" Writing to Count Rochambeau, on January 8, 1788, he says
that the proposed Constitution "is to be submitted to conventions chosen
by _the people in the several States_, and by them approved or
rejected"--showing what _he_ understood by "the people of the United
States," who were to ordain and establish it. These same people--that
is, "the people of the several States"--he says, in a letter to
Lafayette, April 28, 1788, "retain everything they do not, by express
terms, give up." In a letter written to Benjamin Lincoln, October 26,
1788, he refers to the expectation that North Carolina will accede to
the Union, and adds, "Whoever shall be found to enjoy the confidence of
_the States_ so far as to be elected Vice-President," etc.--showing that
in the "confederated Government," as he termed it, the States were still
to act independently, even in the selection of officers of the General
Government. He wrote to General Knox, June 17, 1788, "I can not but hope
that the States which may be disposed to make a secession will think
often and seriously on the consequences." June 28, 1788, he wrote to
General Pinckney that New Hampshire "had acceded to the new
Confederacy," and, in reference to North Carolina, "I should be
astonished if that State should withdraw from the Union."
I shall add but two other citations. They are from speeches of John
Marshall, afterward the most distinguished Chief Justice of the United
States--who has certainly never been regarded as holding high views of
State rights--in the Virginia Convention of 1788.
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