4831. LOUISIANA, Government for.—[further continued].
Without looking at the
old Territorial Ordinance, I had imagined it
best to found a government for the territory
or territories of lower Louisiana on that
basis. But on examining it, I find it will not
do at all; that it would turn all their laws
topsy-turvy. Still, I believe it best to appoint
a governor and three judges, with legislative
powers; only providing that the judges shall
form the laws, and the governor have a negative
only, subject further to the negative of
a national legislature. The existing laws of
the country being now in force, the new legislature
will, of course, introduce the trial
by jury in criminal cases, first; the habeas
corpus, the freedom of the press, freedom of
religion, &c., as soon as can be, and in general
draw their laws, and organizations to the
mould of ours by degrees, as they find practicable,
without exciting too much discontent.
In proportion as we find the people
there riper for receiving these first principles
of freedom, Congress may from session to
session, confirm their enjoyment of them.—
To Albert Gallatin.
Ford ed., viii, 275.
(Nov. 1803)
