The Senate
thought I should ask their advice. I thought that would be a mockery of
them, when I was predetermined against following it, should they advise
its ratification. The constitution had made their advice necessary to
confirm a treaty, but not to reject it. This has been blamed by some;
but I have never doubted its soundness. In the cases of two persons,
antenati, under exactly similar circumstances, the federal court had
determined that one of them (Duane) was not a citizen; the House of
Representatives nevertheless determined that the other (Smith of South
Carolina) was a citizen, and admitted him to his seat in their body.
Duane was a republican, and Smith a federalist, and these decisions were
during the federal ascendancy.
* The constitution controlling the common law in this
particular.
These are examples of my position, that each of the three departments
has equally the right to decide for itself what is its duty under the
constitution, without any regard to what the others may have decided
for themselves under a similar question. But you intimate a wish that my
opinion should be known on this subject. No, dear Sir, I withdraw
from all contests of opinion, and resign every thing cheerfully to
the generation now in place. They are wiser than we were, and their
successors will be wiser than they, from the progressive advance of
science. Tranquillity is the _summum bonum_ of age.
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