each State, large or small, voted
as a unit), should and must be preserved in the future government. To
this the larger States were quite unwilling to yield, and when the
committee rose they reported, in substance, the Virginia plan, with the
proviso that representation in the proposed double-chambered Congress
should be "according to some equitable ratio of representation."

On June 15 the small States presented their draft, which was afterwards
known as the New Jersey plan, because it was introduced by Mr. Patterson
of that State. It only contemplated an amendment to the existing
Constitution and an amplification of the powers of the impotent
Confederation. Its chief advance over the existing government was that
it provided for a federal executive and a federal judiciary, but
otherwise the government remained a mere league of States, in which the
central government could generally act only by the vote of nine States,
and in which their power was exhausted when they requested the States to
enforce the decrees. Its chief advance over the Articles of
Confederation, in addition to the creation of an executive, was an
assertion that the acts of Congress "shall be the supreme law of the
respective States ... and that the judiciary of the several States shall
be bound thereby in their decisions," and that "if any State or any
body of men in any State shall oppose or prevent the carrying into
execution of such acts or treaties the federal executive shall be
authorized to call forth the power of the confederated States ... to
enforce and compel obedience to such acts or an observance of such
treaties."

While this was some advance toward a truly national government, it yet
left the national executive dependent upon the constituent States, for
if they failed to respond to the call above stated the national
government had no direct power over their citizens.

The New Jersey plan precipitated a crisis, and thereafter, and for many
days, the argument proceeded, only to increase in bitterness.

On June 18 Alexander Hamilton, who agreed with no one else, addressed
the convention for the first time. He spoke for five hours and reviewed
exhaustively the Virginia and New Jersey plans, and possibly the
Pinckney draft. Even the fragment of the speech, as taken in long-hand
by Madison, shows that it was a masterly argument. He stated his belief
"that the British Government was the best in the world and that he
doubted much whether an