post-office. The power of coinage has been so construed by Congress as to levy a tribute immediately from that source also. But pretermitting these instances, was it not an acknowledged object of the Convention, and the universal expectation of the People, that the regulation of trade should be submitted to the General Government, in such a form as would render it an immediate source of general revenue? Had not Congress repeatedly recommended this measure, as not inconsistent with the fundamental principles of the Confederation? Had not every State but one; had not New York herself, so far complied with the plan of Congress, as to recognize the principle of the innovation? Do these principles, in fine, require that the powers of the General Government should be limited, and that, beyond this limit, the States should be left in possession of their sovereignty and independence? We have seen, that in the new Government, as in the old, the general powers are limited; and that the States, in all unenumerated cases, are left in the enjoyment of their sovereign and independent jurisdiction.
The truth is, that the great principles of the Constitution proposed by the Convention may be considered less as absolutely new, than as the expansion of principles which are found in the Articles of Confederation. The misfortune under the latter system has been, that these principles are so feeble and confined as to justify all the charges of inefficiency which have been urged against it; and to require a degree of enlargement, which gives to the new system the aspect of an entire transformation of the old.
In one particular, it is admitted that the Convention have departed from the tenor of their commission. Instead of reporting a plan requiring the confirmation of the Legislatures of all the States, they have reported a plan, which is to be confirmed by the People, and may
