They contended that it would be true policy to suffer the act to expire by its own limitation. Little more than two years would elapse before the arrival of that period. This conduct was dictated by the undisputed fact that the present system had been adopted as an experiment. Hence the limitation of the act. This experiment was now in a fair course of trial. Little more than three years had elapsed since its commencement, and sufficient time had not yet passed to test the goodness or the badness of the principle it involved. It was a fact that the distresses of the commercial world called forth such a system when it was formed in the year 1800; it was a fact that it had done much good; and it might be that a system of bankruptcy, improved to the extent of which it was susceptible, would be of permanent utility. Amendments, radical amendments, the system certainly required; and should the House determine not to destroy it, the amendments could and doubtless would be made. It was believed that the general sentiment of the nation concurred in the propriety of affording some relief to the distresses of the commercial world. On the form and extent of that relief great contrariety of opinion existed. It was the opinion of well-informed merchants and of the best writers, that a greater relief should be afforded to the misfortunes of men engaged in trade than in other occupations. To the argument that the proper relief to be extended should be left to the determination of the States, the objection that the laws of the different States were on this point various and contradictory, was conclusive. Trade, of all human occupations, embraced the widest range. Its operations were confined to no particular State or climate, but pervaded the whole world. It was of great importance then, if practicable, that laws in relation to it should be equally wide with this extensive range. Though this was utterly impracticable, yet it was practicable to make the same laws pervade a whole nation. Of this opinion were the venerable patriots of 1789, who framed the constitution; such was the spirit of the constitution itself; and such its language in speaking of uniform laws respecting imports, bankruptcies, and intercourse between the several States. Not that the power to pass such laws was imperative: but they manifested the sense of that body and the spirit of the instrument, that all laws on those subjects should be uniform throughout the United States. To the argument, that the exoneration of property from the payment of just debts was a violation of justice, it was replied, that however correct the principle might be in ordinary cases, it did not hold in commercial concerns. In other employments an inability to comply with contracts was generally the result of idleness or imprudence; but so great and inevitable were the risks attendant on commerce, that no human prudence could guard against them.