Between these
two evils, when we must make a choice, there can be no hesitation. But
in the mean while, the States should be watchful to note every material
usurpation on their rights; to denounce them as they occur in the most
peremptory terms; to protest against them as wrongs to which our present
submission shall be considered, not as acknowledgments or precedents
of right, but as a temporary yielding to the lesser evil, until their
accumulation shall overweigh that of separation. I would go still
further, and give to the federal member, by a regular amendment of the
constitution, a right to make roads and canals of intercommunication
between the States, providing sufficiently against corrupt practices in
Congress (log-rolling, &c.), by declaring that the federal proportion
of each State of the monies so employed, shall be in works within
the State, or elsewhere with its consent, and with a due _salvo_ of
jurisdiction. This is the course which I think safest and best as yet.
You ask my opinion of the propriety of giving publicity to what is
stated in your letter, as having passed between Mr. John Q. Adams and
yourself. Of this no one can judge but yourself. It is one of those
questions which belong to the forum of feeling. This alone can decide
on the degree of confidence implied in the disclosure; whether under no
circumstances it was to be communicated to others. It does not seem to
be of that character, or at all to wear that aspect.
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