The Address and Reasons of Dissent
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of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction; to controversies to which the
United States shall be a party; to controversies between two or more
States—between a State and citizens of different States—between citizens claiming lands under grants of different States, and between a State
or the citizens thereof and foreign States; and in criminal cases to such
only as are expressly enumerated in the Constitution; and that the United
States in Congress assembled shall not have power to enact laws which
shall alter the laws of descent and distribution of the effects of deceased
persons, the titles of lands or goods, or the regulation of contracts in the
individual States.
After reading these propositions, we declared our willingness to agree
to the plan, provided it was so amended as to meet those propositions or
something similar to them, and finally moved the convention to adjourn,
to give the people of Pennsylvania time to consider the subject and determine for themselves; but these were all rejected and the final vote
taken, when our duty to you induced us to vote against the proposed
plan and to decline signing the ratification of the same.
During the discussion we met with many insults and some personal
abuse. We were not even treated with decency, during the sitting of the
convention, by the persons in the gallery of the house. However, we flatter ourselves that in contending for the preservation of those invaluable
rights you have thought proper to commit to our charge, we acted with
a spirit becoming freemen; and being desirous that you might know the
principles which actuated our conduct, and being prohibited from inserting our reasons of dissent on the minutes of the convention, we have
subjoined them for your consideration, as to you alone we are accountable. It remains with you whether you will think those inestimable privileges,which you have so ably contended for, should be sacrificed at the
shrine of despotism, or whether you mean to contend for them with the
same spirit that has so often baffled the attempts of an aristocratic faction
to rivet the shackles of slavery on you and your unborn posterity.
Our objections are comprised under three general heads of dissent, viz.:
We dissent, first, because it is the opinion of the most celebrated writers on government, and confirmed by uniform experience, that a very extensive territory cannot be governed on the principles of freedom, oth-