With his cackling was certainly
not efficacious in restraining such a flight.
But it is gratifying
to see how this new people, when they had it in their power to
change all their laws, to throw themselves upon any Utopian theory
that the folly of a wild philanthropy could devise, to discard as
abominable every vestige of English rule and English power, - it is
gratifying to see that, when they could have done all this, they
did not do so, but preferred to cling to things English. Their old
colonial limits were still to be the borders of their States.
Their old charters were still to be regarded as the sources from
whence their State powers had come. The old laws were to remain in
force. The precedents of the English courts were to be held as
legal precedents in the courts of the new nation, and are now so
held. It was still to be England, but England without a king
making his last struggle for political power. This was the idea of
the people and this was their feeling; and that idea has been
carried out and that feeling has remained.
In the constitution of the State of New York nothing is said about
the religion of the people. It was regarded as a subject with
which the constitution had no concern whatever. But as soon as we
come among the stricter people of New England, we find that the
constitution-makers have not been able absolutely to ignore the
subject.
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