In Those Early Days,
When The Constitution Was Being Framed, There Was Nothing To Force
The Small States Into A Union With Those Whose Populations
Preponderated.
Each State was sovereign in its municipal system,
having preserved the boundaries of the old colony, together with the
liberties and laws given to it under its old colonial charter.
A
union might be and no doubt was desirable; but it was to be a union
of sovereign States, each retaining equal privileges in that union,
and not a fusion of the different populations into one homogeneous
whole. No State was willing to abandon its own individuality, and
least of all were the small States willing to do so. It was,
therefore, ordained that the House of Representatives should
represent the people, and that the Senate should represent the
States.
From that day to the present time the arrangement of which I am
speaking has enabled the Democratic or Southern party to contend at
a great advantage with the Republicans of the North. When the
Constitution was founded, the seven Northern States - I call those
Northern which are now free-soil States, and those Southern in which
the institution of slavery now prevails - were held to be entitled by
their population to send thirty-five members to the House of
Representatives, and they sent fourteen members to the Senate. The
six Southern States were entitled to thirty members in the Lower
House, and to twelve Senators. Thus the proportion was about equal
for the North and South.
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