within a narrower sphere the power and influence of the general government, and thereby to weaken its arm, at a time when, above all others, it requires to be strengthened. Their obvious tendency also is, to throw amongst the states of the union the apple of discord—to increase those jealousies and suspicions, which have been already too far excited, and to give new life, activity and nurture to those seeds of dissention and disunion which have been recently sown with an unsparing hand by insidious combinations and associations, all of them professing to promote the general good, but acting in direct opposition to their professions. The committee feel themselves impelled, therefore, by the strongest obligations of patriotism and duty, to recommend to the house, that each and all of the before mentioned seven propositions of amendment be most promptly and unqualifiedly rejected.
To which report the house of assembly agreed and thereupon,
Resolved, by the house of assembly of New Jersey, That the before mentioned seven propositions of amendment of the constitution of the United States be and the same are hereby rejected. [Agreed to by the Senate, February 17.]
[Niles' Register, VIII, 16.]
41. Extract from the Reply of the Legislature of New York.
April 17, 1815.
In the opinion of your committee, in order correctly to estimate the respect due to the resolutions referred to them, it is necessary to recur to the sources from whence they sprang; and to the time and circumstances in which they originated. [Here follows an unfriendly summary of the work of the Hartford Convention and an inference as to its intentions.] From this convention, emanated the resolutions submitted to the consideration of your committee.
The enlightened patriots who formed the constitution of the United States, aware that confederated sovereignties are ever prone to factions combinations, wisely inserted a provision, “that no state should enter into any agreement or compact with another state." Yet in utter violation of this most explicit declaration of the constitution, was this convention called, these delegates appointed, and their proceedings approved by the states of Massachusetts and Connecticut. [Here follows a severe arraign-
