THE FALSE ALARM.
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tuents can immediately ſend back, if they can expel but cannot exclude, they have nothing more than nominal authority, to which perhaps obedience never may be paid.
The repreſentatives of our anceſtors had an opinion very different: they fined and impriſoned their members; on great provocation they diſabled them for ever, and this power of pronouncing perpetual diſability is maintained by Selden himſelf.
Theſe claims ſeem to have been made and allowed, when the conſtitution of our government had not yet been ſufficiently ſtudied. Such powers are not legal, becauſe they are not neceſſary; and of that power which only neceſſity juſtifies, no more is to be admitted than neceſſity obtrudes.
The
