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and upon conviction to be removed from office, and disqualified for holding any place of ti uft and profit. And all impeachments to be tried by a court to confift of the Chief Justice, or Judge of the fuperior court of law of each State, provided fuch Judge hold his place during good behaviour and have a permanent falary.

X. All laws of the particular States, contrary to the Conftitu tion or laws of the United States, to be utterly void; and the better to prevent fuch laws being paffed, the Governor or President of each State shall be appointed by the General Government, and fhall have a negative upon the laws about to be paffed in the State of which he is Governor or Prefident.

XI. No State to have any force, laid or naval; and the militia to be under the fole and exclufive direction of the United States, the officers of which to be appointed and commiffioned by them.

It was faid, that a Government formed on this plan, would have been "a monarchy in every thing but the name." This is very true, and America wanted precifely fuch a Government. The many of all countries ftand in need of a monarch, at once to keep them in obedience to itself, and to protect them from the tyranny and rapacity of the afpiring, rich, and avaricious few. The people of America wanted fuch a protector, but the delufion of the times would not have permitted him to be called a monarch.

Pursuant to an ordinance for that purpose, the two Houfes of the firft Federal Congrefs, met at NewYork, in March, 1789. Having formed a quorum on the 6th of April, they proceeded to examine the returns of the elections which had been held in the autumn of 1788, for the choofing of the PRESIDENT and VICE-PRESIDENT; when it appeared that the former office had fallen to the lot of GENERAL WASHINGTON, and the latter to JOHN ADAMS. On the 30th of April the PRESIDENT met the two Houfes, and addreffed them in the following speech.

Fellow-citizens of the Senate, and of the Houfe of Reprefentatives, Among the viciffitudes incident to life, no event could have filled me with greater anxieties than that of which the notification` was tranfmitted by your order, and received on the 14th day of the prefent month: on the one hand, I was fummoned by my

country,

country, whofe voice I can never hear but with veneration and Jove, from a retreat which I had chofen with the fondest predilection, and, in my flattering hopes, with an immutable decifion, - as the afylum of my declining years: a retreat which was rendered every day more neceflary, as well as more dear to me, by the addition of habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions in health, to the gradual wafte committed on it by time. On the other hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the truft to which the voice of my country called me, being fufficient to awaken in the wifeft and most experienced of her citizens, a distrustful scrutiny into his qualifications, could not but overwhelm with defpondence one who, inheriting inferior endowments from nature, and unpractifed in the duties of civil administration, ought to be pecufiarly confcious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of emotions, all I dare aver is, that it has been my faithful study to collect my duty from a juft appreciation of every circumftance by which it might be affected, All 1 dare hope is, that if, in executing this talk, I have been too much swayed by a grateful remembrance of former inftances, or by an affectionate fenfibility to this tranfcendant proof of the confidence of my fellow-citizens-and have thence too little confulted my incapacity as well as difinclination for the weighty and untried cares before me-my error will be palliated by the motives which mifled me, and its confequences be judged by my country with fome share of the partiality in which they originated.

Such being the impreffions under which I have, in obedience to the public fummons, repaired to the prefent ftation, it would be peculiarly improper to omit in this firft official act, my fervent fupplicaations to that Almighty Being who rules over the universe, who prefides in the councils of nations, and whose providential aids can fupply every human defect, that his benediction may confecrate to the liberties and happinets of the people of the United States, a government instituted by themselves for thefe effential purposes; and may enable every inftrument employed in its administration, to execute with fuccefs the functions allotted to his charge. In tendering this homage to the great Author of every public and private good, I affure my felf that it expreffes your fentiments not lets than my own, nor those of my fellow-citizens at large, lefs than either. No people can be bound to acknowledge and adore the invisible Hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the United States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation, feems to have been distinguifhed by fome token of providential agency. And in the important revolution just accomplished in the fyftem of their United Government, the tranquil deliberations and voluntary confent of fo many distinct communities, from which the event has resulted, cannot be compared with the means by which moft Governments have been establifhed, without fome return of pious gratitude,

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along with an humble anticipation of the future bleffings which the paft seem to prefage. These reflections, arifing out of the prefent crifis, have forced themselves too ftrongly on my mind to be fuppreffed. You will join with me, I truft, in thinking that there are none under the influence of which the proceedings of a new and free Government can more aufpiciously commence.

By the article establishing the Executive Department, it is made the duty of the Prefident to recommend to your confideration fuch measures as he fhall judge neceffary and expedient. The circumstances under which I now meet you, will acquit me from entering into that fubject farther than to refer to the great conftitutional charter under which you are affembled; and which, in defining your powers, defignates the objects to which your attention is to be given. It will be more confiftent with those circumstances, and far more congenial with the feelings which actuate me, to subftitute, in place of a recommendation of particular measures, the tribute that is due to the talents, the rectitude, and the patriotifm which adorn the characters felected to devife and adopt them. In these honourable qualifications, I behold the fureft pledges, that as, on one fide, no local prejudices or attachments, no feparate views, nor party animofities, will mifdirect the comprehensive and equal eye which ought to watch over this great affeinblage of communities and interefts; fo on another, that the foundations of our national policy will be laid in the pure and immutable principles of private morality; and the pre-eminence of free government be exemplified by all the attributes which can win the affections of its citizens, and command the refpect of the world. I dwell on this profpect with every fatisfaction which an ardent love for my country can infpire: fince there is no truth more thoroughly established, than that there exifts in the economy and course of nature, an indiffoluble union between virtue and happiness, between duty and advantage, between the genuine maxims of an honest and magnanimous policy, and the folid rewards of public profperity and felicity fince we ought to be no lefs perfuaded, that the propitious fmiles of Heaven can never be expected on a nation that difregards the eternal rules of order and right, which Heaven itself has ordained; and fince the prefervation of the facred fire of liberty, and the deftiny of the republican model of government, are justly confidered as deeply, perhaps as finally ftaked on the experiment intrufted to the hands of the American people.

Befides the ordinary objects fubmitted to your care, it will remain with your judgment to decide, how far an exercife of the occafional power delegated by the fifth article of the Constitution is rendered expedient at the present juncture, by the nature of ob jections which have been urged against the fyftem, or by the degree of inquietude which has given birth to them. Inftead of undertaking particular recommendations on this fubject, in which I could be guided by no lights derived from official opportunities, I

fall

fhall again give way to my entire confidence in your difcernment and purfuit of the public good: for I affure myfelf, that, whilst you carefully avoid every alteration which might endanger the benefits of an united and effective Government, or which ought to await the future leffons of experience; a reverence for the characteristic rights of freemen, and a regard for the public harmony, will fufficiently influence your deliberations on the queftion, how far the former can be more impregnably fortified, or the latter be fafely and advantageously promoted.

To the preceding obfervations I have one to add, which will be moft properly addreffed to the House of Reprefentatives. It concerns myself, and will therefore be as brief as poffible. When I was fift honoured with a call into the fervice of my country, then on the eve of an arduous ftruggle for its liberties, the light in which 1 contemplated my duty required that I fhould renounce every pecuniary compenfation. From this refolution I have in no instance departed; and being ftill under the impreffions which produced it, Imuft decline, as inapplicable to vyfelf, any share in the perfonal emoluments, which may be indifpenfably included in a permanent provifion for the executive department; and muft accordingly pray that the pecuniary eftimates for the fiation in which I am placed, may, during my continuance in it, be lim red to fuch actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to require.

Having thus imparted to you my fentiments, as they have been awakened by the occafion which brings us together, I fhall take my prefent leave; but not without reforting once more to the benign l'arent of the human race, in humble fupplication, that, fince he has been pleafed to favour the American people with opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquillity, and difpofitions for deciding with unparalleled unanimity on a form of government for the fecurity of their union and the advancement of their happirets; fo his divine bleffing may be equally confpicuous in the enlarged views, the temperate confultations, and the wife measures on which the fuccefs of this Government must depend.

The Congrefs now proceeded to create the offices under the Federal Government, and to fix on the amount of the falaries that were to be attached to them. The PRESIDENT's falary was fixed at 25,000 dollars a year; the VICE-PRESIDENT's at 5000. The four principal officers placed under the Prefident, were, a Secretary of the Treatury, a Secretary of State, a Secretary at War, and an Attorney-general. Mr. Hamilton was appointed by the President to the firft poft, Mr. Jefferfon to the fecond, Mr. Knox to

the third, and a Mr. William Bradford to the fourth. All the pofts were ably filled, except that of Bradford, who was a man of no legal or political knowledge, and had got himself into vogue by mere canting, and by daubing Washington with undeferved praise.

A fyftem of finance was immediately entered on. Laws were paffed for impofing duties on imported goods, which, in general, were taxed to a confiderable amount. If the people now and then reflected that they had endured eight years of misery and bloodshed, rather than pay a threepenny tax upon tea, they must have been cruelly mortified that thefe new impofitions extended to alinoft every article of drefs and of furniture.

The taxes were, however, neceffary.

There was

a large foreign and domeftic debt to provide interest for; and every honeft man remaining in the country, whether Whig or Tory, wifhed to fee this interest duly paid. Concerning the domeftic debt there was, indeed, fome difference of opinion. This debt confifted of the amount of certificates, given by authority of the old Congrefs, to foldiers and others, in payment for fervices, or for goods, &c. received for the fervice of the United Colonies. The holders of this paper, placing little reliance on either the ability or the honefty of the old Congrefs, had, in general, fold their certificates for a mere trifle. If a difcrimination could have been made, it would have been just enough to pay the fpeculators no more than they had actually paid for the paper; but there were many obftacles to a difcrimination; and in fhort, it was found that the whole amount of the paper must be affumed as a legal debt, on the part of the United States, or recourfe must be had to a general sponge, as in the cafe of the paper (I beg their pardons, it was paficboard) money.

The

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