"(Here Mr. Martin entered into a detail of the comparative powers of each state, and stated their probable weakness and strength.) "At the beginning of our troubles with Great Britain, the smaller states were attempted to be cajoled to submit to the views of that nation, lest the larger states should usurp their rights. We then answered them--your present plan is slavery, which on the remote prospect of a distant evil, we will not submit to. "I would rather confederate with any single state, than submit to the Virginia plan. But we are already confederated, and no power on earth can dissolve it but by the consent of _all_ the contracting powers--and four states, on this floor, have already declared their opposition to annihilate it. Is the old confederation dissolved, because some of the states wish a new confederation?"--Yates, _Secret Proceedings_, etc., 177. M^r Lansing & M^r Dayton moved to strike out "not," so that the 7 art. might read that the rights of suffrage in the 1^{st} branch ought to be according to the rule established by the Confederation." M^r Dayton expressed great anxiety that the question might not be put till tomorrow; Govern^r Livingston being kept away by indisposition, and the representation of N. Jersey thereby suspended. M^r Williamson, thought that if any political truth could be grounded on mathematical demonstration, it was that if the States were equally sovereign now, and parted with equal proportions of sovereignty, that they would remain equally sovereign. He could not comprehend how the smaller States would be injured in the case, and wished some Gentleman would vouchsafe a solution of it. He observed that the small States, if they had a plurality of votes would have an interest in throwing the burdens off their own shoulders on those of the large ones. He begged that the expected addition of new States from the Westward might be kept in view. They would be small States, they would be poor States, they would be unable to pay in proportion to their numbers; their distance from market rendering the produce of their labour less valuable; they would consequently be tempted to combine for the purpose of laying burdens on com[~m]erce & consumption which would fall with greatest weight on the old States.