The writings of George Washington; being his correspondence, addresses, messages, and other papers, official and private, selected and published from the original manuscripts; with a life of the author, notes and illustrations. By Jared Sparks.

428 LIFE OF WASHINGTON. [1785.
which commerce chiefly centred, were influenced by
another motive. A larger amount would be drawn from
the revenue in such States, than in others of equal or
greater extent, population, and internal wealth. The
fact was overlooked or disregarded, that the consumers,
wherever they resided, actually paid the impost, and
that the commercial States, by controlling the impost
in their own ports, enjoyed advantages which the
others did not possess. New York never acceded
to the recommendation of Congress in such a manner
as to make it operative; and, as the success of the
measure everywhere depended on the caprice of the
legislatures, and a rigid system of collection faithfully
administered, there was but little hope of its answering
the important end of supplying the national treasury.
A dissolution of the Union, or an early and thorough
reform, was inevitable. The mode of effecting the latter, and saving the republic, was a theme upon which
Washington dwelt with deep solicitude in his correspondence and conversations with his friends. By a
concurrence of favorable circumstances his advice and
personal efforts were made available at the beginning
of the train of events, which ended in the achievement
of the constitution. "To form a compact relative to
the navigation of the rivers Potomac and Pocomoke,
and of' part of the bay of Chesapeake, commissioners
were appointed by the legislatures of Virginia and
Maryland, who assembled at Alexandria, in March,
1785. While at Mount Vernon on a visit, they agreed
to propose to their respective governments the appointment of other commissioners, with power to make
conjoint arrangements, to which the assent of Congress was to be solicited, for maintaining a naval force
in the Chesapeake, and to establish a tariff of duties
on imports, to which the laws of both States should