Alexandria Advertiser And Commercial Intelligencer

Legislature of Massachusetts.
IN SENATE.— June 5.
The Hon. Messrs Coffin, Bidwell and Pickman
were appointed a committee to wait on the Governor with the following
ANSWER OF THE SENATE
TO HIS
EXCELLENCY'S SPEECH.

May it please your Excellency,

The Senate sincerely congratulate your
Excellency upon your re-election to the
first office of this commonwealth: and however
delicate or arduous may be the duties
which you are called upon to perform, we
doubt not that they will be discharged
with that wisdom, impartiality, and regard
to the best interests of your constituents,
which have hitherto marked your
public conduct and secured to you their
esteem and approbation.

In all our deliberations we shall endeavor to
keep our excellent constitution steadily in view:
to make it the rule and the guide of our conduct;
and we hope that all our measures will tend to
promote the invaluable objects for which it was
ordained and established. We are sensible that
government is necessary for man: without it he
cannot enjoy the blessings of society. And it is
with gratitude we reflect that the citizens of the
United States are blest with the freest governments
on earth; which emanated from themselves,
and are administered by men of their own
appointment. To prove the superiority of these
governments, to preserve and perpetuate them, to
transmit them unimpaired to the latest posterity,
must be the highest ambition of every honest citizen.

With your excellency we feel the necessity and
importance of preserving the union of these
States. On it, under Divine Providence, depend
our respectability and safety as a nation,
and our happiness as individuals. Incalculable
are the evils which might flow from their disunion.
It is, therefore, the duty of all, but
more especially of those who are placed in public
office, to cultivate and cherish such a spirit as
will best tend to avert an event so justly to be
deprecated. As the best means, however, of
perpetuating our union, the citizens of the United
States should be impressed with a due sense
of the importance of preserving the federal constitution
inviolate. To strengthen our national union;
to give stability to the constitutions which
we have in the most solemn manner engaged to
support; to promote a generous confidence in
those who are called to administer our governments,
and at the same time a vigilant attention
to their measures of administration; are not less
the dictates of interest than of duty. We trust
that the good sense and patriotism of the people
will forever preserve the principles of our constitutions
from violation; and if under the influence
of party zeal, or a mistaken desire to promote
the public good any acts should ever be
passed inconsistent with those principles, that they
will not obtain the sanction of time. And we
deem it proper, on this occasion, to declare that
we consider an independent judiciary as one of
the best supports and most essential attributes of
free government.

The experience of an age has proved that
there is no evil to which free nations are more
exposed than the prevalence of party spirit. It
is perhaps the necessary offspring of free governments:
but it frequently proves their bane and
destruction. It is incumbent therefore on every
good citizen carefully to watch over and suppress
such a spirit in himself, to frown upon and
discountenance it in others.—They, who, to promote
party purposes, or to raise themselves to
office, invent and give circulation to tales of calumny
respecting public characters, whatever
may be their professions, must have hearts totally
devold of every truly virtuous and patriotic
principle. They not only injure the persons
whom they calumniate, but they do an irreparable
injury to the community. They discourage
good men from accepting offices of trust and responsibility.
They introduce men unprincipled
and regardless of character in their stead. They
thereby pave the way for the destruction of our
present free governments, and will enable some
popular and successful usurper to establish his
empire on their ruins. We flatter ourselves
that the mildness of the American character,
and the good sense of the people will preserve
them from these evils: but it ought to be deeply
impressed on their minds, that the only way
to avoid the calamities which have befallen other
free nations, is to avoid their errors.

The several subjects which your excellency has
pointed out for our consideration, and subsequent
communications which you may be pleased
to make, shall meet a prompt and respectful attention.
We shall endeavor to expedite the public
business by an assiduous attention to it. We
doubt not your excellency's disposition to render
the session agreeable to the members of the
government, nor of your ready concurrence in
every measure calculated to promote the public
good.