8, and that Congress might pass
navigation acts, and that exports should never be taxed.

%178. The Election of President.%--Another feature of the Virginia
plan was the provision for a President whose business it should be to
see that the acts of Congress were duly enforced or executed. But when
the question arose, How shall he be chosen? all manner of suggestions
were made. Some said by the governors of the states; some, by the United
States Senate; some, by the state legislatures; some, by a body of
electors chosen for that purpose. When at last it was decided to have a
body of electors, the difficulty was to determine the manner of electing
the electors. On this no agreement could be reached; so the convention
ordered that the legislature of each state should have as many electors
of the President as it had senators and representatives in Congress, and
that these men should be appointed in such way as the legislatures of
the states saw fit to prescribe.

%179. Sources of the Constitution.%--An examination of the
Constitution shows that some of its features were new; that some were
drawn from the experience of the states under the Confederation; and
that others were borrowed from the various state constitutions. Among
those taken from state constitutions are such names as President,
Senate, House of Representatives, and such provisions as that for a
census, for the veto, for the retirement of one third of the Senate
every two years, that money bills shall originate in the House, for
impeachment, and for what we call the annual message.[1]

[Footnote 1: On the sources of the Constitution, read "The First Century
of the Constitution" in _New Princeton Review,_ September, 1887,
pp. 175-190.]

The features based directly on experience under the Articles of
Confederation are the provisions that the acts of Congress must be
_uniform_ throughout the Union; that the President may call out the
militia to repel invasion, to put down insurrection, and to maintain the
laws of the Union; that Congress shall have _sole_ power to regulate
_foreign trade_ and _trade between the states._ No state can now coin
money or print paper money, or make anything but gold or silver legal
tender. Congress now has power to lay taxes, duties, and excises. The
Constitution divides the powers of government between the legislative
department (Senate and House of Representatives); the executive
department (the President, who sees that laws and tr