convention, for the purpose of altering and amending it.
There is the utmost danger to the State of Pennsylvania in a temporary submission to the Constitution from the following causes, i. The government is a tyranny. The moment we submit to it we become slaves. We hold every thing dear to us in society upon the tenure of the will of a single man in a single Assembly. Perhaps the mark of the beast may not be fixed immediately upon us, but the contract is made, and we are sold, together with our posterity, to be hewers of wood and drawers of water for ever. 2. The Constitution cannot be executed in part without being broken. Now there cannot be a more dangerous precedent in a free country, than a legislature violating in a single article even the ^onm of a Constitution. 3. The present government will not draw forth the wisdom nor strength of the State, nor afford that assistance to our Sister States which is expected from us in the present contest with Great Britain. Wise and good men every where decline to accept of the first offices in the government. The militia law is only partially executed. We have no courts of justice open for the sequestration or confisca- tion of Tory property; and, lastly, we shall never be able under the present government to contribute our share towards sinking the Continental debt by taxes. There is not force enough in the 'whole State to draw taxes from a single county against their
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consent. f Alas! we are on the brink of ruin. Our State has lifted a knife to her throat, and is about to undo herself by a hasty and ill-judged exercise of her own power. Our enemies are ex- ulting, and our friends are weeping over our alarming situation. Our ancestors look down, and our posterity look up to us for a happier Constitution. We are engaged with our Sister States in a bloody and expensive war. The liberty of the whole world is the price for which we fight. Human nature looks to us to avenge the mighty ills she has suffered from the tyrants of the old world. She has already dropped a tear of joy upon the pros- pect of recovering among us her first and original dignity. A good government is an engine not less necessary to ensure us success in these glorious purposes than ammunition and fire-arms. The way of duty is plain. Let a Convention be chosen, to alter and amend the government. This measure alone will restore vigor and union to Pennsylvania. Say not, my dear countrymen, that this is not the time, the enemy are at our gates, let us first repel them. Look at our militia on a field day — see the attempts of the friends to the Constitution to open our courts — hear the complaints and murmurs of the people. They all proclaim that NOW is the time for altering our Constitution. No confusion can arise from it. The gentlemen in the opposition declare their determination to sup- port the present Assembly in the execution of every law necessary
t The gentlemen in the opposition to the government have con- stantly prayed, that the Constitution might be referred to the arbitration of a Convention, and have declared their willingness to submit to, or con- cur in the execution of it, if it should be confirmed by a representation of the people fairly chosen. I am sorry to find upon the Journals of the Assembly, an address from a battalion of militia in Chester county, to the Honourable House, assuring them, that "they will support the present government with their lives and fortunes." Such addresses indicated the weakness, and foreboded the present contemptible situation of the court of Britain. They were presented in times similar to our own, viz. when the American colonies were upon their knees to the throne, praying to be governed by their own representatives, and to be delivered from impending slavery. But it is characteristic of the present Constitution, that, in the first year of its execution, the journals of our rulers were stained with threats of bloodshed, against men who only petitioned for a redress of grievances.
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for the safety and defence of the State, and above all in the execution of the militia and test laws. They have no interest unconnected with yours. They see with the same distress as you do the Tories triumphing in our disunion. Be not deceived. The Tories are not enemies to the present government; they enjoy the benefits of its weakness, and there is good authority to say they have secretly helped to carry it into execution. Let us beware of being imposed upon by the popular cry of the necessity of the times. When the Dissenters in Virginia and South Carolina prayed for the abolition of the Episcopal estab- lishment in those States, the High Churchmen acknowledged that their demands were just, but said, that this was not the time for attending to them, and that such a change in the government would throw all things into confusion. The demands were not- withstanding complied with, and an union unparalleled in for- mer times was immediately produced in those States. When a declaration of independence last summer appeared to be the only measure that could save America, the Tories and moderate men acknowledged the justice of our separation from Great Britain, but said, "This is not the time." The event showed that the time was come, for, exclusive of the advantages we have gained from it in foreign Courts, it served to precipitate the timid, the doubtful and the disaffected characters from their mixture with the rpal Whigs, and although it lessened the num- bers in the opposition, it added to their strength by producing union and decision among them. To delay justice (has been em- phatically said) is to deny it. In like manner to delay liberty is to take it away.
The Convention of New York formed their government within the reach of the thunder of the enemy's cannon, and while one half of their State was in their possession. Is our situation more dangerous than it was last year? The members of the late Convention were chosen on a day when the Associators of the whole State were in motion. The Constitution was made while above 5000 of them were in the field. The sense of the people was not asked upon the subject of the Constitution; but it was
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given in the most public manner. No more than 1500 freemen voted for its being executed, for that number only took the oath of allegiance to the Constitution at the election in October. Let us talk no more then of the "necessity of the times" This is the State apology at St. James's for all the crimes of the present reign and for all the ravages and bloodshed we have witnessed in America. The State of Massachusetts Bay are preparing for an invasion; they expect General Burgoyne every hour in their harbours with a powerful army, and yet in a Boston paper, of the 5th of May, I find the following resolution of their Assembly and Council,
STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS BAY. In the HOUSE of REPRESENTATIVES, M*y 5, 1777.
"Resolved, That it be, and hereby is recommended to the several towns and places in this State, impowered by the laws thereof, to send Members to the General Assembly, that, at their next election of a Member or Members to represent them, they make choice of men, in whose integrity and abilities they can place the greatest confidence; and, in addition to the common and ordinary powers of representation, instruct them in one Body with the Council, to form such a Constitution of Govern- ment, as they shall judge best calculated to promote the happiness of this State; and when completed, to cause the same to be printed in all the Boston News-Papers, and also in Hand-Bills, one of which to be transmitted to the Selectmen of each town, or the Committee of each plantation, to be by them laid before their respective towns or plantations, at a regular meeting of the inhabitants thereof, to be called for that purpose; in order to its being, by each town and plantation, duly considered. And a return of their approbation or disapprobation to be made into the Secretary's Office of this State, at a reasonable time to be fixed on by the General Court, specifying the numbers present in such meeting, voting for, and those voting against the same: And if, upon a fair examination of the said returns by the Gen-
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eral Court, or such Committee as they shall appoint for that purpose, it shall appear, that the said Form of Government is approved of by at least two thirds of those who are free, and twenty one years of age, belonging to this State, and present in the several meetings, then the General Court shall be im- powered to establish the same as the Constitution and Form of Government of the State of Massachusetts Bay, according to which the inhabitants thereof shall be governed in all succeeding generations, unless the same shall be altered by their own express direction, or that of at least two thirds of them. And it is further recommended to the Selectmen of the several towns, in the return of their precepts for the choice of Representatives, to signify their having considered this Resolve, and their doings thereon."
But further, recollect, my dear countrymen, our conduct upon reading the resolution of the Honourable Congress of the 1 5th of May, 1776. We seized it as a Warrant that proclaimed liberty to us and our posterity for ever. It was said by some people at that time, "Let the Assembly execute that resolution;" but we spurned the advice, and we acted like men. We said, that the "Assembly was not chosen by a majority of votes in the State," owing to the inequality of our representation, and that they wanted the "confidence of the people." We thought noth- ing then of the loss of time Occasioned by the meeting of a Conference of Committees, to settle the mode and time of choos- ing a Convention. The delay of months, the distractions of the State, and the danger of an invasion, were thought to be trifling when compared with the prospect of a good Constitution, that should immediately collect and exert the Whig strength of the state.
Thus have I finished my observations upon the Constitution of Pennsylvania. I have taken notice only of its most essential defects, and have aimed to discuss them with candor. The occa- sional remarks upon the proceedings of the Assembly, are to be charged entirely to the faults of the Constitution. — I believe
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the gentlemen in power have nothing in view but the freedom and independance of the State; and such has been the zeal and integrity of many of them in the pursuit of those great objects, that it gives me pain to reflect, that I have been obliged to differ from them in the best means of obtaining them.
With this declaration I shall close my letters to the people of Pennsylvania. Accept thou dear asylum of my ancestors, nurse of my infancy, protectress of my childhood, and generous rewarder of the toils of my youth, accept of these humble efforts to restore thee to freedom and happiness! If I have laboured in vain, I shall henceforth mourn in secret only over my beloved country, and lament the day that I was born a Pennsylvanian.
ON EDUCATION
OF THE MODE OF EDUCATION PROPER IN A REPUBLIC
THE BUSINESS of education has acquired a new complexion by the independence of our country. The form of government we have assumed, has created a new class of duties to every Ameri- can. It becomes us, therefore, to examine our former habits upon this subject, and in laying the foundations for nurseries of wise and good men, to adapt our modes of teaching to the peculiar form of our government.
The first remark that I shall make upon this subject is, that an education in our own, is to be preferred to an education in a foreign country. The principle of patriotism stands in need of the reinforcement of prejudice, and it is well known that our strongest prejudices in favour of our country are formed in the first one and twenty years of our lives. The policy of the Lace- demonians is well worthy of our imitation. When Antipater demanded fifty of their children as hostages for the fulfillment of a distant engagement, those wise republicans refused to com- ply with his demand, but readily offered him double the num- ber of their adult citizens, whose habits and prejudices could not be shaken by residing in a foreign country. Passing by, in this place, the advantages to the community from the early at- tachment of youth to the laws and constitution of their country, I shall only remark, that young men who have trodden the paths of science together, or have joined in the same sports,% whether of swimming, skating, fishing, or hunting, generally feel,
8?
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thro' life, such ties to each other, as add greatly to the obligations of mutual benevolence.
I conceive the education of our youth in this country to be peculiarly necessary in Pennsylvania, while our citizens are composed of the natives of so many different kingdoms in Europe. Our schools of learning, by producing one general, and uniform system of education, will render the mass of the people more homogeneous, and thereby fit them more easily for uniform and peaceable government.
I proceed in the next place, to enquire, what mode of edu- cation we shall adopt so as to secure to the state all the advan- tages that are to be derived from the proper instruction of youth; and here I beg leave to remark, that the only foundation for a useful education in a republic is to be laid in Religion. Without this there can be no virtue, and without virtue there can be no liberty, and liberty is the object and life of all republican gov- ernments.
Such is my veneration for every religion that reveals the attributes of the Deity, or a future state of rewards and punish- ments, that I had rather see the opinions of Confucius or Ma- hohied inculcated upon our youth, than see them grow up wholly devoid of a system of religious principles. But the re- ligion I mean to recommend in this place, is that of the New Testament.
It is foreign to my purpose to hint at the arguments which establish the truth of the Christian revelation. My only business is to declare, that all its doctrines and precepts are calculated to promote the happiness of society, and the safety and well being of civil government. A Christian cannot fail of being a republican. The history of the creation of man, and of the re- lation of our species to each other by birth, which is recorded in the Old Testament, is the best refutation that can be given to the divine right of kings, and the strongest argument that can be used in favor of the original and natural equality of all man- kind. A Christian, I say again, cannot fail of being a republican, for every precept of the Gospel inculcates those degrees of hu-
ON EDUCATION 89
mility, self-denial, and brotherly kindness, which are directly opposed to the pride of monarchy and the pageantry of a court. A Christian cannot fail of being useful to the republic, for his religion teacheth him, that no man "liveth to himself." And lastly, a Christian cannot fail of being wholly inoffensive, for his religion teacheth him, in all things to do to others what he would wish, in like circumstances, they should do to him.
I am aware that I dissent from one of those paradoxical opinions with which modern times abound; and that it is im- proper to fill the minds of youth with religious prejudices of any kind, and that they should be left to choose their own principles, after they have arrived at an age in which they are capable of judging for themselves. Could we preserve the mind in childhood and youth a perfect blank, this plan of education would have more to recommend it; but this we know to be impossible. The human mind runs as naturally into principles as it does after facts. It submits with difficulty to those restraints or partial discoveries which are imposed upon it in the infancy of reason. Hence the impatience of children to be informed upon all subjects that relate to the invisible world. But I beg leave to ask, why should we pursue a different plan of education with respect to religion, from that which we pursue in teaching the arts and sciences? Do we leave our youth to acquire systems of geography, philosophy, or politics, till they have arrived at an age in which they are capable of judging for themselves? We do not. I claim no more then for religion, than for the other sciences, and I add further, that if our youth are disposed after they are of age to think for themselves, a knowledge of one system, will be the best means of conducting them in a free enquiry into other systems of religion, just as an acquaintance with one system of philosophy is the best introduction to the study of all the other systems in the world.
Next to the duty which young men owe to their Creator, I wish to see a regard to their country, inculcated upon them. When the Duke of Sully became prime minister to Henry the IVth of France, the first thing he did, he tells us, "Was to subdue
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and forget his own heart." The same duty is incumbent upon every citizen of a republic. Our country includes family, friends and property, and should be preferred to them all. Let our pupil be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught, at the same time, that he must forsake, and even forget them, when the welfare of his country requires it. He must watch for the state, as if its liberties depended upon his vigilance alone, but he must do this in such a manner as not to defraud his creditors, or neglect his family. He must love private life, but he must decline no station, however public or responsible it may be, when called to it by the suffrages of his fellow citizens. He must love popularity, but he must despise it when set in competition with the dictates of Jiis judgement, or the real interest of his country. He must love character, and have a due sense of injuries, but he must be taught to appeal only to the laws of the state, to defend the one, and punish the other. He must love family honor, but he must be taught that neither the rank nor antiquity of his ancestors, can command respect, without personal merit. He must avoid neutrality in all questions that divide the state, but he must shun the rage, and acrimony of party spirit. He must be taught to love his fellow creatures in every part of the world, but he must cherish with a more intense and peculiar affection, the citizens of Penn- sylvania and of the United States. I do not wish to see our youth educated with a single prejudice against any nation or country; but we impose a task upon human nature, repugnant alike to reason, revelation and the ordinary dimensions of the human heart, when we require him to embrace, with equal affection, the whole family of mankind. He must be taught to amass wealth, but it must be only to encrease his power of contributing to the wants and demands of the state. He must be indulged occasion- ally in amusements, but he must be taught that study and busi- ness should be his principal pursuits in life. Above all he must love life, and endeavour to acquire as many «of its conveniences as possible by industry and economy, but he must be taught
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that this life "is not his own," when the safety of his country requires it. These are practicable lessons, and the history of the commonwealths of Greece and Rome show, that human nature, without the aids of Christianity, has attained these degrees of perfection.
While we inculcate these republican duties upon our pupil, we must not neglect, at the same time, to inspire him with re- publican principles. He must be taught that there can be no durable liberty but in a republic, and that government, like all other sciences, is of a progressive nature. The chains which have bound this science in Europe are happily unloosed in America. Here it is open to investigation and improvement. While philosophy has protected us by its discoveries from a thousand natural evils, government has unhappily followed with an unequal pace. It would be to dishonor human genius, only to name the many defects which still exist in the best systems of legislation. We daily see matter of a perishable nature ren- dered durable by certain chemical operations. In like manner, I conceive, that it is possible to combine power in such a way as not only to encrease the happiness, but to promote the dura- tion of republican forms of government far beyond the terms limited for them by history, or the common opinions of man- kind.
To assist in rendering religious, moral and political instruction more effectual upon the minds of our youth, it will be necessary to subject their bodies to physical discipline. To obviate the in- conveniences of their studious and sedentary mode of life, they should live upon a temperate diet, consisting chiefly of broths, milk and vegetables. The black broth of Sparta, and the barley broth of Scotland, have been alike celebrated for their beneficial effects upon the minds of young people. They should avoid tasting spirituous liquors. They should also be accustomed occa- sionally to work with their hands, ill the intervals of study, and in the busy seasons of the year in the country. Moderate sleep, silence, occasional solitude and cleanliness, should be inculcated upon them, and the utmost advantage should be taken of a
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proper direction of those great principles in human conduct, — sensibility, habit, imitations and association.
The influence of these physical causes will be powerful upon the intellects, as well as upon the principles and morals of young people.
To those who have studied human nature, it will not appear paradoxical to recommend, in this essay, a particular attention to vocal music. Its mechanical effects in civilizing the mind, and thereby preparing it for the influence of religion and gov- ernment, have been so often felt and recorded, that it will be unnecessary to mention facts in favour of its usefulness, in order to excite a proper attention to it.
I cannot help bearing a testimony, in this place, against the custom, which prevails in some parts of America, (but which is daily falling into disuse in Europe) of crowding boys together under one roof for the purpose of education. The practice is the gloomy remains of monkish ignorance, and is as unfavorable to the improvements of the mind in useful learning, as monas- teries are to the spirit of religion. I grant this mode of secluding boys from the intercourse of private families, has a tendency to make them scholars, but our business is to make them men, citi- zens and Christians. The vices of young people are generally learned from each other. The vices of adults seldom infect them. By separating them from each other, therefore, in their hours of relaxation from study, we secure their morals from a principal source of corruption, while we improve their manners, by sub- jecting them to those restraints which the difference of age and sex, naturally produce in private families.
From the observations that have been made it is plain, that I consider it is possible to convert men into republican machines. This must be done, if we expect them to perform their parts properly, in the great machine of the government of the state. That republic is sophisticated with monarchy or aristocracy that does not revolve upon the wills of the people, and these must be fitted to each other by means of education before they can be made to produce regularity and unison in government.
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Having pointed out those general principles, which should be inculcated alike in all the schools of the state, I proceed now to make a few remarks upon the method of conducting, what is commonly called, a liberal or learned education in a republic.
I shall begin this part of my subject, by bearing a testimony against the common practice of attempting to teach boys the learned languages, and the arts and sciences too early in life. The first twelve years of life are barely sufficient to instruct a boy in reading, writing and arithmetic. With these, he may be taught those modern languages which are necessary for him to speak. The state of the memory, in early life, is favorable to the acqui- sition of languages, especially when they are conveyed to the mind, through the ear. It is, moreover, in early life only, that the organs of speech yield in such a manner as to favour the just pronunciation of foreign languages.
Too much pains cannot be taken to teach our youth to read and write our American language with propriety and elegance. The study of the Greek language constituted a material part of the literature of the Athenians, hence the sublimity, purity and immortality of so many of their writings. The advantages of a perfect knowledge of our language to young men intended for the professions of law, physic, or divinity are too obvious to be mentioned, but in a state which boasts of the first com- mercial city in America, I wish to see it cultivated by young men, who are intended for the compting house, for many such, I hope, will be educated in our colleges. The time is past when an academical education was thought to be unnecessary to qualify a young man for merchandize. I conceive no profession is capable of receiving more embellishments from it. The French and German languages should likewise be carefully taught in all our colleges. They abound with useful books upon all sub- jects. So important and necessary are those languages, that a degree should never be conferred upon a young man who can- not speak or translate them.
Connected with the study of languages is the study of elo- quence. It is well known how great a part it constituted of the
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Roman education. It is the first accomplishment in a republic, and often sets the whole machine of government in motion. Let our youth, therefore, be instructed in this art. We do not extol it too highly when we attribute as much to the power of elo- quence as to the sword, in bringing about the American Revo- lution.
With the usual arts and sciences that are taught in our Ameri- can colleges, I wish to see a regular course of lectures given upon History and Chronology. The science of government, whether it relates to constitutions or laws, can only be advanced by a careful selection of facts, and these are to be found chiefly in history. Above all, let our youth be instructed in the history of the ancient republics, and the progress of liberty and tyranny in the different states of Europe. I wish likewise to see the numer- ous facts that relate to the origin and present state of commerce, together with the nature and principles of money, reduced to such a system, as to be intelligible and agreeable to a young man. If we consider the commerce of our metropolis only as the avenue of the wealth of the state, the study of it merits a place in a young man's education; but, I consider commerce in a much higher light when I recommend the study of it in re- publican seminaries. I view it as the best security against the influence of hereditary monopolies of land, and, therefore, the surest protection against aristocracy. I consider its effects as next to those of religion in humanizing mankind, and lastly, I view it as the means of uniting the different nations of the world together by the ties of mutual wants and obligations.
Chemistry by unfolding to us the effects of heat and mixture, enlarges our acquaintance with the wonders of nature and the mysteries of art; hence it has become, in most of the universities of Europe, a necessary branch of a gentleman's education. In a young country, where improvements in agriculture and manu- factures are so much to be desired, the cultivation of this science, which explains the principles of both of them, should be con- sidered as an object of the utmost importance.
Again, let your youth be instructed in all the means of pro-
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moting national prosperity and independence, whether they relate to improvements in agriculture, manufactures, or inland navigation. Let him be instructed further in the general principles of legislation, whether they relate to revenue, or to the preserva- tion of life, liberty or property. Let him be directed frequently to attend the courts of justice, where he will have the best op- portunities of acquiring habits of comparing, and arranging his ideas by observing the discovery of truth, in the examination of witnesses, and where he will hear the laws of the state ex- plained, with all the advantages of that species of eloquence which belongs to the bar. Of so much importance do I con- ceive it to be, to a young man, to attend occasionally to the decisions of our courts of law, that I wish to see our colleges established, only in county towns.
But further, considering the nature of our connection with the United States, it will be necessary to make our pupil ac- quainted with all the prerogatives of the national government. He must be instructed in the nature and variety of treaties. He must know the difference in the powers and duties of the several species of ambassadors. He must be taught wherein the obliga- tions of individuals and of states are the same, and wherein they differ. In short, he must acquire a general knowledge of all those laws and forms, which unite the sovereigns of the earth, or separate them from each other.
I beg pardon for having delayed so long to say any thing of the separate and peculiar mode of education proper for women in a republic. I am sensible that they must concur in all our plans of education for young men, or no laws will ever render them effectual. To qualify our women for this purpose, they should not only be instructed in the usual branches of female education, but they should be taught the principles of liberty and govern- ment; and the obligations of patriotism should be inculcated upon them. The opinions and conduct of men are often regu- Jated by the women in the most arduous enterprizes of life; and their approbation is frequently the principal reward of the hero's dangers, and the patriot's toils. Besides, the first impressions upon
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the minds of children are generally derived from the women. Of how much consequence, therefore, is it in a republic, that they should think justly upon the great subject of liberty and government!
The complaints that have been made against religion, liberty and learning, have been, against each of them in a separate state. Perhaps like certain liquors, they should only be used in a state of mixture. They mutually assist in correcting the abuses, and in improving the good effects of each other. From the com- bined and reciprocal influence of religion, liberty and learning upon the morals, manners and knowledge of individuals, of these, upon government, and of government, upon individuals, it is impossible to measure the degrees of happiness and perfection to which mankind may be raised. For my part,- 1 can form no ideas of the golden age, so much celebrated by the poets, more delightful, than the contemplation of that happiness which it is now in the power of the legislature of Pennsylvania to confer upon her citizens, by establishing proper modes and places of education in every part of the state.
EDUCATION AGREEABLE TO A REPUBLICAN FORM OF GOVERNMENT
BEFORE I proceed to the subject of this essay, I shall point out, in a few words, the influence and advantages of learning upon mankind.
I. It is friendly to religion, inasmuch as it assists in removing prejudice, superstition and enthusiasm, in promoting just notions of the Deity, and in enlarging our knowledge of his works.
II. It is favourable to liberty. Freedom can exist only in the society of knowledge. Without learning, men are incapable of knowing their rights, and where learning is confined to a few people, liberty can be neither equal nor universal.
III. It promotes just ideas of laws and government. "When the clouds of ignorance are dispelled (says the Marquis of Beccaria) by the radiance of knowledge, power trembles, but the authority of laws remains immovable."
IV. It is friendly to manners. Learning in all countries, promotes civilization, and the pleasures of society and conver- sation.
V. It promotes agriculture, the great basis of national wealth and happiness. Agriculture is as much a science as hydraulics, or optics, and has been equally indebted to the experiments and researches of learned men. The highly cultivated state, and the immense profits of the farms in England, are derived wholly from the patronage which agriculture has received in that coun- try, from learned men and learned societies.
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VI. Manufactures of all kinds owe their perfection chiefly to learning — hence the nations of Europe advance in manufac- tures, knowledge, and commerce, only in proportion as they cultivate the arts and sciences.
For the purpose of diffusing knowledge through every part of the state, I beg leave to propose the following simple plan.
I. Let there be one university in the state, and let this be established in the capital. Let law, physic, divinity, the law of nature and nations, economy, &c. be taught in it by public lec- tures in the winter season, after the manner of the European universities, and let the professors receive such salaries from the state as will enable them to deliver their lectures at a moderate price.
II. Let there be four colleges. One in Philadelphia; one at Carlisle; a third, for the benefit of our German fellow citizens, at Lancaster; and a fourth, some years hence at Pittsburgh. In these colleges, let young men be instructed in mathematics and in the higher branches of science, in the same manner that they are now taught in our American colleges. After they have re- ceived a testimonial from one of these colleges, let them, if they can afford it, complete their studies by spending a season or two in attending the lectures in the university. I prefer four colleges in the state to one or two, for there is a certain size of colleges as there is of towns and armies, that is most favourable to morals and good government. Oxford and Cambridge in England are the seats of dissipation, while the more numerous, and less crowded universities and colleges in Scotland, are remarkable for the order, diligence, and decent behaviour of their students.
II. Let there be free schools established in every township, or in districts consisting of one hundred families. In these schools let children be taught to read and write the English and German languages, and the use of figures. Such of them as have parents that can afford to send them from home, and are disposed to extend their educations, may remove their children from the free school to one of the colleges.
By this plan the whole state will be tied together by one
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system of education. The university will in time furnish masters for the colleges, and the colleges will furnish masters for the free schools, while the free schools, in their turns, will supply the colleges and the university with scholars, students and pupils. The same systems of grammar, oratory and philosophy, will be taught in every part of the state, and the literary features of Pennsylvania will thus designate one great, and equally enlight- ened family.
But, how shall we bear the expense of these literary institu- tions?— I answer — These institutions will lessen our taxes. They will enlighten us in the great business of finance — they will teach us to increase the ability of the state to support government, by increasing the profits of agriculture, and by promoting manu- factures. They will teach us all the modern improvements and advantages of inland navigation. They will defend us from hasty and expensive experiments in government, by unfolding to us the experience and folly of past ages, and thus, instead of adding to our taxes and debts, they will furnish us with the true secret of lessening and discharging both of them.
But, shall the estates of orphans, bachelors and persons who have no children, be taxed to pay for the support of schools from which they can derive no benefit? I answer in the affirmative, to the first part of the objection, and I deny the truth of the latter part of it. Every member of the community is interested in the propagation of virtue and knowledge in the state. But I will go further, and add, it will be true economy in individuals to sup- port public schools. The bachelor will in time save his tax for this purpose, by being able to sleep with fewer bolts and locks to his doors — the estates of orphans will in time be benefited, by being protected from the ravages of unprincipled and idle boys, and the children of wealthy parents will be less tempted, by bad company, to extravagance. Fewer pillories and whipping posts, and smaller gaols, with their usual expenses and taxes, will be necessary when our youth are properly educated, than at pres- ent; I believe it could be proved, that the expenses of confining, trying and executing criminals, amount every year, in most of
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the counties, to more money than would be sufficient to main- tain all the schools that would be necessary in each county. The confessions of these criminals generally show us, that