Note 566 — Chapter VIII · THE PROCESS OF RATIFICATION
Reading edition
McMaster and Stone, op. cit., p. 20. The following year [1788] when the ratification of the Constitution was celebrated in Philadelphia, James Wilson, in an oration on the great achievement said: “A people free and enlightened, establishing and ratifying a system of government which they have previously considered, examined, and approved! This is the spectacle which we are assembled to celebrate; and it is the most dignified one that has yet appeared on our globe.... What is the object exhibited to our contemplation? A whole people exercising its first and greatest power—performing an act of sovereignty, original and unlimited!... Happy country! May thy happiness be perpetual!” Works (1804 ed.), Vol. III, pp. 299 ff.