bious, viciffitudes of fortune often difcouraging, in fituations in which, not unfrequently, want of fuccefs has countenanced the fpirit of criticifm; the conftancy of your fupport was the effential prop of the efforts, and a guarantee of the plans by which they were effected. Profoundly penetrated with this idea, I fhall carry it with me to my grave, as a strong incitement to unceafing vows that heaven may continue to you the choiceft tokens of its beneficence, that your union and brotherly affection may be perpetual; that the free conftitution, which is the work of your hands, may be facredly maintained; that its adminiftration in every department may be ftamped with wifdom and virtue; that, in fine, the happiness of the people of thefe ftates, under the aufpices of liberty, may be made complete, by fo careful a prefervation and fo prudent a ufe of this bleffing, as will acquire to them the glory of recommending it to the applaufe, the affection, and adoption of every nation which is yet a ftranger to it.

Here, perhaps, I ought to ftop. But folicitude for your welfare, which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehenfion of dan ger, natural to that folicitude, urge me, on an occafion like the prefent, to offer to your folemn contemplation, and to recommend to your frequent review, fome fentiments, which are the refult of much reflection, of no inconfiderable obfervation, and which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a people. Thefe will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only fee in them the difinterefted warnings of a parting friend, who can poffibly have no perfonal motive to bias his counfel. Nor can I forget, as an

encouragement to it, your indulgent reception of my fentiments on a former and not diffimilar occafion.

Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your heart, no recommendation of mine is neceffary to fortify or confirm the attachment.

The unity of government, which conftitutes you one people, is alfo now dear to you. It is jufty fo; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the fupport of your tranquillity at home, your peace abroad; of your fafety, of your profperity, of that very liberty which you fo highly prize. But, as it is eafy to forefee, that from different caufes, and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth; as this is the point in your political fortress againft which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be moft conftantly and actively though covertly and infidioutly) directed, it is of infinite moment that you fhould properly estimate the immenfe value of your national union to your collective and individual happiness; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immoveable attachment to it; accuftoming yourfelves to think and fpeak of it as of the palladium of your political fafety and profperity; watching for its prefervation with jealous anxiety; discountenancing whatever may fuggeft even a fufpicion that it can in any event be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the firft dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country from the reft, or to enfeeble the facred ties which now link together its various parts.

For this you have every induce

ment

ment of fympathy and intereft. Citizens, by birth or choice, of a common country, that country has a right to concentrate your affections. The name of American, which belongs to you in your national capacity, must always exalt the juft pride of patriotifm more than any appeilation derived from local difcriminations. With flight fhades of difference, you have the fame religion, manners, habits, and political principles. You have, in a common caufe, fought and triumphed together; the independence and liberty you poffefs, are the work of joint councils and joint efforts, of common dangers, fufferings, and fucceffes.

But there confiderations, how ever powerfully they addrefs themfelves to your fenfibility, are greatly outweighed by thofe which apply more immediately to your intereft. Here every portion of our country finds the most commanding motives for carefully guarding and preferving the union of the whole.

The north, in an unreftrained intercourse with the fouth, protected by the equal laws of a common government, finds, in the productions of the latter, great additional refources of maritime and commercial enterprife, and precious materials of manufacturing induftry. The fouth, in the fame intercourse, benefiting by the agency of the north, fees its agriculture grow and its commerce expand; turning partly into its own chan nels the feamen of the north, it finds its particular navigation invigorated; and while it contributes, ia different ways, to nourish and increase the general mafs of the national navigation, it looks forward to the protection of a ma 1796.

ritime ftrength, to which itself is unequally adapted. The eaft, in a like intercourfe with the weit, already finds, and, in the progreffive improvement of interior communication by land and water, will more and more find a valuable vent for the commodities which it brings from abroad, or manufactures at home. The weft derives from the eaft fupplies requifite to its growth and comfort; and what is perhaps of ftill greater confequence, it nift of neceffity owe the fecure enjoyment of indifpenfable outlets for its own productions to the weight, influence, and the future maritime ftrength of the Atlantic fide of the Union, directed by an indiffoluble community of intereft as one nation. Any other tenure by which • the weft can hold this effential advantage, whether derived from its own feparate ftrength, or from an apoftate and unnatural connection with any foreign power, must be intrinfically precarious.

While, then, every part of our country thus feels an immediate and particular intereft in union, all the parts combined cannot fail to find, in the united mafs of means and efforts, greater ftrength, greater refource, proportionably greater fecurity from external danger, a lefs frequent interruption of their peace by foreign nations; and, what is of ineftimable value, they muft derive from union, an exemption from thofe broils and wars between themfelves which fo frequently afflict neighbouring countries, not tied together by the fame govern. ment, which their own rivalfhips alone would be fufficient to produce, but which oppofite foreign alliances, attachments and intrigues, would ftimulate and imbitter. Hence likewife, they will avoid the necef (M)

fity

fity of thofe overgrown eftablish ments, which, under any form of government, are inaufpicious to liberty, and which are to be regarded as particularly hoftile to republican liberty in this fenfe it is, that your union ought to be confidered as a main prop of your liberty, and that the love of the one ought to endear to you the prefer. vation of the other.

These confiderations speak a perfuafive language to every reflecting and virtuous mind, and exhibit the continuance of the union as a primary object of patriotic defire. Is there a doubt whether a common government can embrace fo large a fphere? Let experience folve it. To listen to mere fpeculations in fuch a cafe, were criminal. We are authorifed to hope that a proper organization of the whole, with the auxiliary agency of governments for the refpective fubdivifions, will afford a happy iffue to the experiment. 'Tis well worth a fair and full experiment. With fuch powerful and obvious motives to union, affecting all parts of our country, while experience hall not have demonftrated its impracticability, there will always be reafon to diftruft the patriotifm of those who in any quarter may endeavour to weaken its bands.

In contemplating the caufes which may difturb our union, it occurs as matter of ferious concern, that any ground fhould have been furnished for characterizing parties by geographical difcriminations, northern and fouthern, Atlantic and western; whence defigning men may endeavour to excite a belief that there is a real difference of local interefts and views. One of the expedients of party to acquire influence within particular districts, is,

to mifreprefent the opinions and aims of other diftricts. You cannot fhield yourselves too much against the jealoufies and heartburnings which fpring from these mifreprefentations; they tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection. The inhabitants of our western country have lately had a useful leffon on this head; they have seen, in the negotiation by the executive, and in the unanimous ratification by the fenate, of the treaty with Spain, and in the univerfal fatisfaction at the event throughout the United States, a decifive proof how unfounded were the fufpicions propagated among them, of a policy in the general government, and in the Atlantic ftates, unfriendly to their interefts in regard to the Miffiffippi: they have been witnefes to the formation of two treaties, that with Great Britain, and that with Spain, which fecure to them every thing they could defire, in refpect to our foreign relations, towards confirming their profperity. Will it not be theis wifdom to rely for the prefervation of thefe advantages on the union by which they were procured? Will they not henceforth be deaf to thofe advifers, if fuch there are, who would fever them from their brethren, and connect them with aliens?

To the efficacy and permanency of your union, a government for the whole is indifpenfable. No alliances, however ftrict, between the parties, can be an adequate fubftitute; they must inevitably experience the infractions and interruptions which all alliances in all times have experienced. Senfible of this momentous truth, you have

improved

improved upon your firft effay, by the adoption of a conftitution of government better calculated than your former for an intimate union, and for the efficacious management of your common concerns. This government, the offspring of our own choice, uninfluenced and unawed, adopted upon full inveftigation and mature deliberation, completely free in its principles, in the diftribution of its powers uniting fecurity with energy, and containing within itfelf a provifion for its own amendment, has just claim to your confidence and your fupport. Refpect for its authority, compliance with its laws, acquief-cence in its measures, are duties enjoined by the fundamental maxims of true liberty. The bafis of our political fyftems is the right of the people to make and to alter their conftitutions of government; but the conftitution, which at any time exifts, until changed by an explicit and authentic act of the whole people, is facredly obligatory upon all. The very idea of the power and the right of the people to eftablish government, prefuppofes the duty of every individual to obey the established government.

All obftructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and affociations, under whatever plaufible character, with the real defign to direct, controul, counter. act, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the conftituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They ferve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force, to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a fmali but artful and enterprifing minority of the community;

and according to the alternate triumphs of different pasties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the org. of confiftent and wholefon.e plans, digefted by common councils, and modified by mutual interefts.

However combinations or affociations of the above defcription may, now and then, anfwer popu lar ends, they are likely, in the courfe of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to fubvert the powers of the people, and to ufurp for themselves the reins of government; deftroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjuft dominion.

Towards the preservation of your government, and the permanency of your prefent happy ftate, it is requifite, not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppofitions to its acknowledged authority, but alfo, that you refift with care the fpirit of innovation upon its principles, however fpecious the pretexts. One method of affault may be to effect, in the forms of the conftitution, alterations which will impair the energy of the fyftem, and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown. In all the changes to which you may be invited, remember that time and habit are at least as neceffary to fix the true character of governments as of other human inftitutions — that experience is the fureft ftanddard by which to test the real tendency of the exifting conftitution of a country; that facility in changes, upon the credit of mere hypothefis and opinion, expofes to perpetual change, from the endless variety of (M2)

hypo

hypothesis and opinion; and remember, especially, that for the efficient management of your common interests, in a country fo extenfive as ours, a government of as much vigour as is confiftent with the perfect fecurity of liberty is indifpenfable. Liberty itself will find in fuch a government, with powers properly diftributed and adjufted, its fureft guardian. It is, indeed, little elfe than a name, where the government is too feeble to withstand the enterprizes of faction, to confine each member of the fociety within the limits prefcribed by the laws, and to maintain all in the fecure and tranquil enjoyment of the rights of perfons and property.

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the ftate, with the particular reference to the founding of them on geographical difcriminations. Let me now take a more comprehenfive view, and warn you in the moft folemn manner against the baneful effects of the fpirit of party gene

rally.

This fpirit, unfortunately, is infeparable from our nature, having its roots in the strongest paffions of the human mind. It exifts under different shapes in all governments, more or lefs ftifled, controuled, or fuppreffed; but in thofe of the popular form, it is feen in its greatett ranknefs, and it is truly their worst enemy.

The alternate dominion of one faction over another, tharpened by the fpirit of revenge natural to party diffenfion, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itfelf a most horrid defpotifm. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent defpotifin. The

forders and miferies which refult,

gradually incline the minds of men to feek fecurity and repofe in the abfolute power of an individual; and, fooner or later, the chief of fome prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this difpofition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of public liberty.

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of fight), the common and continued mifchiefs of the fpirit of party are fufficient to make it the intereft and duty of a wife people to difcourage and restrain, it.

It ferves always to diffract the public councils and enfeeble the public adminiftration. It agitates the community with ill-founded jealoufies and falfe alarms; kindles the animofity of one part against another, foments occafionally riot and infurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party pallions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are fubjected to the policy and will of another.

There is an opinion, that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the adminiftration of the government, and ferve to keep alive the firit of liberty. This, within certain limits, is probably true; and in governments of a monarchical caft, patriotifm may look with indulgence, if not with favour, upon the spirit of party. But in thofe of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a fpirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain there will always be enough of that tpirit for every falutary purpose.

And