1848. COUNCIL, Expensive.—
What will
you do with the Council? They are expensive,
and not constantly nor often necessary;
yet to drop them would be wrong. I think
you had better require their attendance twice
a year to examine the executive department,
and see that it be going on rightly, advise on
that subject the Governor, or inform the Legislature,
as they shall see occasion. Give them
fifty guineas for each trip, fill up only five
of the places, and let them be always subject
to summons on great emergencies by the Governor,
on which occasions their expenses only
should be paid. At an expense of five hundred
guineas you will then preserve this member
of the Constitution always fit for use.
Young and ambitious men will leave it to go
into the Assembly; but the elderly and able,
who have retired from the legislative field
as too turbulent, will accept of the offices.—
To James Madison.
Ford ed., iii, 404.
(A.
Feb. 1784)
