The Mystery of the Pinckney DraughtNott, Charles C.
History
The Mystery of the Pinckney Draught
Nott, Charles C.
Constitutional history -- United States; Pinckney, Charles, 1757-1824
"It may be necessary to remark," he says, "that very soon after the
Convention met I changed and avowed candidly the change of my opinion on
giving the power to Congress to revise the State laws in certain cases,
and in giving the exclusive power to the Senate to declare war, thinking
it safest to refuse the first altogether and to vest the latter in
Congress." Hunt's Madison, III, p. 22.
As to one of these things concerning which Pinckney says he changed his
mind after the Convention met, the power of Congress to revise the laws
of the States, the assertion is not sustained by Madison's record of the
proceedings. He undoubtedly did change his mind but not until after the
adjournment of the Convention. There was however another provision in
his draught to which his assertion would apply. Concerning it he did
change his mind and "avowed candidly the change of his opinion" and did
so "very soon after the Convention met." This is the provision which
declares that members of the lower house shall be chosen by the _people_
of the several States. Article 3. As early as the 6th of June he
proposed that they should be chosen by the _legislatures_ of the several
States. Writing 32 years after the event and when the record had faded
in his memory, the two things, to use Madison's words, "were not
separated by his recollection."
The letter is a contemporaneous declaration, given at the moment when he
produced the document and placed it on file in the Department of State,
that the copy, like the original, contained provisions which he opposed
in the Convention. With this contemporaneous notice to the Secretary of
State one of Madison's objections which at first seemed insuperable, if
it does not fall to the ground, at least becomes susceptible of
explanation; and the retention in the copy of the draught of these
apparently inconsistent things, accompanied at the time, as they were,
by Pinckney's declaration, not only removes the objection of Madison but
tells strongly in favor of the draught being what Pinckney represented
it to be.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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