Richard Dobbs Spaight to James Iredell (August 12, 1787)

Philadelphia, August 12th, 1787. Dear Sir: —The Convention having agreed upon the outlines of a plan of government for the United States, referred it to a small committee to detail: that committee have reported, and the plan is now under consideration. I am in hopes we shall be able to get through it by the 1st or 15th of September. It is not probable that the United States will in future be so ideal as to risk their happiness upon the unanimity of the whole; and thereby put it in the power of one or two States to defeat the most salutary propositions, and prevent the Union from rising out of that contemptible situation to which it is at present reduced. There is no man of reflection, who has maturely considered what must and will result from the weakness of our present Federal Government, and the tyrannical and unjust proceedings of most of the State governments, if longer persevered in, but must sincerely wish for a strong and efficient National Government. We may naturally suppose that all those persons who are possessed of popularity in the different. States, and which they make use of, not for the public benefit, but for their private emolument, will oppose any system of this kind.1