2916. FEDERAL GOVERNMENT, Formation of.—[further continued].
You ask me what
amelionation I think necessary in our Federal
constitution. * * * My own general idea
is that the States should severally preserve
their sovereignty in whatever concerns themselves alone, and that whatever may concern
another State, or any foreign nation, should
be made a part of the Federal sovereignty;
that the exercise of the Federal sovereignty
should be divided among three several bodies,
legislative, executive and judiciary, as the
State sovereignties are; and that peaceable
means should be contrived for the Federal
head to enforce compliance on the part of the
State.—
To George Wythe. Washington ed. ii, 267.
Ford ed., iv, 445.
(P.
Sep. 1787)
