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178?] Election by State legislatures prevails. 275 was like the solar system, in which the States were the planets and ought therefore to be left to move freely in their own orbits. Wilson, he said, wished to extinguish the planets. But if the State governments were excluded from all agency in the national system, and all power drawn from the people at large, the result would be that the national govern- ment would move in the same direction as that in which the States now moved, and would run into the same mischiefs. He adhered to the opinion that the Senate ought to be composed of a large number, and that the influence of the body, from family and other causes, would be increased thereby. He did not admit that the Roman tribunes lost weight as their number was increased. Wilson agreed that the question was a difficult one ; but they must settle it. He denied that the British Constitution could be a model for them ; there were no materials for anything like it. He did not see the danger of the States being devoured by the national government ; the danger was the converse. But he was not for putting out the planets ; nor did he believe that they would warm or give light to the sun. They must be suffered within their proper orbits, for subordinate pur- poses, for which they were made essential by the great extent of the country. He was for election by the people, in large districts, regardless of the size of the States. Madison could not understand how family weight would be carried into the Senate more certainly on Dickinson's plan than in other ways. The great question was, how to make the best choice. If other modes would give the Senate as good men, there could be no need of appoint- ment by the State legislatures ; nor was it apparent that Dickinson's plan would afford a better check than other plans. The legislatures ran into bad schemes of paper money and the like whenever the people asked for them, and sometimes when they did not. Gerry re-asserted that the commercial interest would be more secure in the hands of the State legislatures than in the hands of the people. The former had more sense of character ; in Massachusetts the county conventions had declared for a depreciation of paper that would sink the project. Besides, there were two branches of the State legislatures, one of which was somewhat aristocratic ; there would therefore be, so far, a better chance of refinement. He objected to election by districts for several reasons; one had already been referred to, that a small State would form but part of the same district with a large one, and hence would have no chance of gaining an appointment for its own citizens. Dickinson's motion prevailed (June 7), all the States present voting for it. The question came before the House in Convention on June 25 ; where, on the same day, the vote in committee was affirmed, nine States aye, two States, Pennyslvania and Virginia, nay. The decision went accordingly to the committee of. detail, and thence into the CH. viii. 182