resolution of the Committee of the whole House—that each State not containing that number shall be allowed one member—that all writs for raising or appropriating money, and for fixing the salaries of the officers of government of the United States, shall originate in the first branch of the Legislature, and shall not be altered or amended by the second branch—and that no money shall be drawn from the treasury of the United States, but in pursuance of appropriations to be originated by the first branch.
‘Secondly. That in the second branch of the Legislature each State shall have an equal vote.’
The number of forty thousand inhabitants to every member in the House of Representatives, was not a subject of much debate, or an object insisted on, as some of the Committee were opposed to it. Accordingly, on the 10th of July, a motion was made ‘to double the number of representatives, being sixty-five,’ and it passed in the negative.
The admission, however, of the smaller States to an equal representation in the Senate, never would have been agreed to by the Committee, or by myself, as a member of it, without the provision ‘that all bills for raising or appropriating money, and for fixing the salaries of the officers of government,’ should originate in the House of Representatives, and ‘not be altered or amended’ by the Senate, ‘and that no money should be drawn from the treasury’ ‘but in pursuance of such appropriations.’
This provision was agreed to by the Convention, at the same time and by the same vote, as that which allows to each State an equal voice in the Senate, and was afterwards referred to the Committee of Detail, and reported by them as part of the Constitution, as will appear by documents in my possession. Nevertheless, the smaller States having attained their object of an equal voice in the Senate, a new provision, now in the Constitution, was substituted, whereby the Senate have a right to propose amendments to revenue bills, and the provision reported by the Committee was effectually destroyed.
It was conceived by the Committee to be highly unreasonable and unjust that a small State, which would contribute but one sixty-fifth part of any tax, should, nevertheless, have an equal right with a large State which would contribute eight or ten sixty-fifths of the same tax, to take money from the pockets of the latter, more especially as it was intended that the powers of the new legislature should extend to internal taxation. It was likewise conceived, that the right of expending should be in proportion to the ability of raising money—that the larger States would not have the least security
