dictating a constitution to the other states; the only difference being, that this state does not adopt previously. The gentleman had objections to his legal maxims, and said they were not politic. He would be extremely sorry, he said, if the maxims of justice should not take place in politics. Were this to be the case, there could be no faith put in any compact. He thought the comparison of the state to a beggar was a degradation of it, and insisted on the propriety of his own comparison, which he thought obvious to any one. ,He acknowledged that an exclusion from the Union would be a most unhappy circumstance; but he had no idea that it would be the case. As this mode of proceeding would hasten the amendments, he could not but vote for it.
Mr. JONES defined the word modesty by contrasting it with its antagonist, impudence. The gentleman found fault with the observation, that this was the most decent and best way of obtaining amendments. If gentlemen would propose a more eligible method, he would consent to that. He said the gentleman had reviled the state by his comparison, and must have hurt the feelings of every gentleman in the house. He had no apprehension that the other states would refuse to admit them into the Union, when they thought proper to come in. It was their interest to admit them. He asked if a beggar would refuse a boon, though it were but a shilling; or if twelve men, struggling under a heavy load, would refuse the assistance of a thirteenth man.
A desultory conversation now took place.
Mr. DAVIE hoped they would not take up the whole collectively, but that the proposed amendments would be considered one by one. Some other gentlemen expressed the same desire.
Many other gentlemen thought the resolution very proper as it stood.
The question being put, the resolution was agreed to by a great majority of the committee.
It was then resolved that the committee should rise. Mr. President resumed the chair, and Mr. Kenan reported, from the committee of the whole Convention, that the committee had again had the Constitution proposed for the future government of the United States under consideration, and had come to a resolution thereupon; which he read in his place, and afterwards delivered in at the clerk's table.
Ordered, That the said report lie on the table until to-morrow morning, 9 o'clock; to which time the house adjourned.
Friday, August 1, 1788.
The Convention met according to adjournment.
