III. DEBATE OVER CONSTITUTION

here further from   General Washington7 but not thinking it proper to
invite further Correspondence from one who had So little leisure, After
the first Numbers they were sent under a Blank Cover.-We have No
accounts from North Carolina but I confess from the knowledge I have
of the General Situation of the Country (the State laws, large Debts,
Small means, & weaker inclinations to discharge them) I fear, there
will be a Strong opposition to the Adoption of the New Government-
Those who have property to preserve wish for an efficient Government.
Those who do not wish to pay & who have nothing to lose but what
ought to be in possession of their Creditors, wish for no Government
att all-
Congress it is Said have fixed March for the time of Organisation-
but from what cause we know not (unless to keep in suspence till York
determines) No place is fixed8-
I have sent down by Bush's boat-6 Setts of Mrs. Barbaulds Lessons for
Children republished by Mr Bache
I remain Your friend & admirer
1. RC, Dickinson Papers, Library Company of Philadelphia.
2. The "papers" were apparently the nine Federalist essays signed by "Fabius" that
Dickinson wrote and that were printed in the Pennsylvania Mercury between 12 April and
1 May (CC:677). However, not a single number of Dickinson's "Fabius" has been located
in any extant New York newspaper. The "Gentn" at Poughkeepsie was possibly printer
Francis Childs of the Daily Advertiser who attended the New York Convention debates in
Poughkeepsie.
3. In early June Vaughan, although uncertain, had been more optimistic about New
York's ratifying the Constitution. He stated that "It has been Said that a majority of the
N York Convention were against it [the Constitution] -I am of Opinion that they are at
present about equal, but as no Instance has yet happened of a Federal turning antifed-
eral, & numerous ones of the Contrary, I have no doubt that notwithstanding all that
passion & influence of certain persons can do, but that all will be well-indeed all agree
there is not a doubt, if one more State only adopts.-Virginia will be the first" (to John
Langdon, 6 June, CC:775, p. 168).
4. The reference is to Dickinson's nine "Fabius" essays that Mathew Carey reprinted
in his monthly Philadelphia American Museum in the last six issues for 1788.
5. Probably a reference to Henry Laurens, a South Carolina merchant-planter, who
was formerly president of Congress (1777-78). He was elected to the Constitutional Con-
vention but refused to attend. In May 1788 he voted to ratify the Constitution in the
South Carolina Convention. The first number of "Fabius" was reprinted in the State
Gazette of South Carolina on 8 May.
6. A reference to John Langdon, a Portsmouth merchant, who had voted to ratify the
Constitution in the New Hampshire Convention on 21 June, and to whom Vaughan had
sent all nine numbers of "Fabius." The entire series was reprinted in the Portsmouth
New Hampshire Spy between 17 May and 21 June, while the first five numbers were re-
printed in the Portsmouth New Hampshire Gazette between 22 May and 19 June.
7. Vaughan sent copies of the "Fabius" essays to George Washington, who praised the
first four numbers in a 27 April letter to Vaughan (CC:677, p. 79).

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