patronized; and that all the others have
refused to give it the least countenance; wisely judging that confidence
must be placed somewhere; that the necessity of doing it, is implied in
the very act of delegating power; and that it is better to hazard the
abuse of that confidence than to embarrass the government and endanger
the public safety by impolitic restrictions on the legislative
authority. The opponents of the proposed Constitution combat, in this
respect, the general decision of America; and instead of being taught
by experience the propriety of correcting any extremes into which we
may have heretofore run, they appear disposed to conduct us into others
still more dangerous, and more extravagant. As if the tone of government
had been found too high, or too rigid, the doctrines they teach are
calculated to induce us to depress or to relax it, by expedients
which, upon other occasions, have been condemned or forborne. It may
be affirmed without the imputation of invective, that if the principles
they inculcate, on various points, could so far obtain as to become the
popular creed, they would utterly unfit the people of this country for
any species of government whatever. But a danger of this kind is not to
be apprehended. The citizens of America have too much discernment to
be argued into anarchy. And I am much mistaken, if experience has not
wrought a deep and solemn conviction in the public mind, that greater
energy of government is essential to the welfare and prosperity of the
community.

It may not be amiss in this place concisely to remark the origin
and progress of the idea, which aims at the exclusion of military
establishments in time of peace. Though in speculative minds it
may arise from a contemplation of the nature and tendency of such
institutions, fortified by the events that have happened in other ages
and countries, yet as a national sentiment, it must be traced to
those habits of thinking which we derive from the nation from whom the
inhabitants of these States have in general sprung.

In England, for a long time after the Norman Conquest, the authority of
the monarch was almost unlimited. Inroads were gradually made upon the
prerogative, in favor of liberty, first by the barons, and afterwards
by the people, till the greatest part of its most formidable pretensions
became extinct. But it was not till the revolution in 1688, which
elevated the Prince of Orange to the throne of Great Britain, t