fication of a system which, even in its present form, seems competent to the perpetual preservation of our security and happiness.
Mr. HENRY then arose, and expressed a desire that the honorable gentleman on the other side (Gov. Randolph) should continue his observations on the subject he had left unfinished the day before; that he had before, and would now, give him a patient hearing, as he wished to be informed of every thing that gentlemen could urge in defence of that system which appeared to him so defective.
Gov. RANDOLPH. Mr. Chairman, as the gentleman who was last up has given us an opportunity of continuing our observations, I shall, in resuming the subject, endeavor to put this question in a more correct and accurate point of view than it has yet been put in.
I took the liberty, yesterday, of declaring to the house the necessity of a national rather than a federal government, and that the union was necessary for Virginia for many powerful reasons; that this necessity arose from the certainty of her being involved in disputes and war with the adjoining states, and the probability of an attack by foreign nations, particularly by those nations to which she is greatly in debt, and which she is unable to pay; from her inability to raise an army to protect her citizens from internal seditions and external attacks, and her inability to raise a navy to protect her trade and her coasts against descents and invasions. I also, in the course of my argument on this occasion, showed the imbecility of the present system, in order to obviate and detect the sophistry of that truly delusive opinion, which has taken possession of the minds of some gentlemen, that this shipwrecked vessel is sufficiently strong and safe for us to embark in. Whether I have succeeded or not, I have given the full effusions of my soul, in my attempt to prove the futility of that opinion. Permit me now to pursue the object of my inquiry respecting the powers necessary to be given to the general government. I shall discard general considerations at present, as I wish to be as brief as possible, and take up the particular idea of direct taxation. Is it necessary that the legislative power of the United States should be authorized to levy taxes? A strange question to be agitated in this house, after hearing the delinquency of other states, and even of
