But the charge of anti-republican tendencies or designs has been most often urged against Hamilton, on account of his theoretical opinions concerning the comparative merits of different governments, and of certain features of the plan of a constitution which he read to the Convention. With respect to these points, I shall state the results of a very careful examination which I have made of all the sources of information as to the views and opinions which he expressed or entertained. Mr. Madison has given us what he probably intended as a full report of at least the substance of Hamilton's great speech addressed to the committee of the whole, and has informed us that his report was submitted to Colonel Hamilton, who approved it, with a few verbal changes. But how meagre a report, which fills but six pages in the octavo edition of Mr. Madison's "Debates," must have been in comparison with the speech actually made by Hamilton, will occur to every reader who notices the fact that the speech occupied the entire session of one day (June 18), and who examines the brief from which he spoke, and which is still extant. (Hamilton's Works, II. 409.) He was an earnest, and I am inclined to think a fervid and rapid speaker. Certainly he spoke from a mind full of knowledge of the principles and the working of other systems of polity, and possessed of resources which have never been excelled in any statesman who has been called to aid in the work of creating a government. The topics set down in his brief exhibit a very wide range of thought, enriched by copious illustrations from the history and experience of other countries, and from the views of the most important writers on government; while the whole argument bears logically and closely upon the actual situation of our confederacy and upon the questions at issue. It is not probable, therefore, that Mr. Madison's report gives us an adequate idea of the speech, or fully exhibits its reasoning. I have collated it, sentence by sentence, with the report in Judge Yates's Minutes, and with Hamilton's own brief, and have prepared for my own use a draft containing the substance of what these three sources can give us. The results may be thus given:-- 1. That Hamilton, in stating his views of the theoretical value of different systems of government, frankly expressed the opinion that the British constitution was the best form which the world had then produced;--citing the praise bestowed upon it by Necker, that it is the only government "which unites public strength with individual security." 2. That, with equal clearness, he stated it as his opinion that none but a republican form could be attempted in this country, or would be adapted to our situation.