lation would very much lessen the number of voters, without injuring the rights of any class, and would put the magistracy, the election and control of public agents, and the judging and voting on laws, into the hands of men, who, from having cooler passions, and more experience, are best qualified for such important trusts. It has been found by exact registers, that whatever number of men there are in England of twenty-one years of age and upwards, one half of them are under forty; so that if the right of voting were confined to those

youthful mind is sooner able to distinguish between persons worthy to be trusted, than to discuss principles of an abstract nature. And do not the laws of Britain and America recognize such an intuitive discernment in such matters? At 14 years a youth chooses the person to whom he is bound apprentice; at 14 years the law requires him to choose his guardian to be intrusted with his person and property, &c.; and at 14 years he may choose a partner for life, and the marriage is valid-And are not these choices fully more important than that of a legislator, who is to be rechosen or displaced in the short space of a year, or perhaps two or three? These observations will not indeed apply to the office of a legislator, which the author proposes to disable any person from holding till 40 years—this disqualification is a double one; it proposes to disqualify the people from electing, thereby limiting their choice, as well as preventing the individual from accepting the place. AUTHOR'S FRIEND,

who were above forty, in countries equally healthful, half of the whole number above twenty-one, and those of the strongest passions and least experience, would be prevented from crowding or disturbing the meetings.

ADMITTING the propriety of this regulation, the Roman constitution may be rendered fit for an extensive country, by adopting some such regulations as the following: Divide the nation into provinces of from thirty to sixty miles square, according as the country is populous and conveniently situated; and divide each province into districts, and make up separate lists of all the men in each district above

forty years of age. Every three hundred of these, living most contiguous, to form a ward*, and to meet in a church or some other convenient place, on a certain day annually, to elect two provincial senators, and one warden or

*In this case, there would be about 4,100 persons of all ages in each ward.

judge for the ward. These three officers must be forty years of age, and resident in the ward for which they are elected, or in one that is adjoining. These ward-voters also to elect at the same time, fifteen jury-men, each forty years old, and resident in the ward. The wardens and jury-men of every forty contiguous wards in the nation to elect out of their respective provincial senators, two men to be national senators; these to continue to be also provincial senators.

THE national senate, thus elected, to have the supreme direction of all the current national business, with full control over the military force and all national officers; but respecting laws, either for civil regulation or taxation, the senate, when it judges proper, may propose a law or a tax, or to engage in a war, and if no objections are made within a certain time, the laws are enacted, and the war declared, in the name of the people; silence being considered,

as their consent. But if an actual majority of the ward-voters, or of the wardens and jurymen, give instructions to their respective senators to vote against any measure, they must vote accordingly; and if a majority of senators are instructed to vote against any measure, it is then dropt, as the senate is not sovereign. It is only a select committee, composed of men of the highest rank and greatest abilities, chosen by the society to manage their common

concerns.

It is proper therefore that the wardens and jury-men, who are of the middle ranks, should have a negative upon laws, or engaging in war. And to prevent the lower ranks from being oppressed, it is necessary that the majority of ward-voters, which includes every rank, should also have a negative. It is equally proper that the majority of the ward-voters, or the majority of the wardens and jury-men of the nation, shall have power at any time to annul any law

enacted by the senate, the evils of which were not foreseen when it was enacted. The provincial senators and wardens, to have the same power over their province in all civil affairs, that the national senate has over the nation the senators and wardens of each district, to have the same power over their district; and the senators, wardens, and jury-men, to have the same power in their ward. But the wardvoters in all these divisions respectively to have a negative. None of the inferior legislatures to have power to control the laws of a higher, nor a higher legislature to have any power to interfere with the affairs of a lower, except by general laws for the nation, for the province, for the district, and for the ward, by their respective legislatures; so as to leave the people at full liberty to manage their own affairs as they may think proper in their families, wards, districts, and provinces. Neither national nor provincial senates to have any power to refuse any person a seat in their assem