| To
declare the punishment of treason, which shall consist only in levying war against the U. S., or any of them, or in adhering to their enemies. No person shall be convicted of treason but by the testimony of two witnesses. |
These and other important powers and |
| The prohibition of any tax on exports—— | are unnoticed in his remarks. |
There is no numerical correspondence between the articles contained in the plan & those treated of in the pamphlet & the latter alludes to several more than are included in the former.
In Mr. Pinkney’s letter to Mr. Adams, accompanying his plan, he states that “very soon after the Convention met, I changed and avowed candidly the change of my opinion on giving the power to Congress to revise the State laws in certain cases, and in giving the exclusive power to the Senate to declare war, thinking it safer to refuse the first altogether, and to vest the latter in Congress.”
In his pamphlet he concludes the 5th. page of his argument in favor of the first power with these remarks—“In short, from their example, (other republics) and from our own experience, there can be no truth more evident than this, that, unless our Government is consolidated, as far as is practicable, by retrenching the State authorities, and concentering as much force & vigor in the Union, as are adequate to its exigencies, we shall soon be a divided, and consequently an unhappy people. I shall ever consider the revision and negative of the State laws, as one great and leading step to this reform, and have therefore conceived it proper to bring it into view.”
On the 23. August He moved a proposition to vest this power in the Legislature, provided ⅔ of each House assented.
He does not designate the depository of the power to declare war & consequently avows no change of opinion on that subject in the pamphlet, altho’ it was printed after the adjournment of the Convention and is stated to embrace the “observations he delivered at different times in the course of their discussions”
J.M. has a copy of the pamphlet much mutilated by dampness; but one in complete preservation is bound up with “Select Tracts Vol. 2.” belonging to the New York Historical Society, numbered 2687.
