ower.

But the argument it was said proved too much. If a debt was now
essential to the preservation of state authority, it would always be
so. It must therefore never be extinguished, but must be perpetuated,
in order to secure the existence of the state governments. If, for
this purpose, it was indispensable that the expenses of the
revolutionary war should be borne by the states, it would not be less
indispensable that the expenses of future wars should be borne in the
same manner. Either the argument was unfounded, or the constitution
was wrong; and the powers of the sword and the purse ought not to have
been conferred on the government of the union. Whatever speculative
opinions might be entertained on this point, they were to administer
the government according to the principles of the constitution as it
was framed. But, it was added, if so much power follows the assumption
as the objection implies, is it not time to ask--is it safe to forbear
assuming? if the power is so dangerous, it will be so when exercised
by the states. If assuming tends to consolidation, is the reverse,
tending to disunion, a less weighty objection? if it is answered that
the non-assumption will not necessarily tend to disunion; neither, it
may be replied, does the assumption necessarily tend to consolidation.

It was not admitted that the assumption would tend to perpetuate the
debt. It could not be presumed that the general government would be
less willing than the local governments to discharge it; nor could it
be presumed that the means were less attainable by the former than the
latter.

It was not contended that a public debt was a public blessing. Whether
a debt was to be preferred to no debt was not the question. The debt
was already contracted: and the question, so far as policy might be
consulted, was, whether it was more for the public advantage to give
it such a form as would render it applicable to the purposes of a
circulating medium, or to leave it a mere subject of speculation,
incapable of being employed to any useful purpose. The debt was
admitted to be an evil; but it was an evil from which, if wisely
modified, some benefit might be extracted; and which, in its present
state, could have only a mischievous operation.

If the debt should be placed on adequate funds, its operation on
public credit could not be pernicious: in its present precarious
condition, there was much more to be apprehended in that respect.

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