Comments on Edmund Randolph’s “Facts and Observations,” [16 August] 1782
Comments on Edmund Randolph’s
“Facts and Observations”
Printed copy ( pp. 141–42). See Comments on Temple, 1 August 1782, headnote.
Editorial Note
On 16 August 1782 Congress listened to a reading of most of Randolph’s “Facts and Observations in support of the several Claims of the United States not included in their Ultimatum of the 15th of June, 1781” (Report on Instructions to Peace Commissioners, 15 August 1782, n. 5). Although a few of the initial pages are devoted to a defense of the right of the United States to share in the Newfoundland fisheries, most of this long report upholds the claims of the individual states to extend west and northwest to the Mississippi River. Randolph asserted “that if the vacant lands cannot be demanded upon the preceding grounds, that is upon the titles of individual States, they are to be deemed to have been the property of his Britannic Majesty immediately before the Revolution and to be now devolved upon the United States, collectively taken” ( pp. 116, 141).
Upon hearing this “clause” read, Theodorick Bland moved, and was seconded by Arthur Lee, to have it “expunged.” The motion “brought on a long debate,” Thomson recorded, “in which many members spoke” (ibid., p. 141). The delegates from states with fixed boundaries probably were amazed to hear the Virginian JM express a willingness to concede the validity of their argument against the claims of the “landed” states, and especially of Virginia, to the western territory. The following summary of what JM said during the discussion reveals not only awareness of this apparent inconsistency but also of the imperative need, for the sake of obtaining a united front in the peace negotiations, to support a position which he had attacked when taken on the western-lands issue in its domestic aspects. In other words, the United States comprised thirteen sovereignties at home, but they necessarily became one sovereign state in international affairs. These two facets of the Confederation were so dissimilar, constitutionally viewed, that an argument of determinative weight in relation to one of them might be almost irrelevant in relation to the other.
[16 August 1782]
… Mr Madison observed that the clause was imported1 for the purpose of reconciling all the States to the report, that though he was satisfied there was no solid foundation in the argument, yet he saw plainly if the clause was struck out sundry States would object to the rest of the report & therefore he should be for its standing. But he thought it improper that any vote should be taken.2
1. JM used “imported” in the sense of “introduced.”
2. That is, both on Bland’s motion to expunge and on the document as a whole. For JM’s reason for objecting to a vote, see Comments on Instructions to Peace Commissioners, 15 August 1782, and n. 1. For his interpretation of the strategy prompting the Bland-Lee motion, see his letter to Randolph of 20 August 1782. Following JM’s remarks, Bland “insisted on a vote & called for the yeas & nays. Hereupon it was observed that the whole debate was out of order; that the report was reading for information not for debate; that the interruption & motion were improper and that no question could be taken until the whole was read through. To this it was answered that the objection should have been made sooner. To put an end to the debate an adjournment was called for and agreed to” ( p. 142).
The Bland-Lee motion and the subsequent debate had violated the fourth of the twenty-eight rules of procedure adopted by Congress on 4 May 1781 and also an additional rule adopted on 14 February 1782 (, XX, 476; XXII, 76). Probably because the proceedings of 16 August, except for the motion to adjourn, had been out of order, they were not entered in the journal and Randolph’s entire report was re-read on 20 August 1782 (, XXIII, 470, 471–521; p. 142). See Instructions to Secretary for Foreign Affairs, 20 August 1782, and ed. n., and n. 2.