How Tench Coxe Shaped the Ratification Debates: Essays of A Pennsylvanian

By: Mike Maharrey

 

History often overlooks Tench Coxe, but he was one of the most important founding fathers. While the Federalist Papers are celebrated and widely discussed today, Coxe’s essays, written under the pen name “A Pennsylvanian,” had a far greater impact on swaying public opinion during the ratification debates.

But they’re almost completely ignored today.

Distributed widely beyond Pennsylvania, Coxe’s work directly addressed the opposition’s concerns and became crucial ammunition for ratification efforts in many states.

Pennsylvania ratified the Constitution on Dec. 12, 1787. Six days later, a majority of the delegates who opposed ratification issued a public statement titled “The Address and Reasons of Dissent of the Minority of the Convention of the State of Pennsylvania.”

Like most Anti-federalist writings, the dissent focused on the prospect of consolidation, arguing that the Constitution would allow the federal government to grow too centralized and powerful. It specifically cited the general welfare and necessary and proper clauses as avenues for tyranny.

Coxe took up his pen and wrote a number of essays rebutting the Anti-federalist arguments. In February 1788, the Pennsylvania Gazette published four under the pseudonym “A Pennsylvanian.” He wrote a fifth under that name in June, addressed solely to the New York convention. Previously, he wrote under other pseudonyms including “An American Citizen,” and “A Freeman.” 

While his essays from “A Pennsylvanian” were obviously too late to impact the outcome of the Pennsylvania ratifying convention, they were widely read in states that had yet to ratify. As Rob Natelson notes, “one vehicle was the Gazette itself, perhaps the most respected newspaper in America and widely read outside Pennsylvania. In addition, the Constitution’s advocates distributed copies of the articles in other states; for example, [James] Madison sent them throughout Virginia.”

They were intended for a broad audience as well, which can be seen in the fact that each started out with “To the People of the United States.”

Professor Jacob E. Cooke, a prominent Coxe biographer, described the Pennsylvanian essays as “Coxe’s most noteworthy contribution to the ratification debate,” adding that they “invite comparison to the best of the literature spawned by that controversy, including the Federalist essays.”

CONSOLIDATION AND FEAR

Like the Dissent, the overarching anti-federalist fear was the Constitution would allow the federal government to centralize power. Ultimately, anti-federalists worried that this would annihilate the states and render them powerless in the face of an all-powerful national government. During the Virginia ratifying convention, Patrick Henry called the dangers of consolidation “the most destructive.”

Throughout his essays of “A Pennsylvanian,” Coxe primarily attacked these Anti-federalist worries about consolidation.

He summarized this Anti-federalist opposition, writing that “the proposed constitution will annihilate the legislative, executive and judicial powers of the several states” was “the great ground, on which all the fears of the opposition rest in Pennsylvania, and throughout the union.”

However, he argued this fear was unfounded because so many government functions were left outside of the federal sphere.

“The legislature of each state must possess, exclusively of Congress, many powers, which the latter can never exercise.”

In the first two essays, Coxe also focused on internal factions in Pennsylvania, writing, “You well know, my countrymen, the unhappy and baneful party contentions which have distracted Pennsylvania.”

The implication was that much of their opposition to the ratification of the Constitution was rooted in party politics.

DELEGATED AND RESERVED

He went on to itemize many powers that remained with the states. These fit into several categories.

For instance, Coxe said states would retain most powers relating to infrastructure, including “the improvement of the country by general roads, canals, bridges, clearing rivers, erecting ferries, building state houses, town halls, court houses, market houses, county gaols [jails—ed.], poor houses, places of worship, state and county schools and hospitals.”

Coxe also said the states would retain police powers, including the authority to “prescribe the various punishments that shall be inflicted for disorders, riots, assaults, larcenies, bigamy, arson, burglaries, murders, state treason, and many other offences against their peace and dignity, which, being in no way subjected to the jurisdiction of the federal legislature, would go unpunished.”

And of course, the federal government was to have no power over the internal administration of the state. This included civil and criminal matters, elections, and more.

“They can create new state offices, and abolish old ones; regulate descents of lands, and the distribution of the other property of persons dying intestate; provide for calling out the militia, for any purpose within the state; prescribe the qualifications of electors of the state, and even of the federal representatives; make donations of lands; erect new state courts; incorporate societies for the purposes of religion, learning, policy or profit; erect counties, cities, towns and boroughs; divide an extensive territory into two governments; declare what offenses shall be impeachable in the states, and the pains and penalties that shall be consequent on conviction; and elect the federal senators.”

All of these powers would be reserved to  the states and could be exercised by them “independent of the control or interference of the federal government.”

Coxe argued that would make it impossible for the federal government to swallow up the states.

“How then can it be said, that they will be absorbed by the Congress, who can interfere in few or none of those matters, though they are absolutely necessary to the preservation of society and the existence of both the federal and state governments.”

POWER OF THE SWORD

Coxe also addressed worries that the “power of the sword” was solely in the hands of Congress. He countered that the sword was truly in the hands of “the yeomanry of America from sixteen to 60.”

By this, he meant the militia, and he believed it was an essential first line of defense for the United States.

Coxe wrote, “The militia of these free commonwealths, entitled and accustomed to their arms, when compared with any possible army, must be tremendous and irresistible.”

And who makes up the militia?

As Coxe pointed out, it is the people themselves.

“Is it feared, then, that we shall turn our arms each man against his own bosom?”

In other words, Coxe argued that since the militia is the people, it is not ultimately a threat to the people.

Furthermore, Coxe pointed out, “Congress have no power to disarm the militia.”

Again, that power is in the hands of the people. Coxe argued this wasn’t just a constitutional issue, it was their natural right.

“Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birth-right of an American.”

Coxe summed up his view in support of the individual, natural right to keep and bear arms by noting that the “unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the fœderal or state governments, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people.”

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

Fundamentally, Coxe was arguing that the federal government would only possess the powers delegated to it.

In his fourth essay, Coxe took the same approach by addressing the charge that the Constitution would endanger religious liberty.

“The most careful examination of the powers to be vested in Congress will not enable us to discover one clause, by which the fœderal legislature can interfere in religious affairs.”

Given that there are no delegated powers relating to religious liberty, that power would be left to the states, as each state determined. As Coxe put it, “The Convention have carefully avoided investing them with any authority of that nature.”

He went on to write, “Here, we cannot omit to observe, is an highly important and influential power, remaining with the state governments.”

STATES TO RETAIN THEIR POWER

Coxe summed up the differences between the federal and state governments, arguing that they are entirely different entities with different purposes and powers.

“The federal government and the state governments are neither co-ordinate, co-equal, nor even similar. They are of different natures.”

He went on to contrast the two types of governments.

“The general government is fœderal, or a union of sovereignties, for special purposes. The state governments are social, or an association of individuals, for all the purposes of society and government.”

Coxe conceded that the “greater” could swallow up the “lesser,” but he argued that if that was true, “let the federal government take care, for it is surely less powerful than the state governments combined.”

“Without the state governments, that of the union can have no power, since the latter is created by them—but the state governments have and ever must have much separate and independent power, and do not derive, from the fœderal government, any part of what they possess.”

CONCLUSION

Coxe echoed many of the arguments advanced by other Federalists. He insisted the federal government wouldn’t become dangerously oversized because the Constitution strictly limited its power. He was convinced that this careful division of power would guard against consolidation.

With their wide circulation and persuasive arguments, it’s undeniable Coxe’s essays influenced ratification in other states. His assurances almost certainly moved some fence-sitters to vote for ratification.

This is significant because it reveals the extent of the power people believed they were delegating to the federal government. This was how supporters of the Constitution sold the document and served as the basis for ratification.

This being the case, Coxe’s essays provide strong evidence that the federal government has dramatically overstepped its constitutional limits.