THE

EDITOR'S ADVERTISEMENT.

FTER the Colonies of North A merica had

Mother-Country, by their solemn Declaration of Independence, in the month of July 1776, each of the States into which they were then divided, adopted different forms of independent governments, befides entering into a general treaty of confederation and union. These plans of new governments were completed at different times by the different States; a final sanction having been given sooner by some to that form which they chose to adopt, and later by others: thus, the constitution of the Colony of Massachusetts was not finally fettled till the month of March 1780. The same difference in point of time also took place in regard to the respective accessions of the new American States to the general treaty of confederation; the Colony of Maryland, for instance, having only acceded to it in the same month of March 1780, that is, about four years after the Declaration of Independence. To these circumstances it is very probably owing, that no Collection containing the above new Conftitutions, together, with the general treaty between the United States of North America, was for a long time published. At last, on the 29th of December 1780,

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1780, that is, about eighteen months ago, an order was issued by the Congress for printing correct copies of the above pieces. Why the Congrefs directed a small number to be published, is not faid; only two hundred copies are expressed in their order, which were distributed, some months ago, to the principal men in America, and a few were sent over to Europe. One of these copies having fallen into the Editor's hands, he thinks the reprinting of it will not prove unacceptable to the Public, as the Collection here mentioned may be confidered as the Magna Charta of the United American States, as the code of their fundamental laws, and, in short, the book which the opposite parties among them will at all times claim in some thape or other, and the knowledge of which is therefore necessary to such persons as wish to understand the present or future internal American politics.

In framing their respective Constitutions, each Colony has followed its own particular views; from which it has resulted that their Governments are all different from one another. In the Colony of Pennsylvania, for instance, they have especially directed their endeavours, not only towards eftablishing public frugality, but also towards preventing too much power of any kind falling into the hands of any individual; while the Colony of Maffachusetts have shewn in that respect much greater confidence, and have allowed the Governor of their • Commonwealth a degree of power at least equal to that poffefsfed by the Stadtholder, in the Dutch Government: only, he is to be chofen annually. In regard to the State of Rhode Island, as they already formed, before the American Revolution, a kind of independent

independent Republic, through the ceffion that had been made by Charles the Second to their Governor and Company, of all powers legislative, executive, and judicial, they have continued to admit their original Charter as the rule of their Government; and it has accordingly been inferted among the Constitutions of the other United States.

It may be remarked, in respect to the American Republican Governments, that they differ in two very essential points from the ancient Grecian and Italian Commonwealths, as well as from the modern European ones, which were all framed on the model of these: One, is the circumstance of the People being represented, in the new American Republicks; and the other, is the division of the Legiflature into two distinct separate bodies, that takes place in them, and which they have adopted, as well as many other essential regulations, from the British form of Government.

The precedency among the different American States, like that which obtains among the Helvetian Cantons and the Dutch Provinces, has not been fettled from their respective degrees of power and importance, but from the time of their existence, and the dates of their charter. The Treaty of perpetual Confederation between them, which is inferted in this book, may be confidered as the law, or code, by which the United States are intended to be confolidated into one common Republic; and as the different particular Constitutions are to govern the different respective States, so the Treaty is the Conftitution, or mode of Government, for the collective North - American Commonwealth. The

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copy of this Treaty, which is the most interesting part of the Collection, has accordingly been placed at the beginning of this new edition, together with the Declaration of Independence, which may be confidered as the ground-work of the whole present American political system. This disposition, which is that expressed in the order issued by the Congress, is also the most natural; and it has been rather improperly that the Committee appointed to form the Collection, have inferted these two pieces at the end of the book.

June 15, 1782.

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IN CONGRESS ASSEMBLED.

HEN, in the course of human events, it becomes necefsary for one people to dissolve the political bands which

have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and tranfient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and ufurpations, pursuing invariably

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