[mrsmith]

Anrifederalist William Maclay, United States Senator from Pennsylvania, had this to say in his diary about building the Constitution and her sister ships:
“ It is not suspicion that the designs of the court are to have a fleet and army. The Indian war is forced forward to justify our having a standing army, and eleven unfortunate men, now in slavery in Algiers, is the pretext for fitting out a fleet to go to war with them. While fourteen of these captives were alive, the barbarians asked about thirty-five thousand dollars for them; but it is urged that we should expend half a million dollars rather than redeem these unhappy men. I vociferated against the measure, and, I suppose, offended my colleague.
This thing of a fleet has been working among our members all the session. I have heard it break out often.”

For a view of our first congress through the eyes of an antifederalist:http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?ammem/hlaw:@field(DOCID+@lit(mj001T000)):

[ConorMacNessa]

Luckily, the standing Army and Fleet came to be. Without them, we would not be living in Freedom. But it seems that we keep going to sleep at the wheel - the U.S. Army in the later 1930's was a pale shell of what it had once been.

We are on the brink of another massive reduction in forces in a time when we are at great peril from several sources. To put it in Holmes's words, "The harpies of the shore shall pluck / The eagle of the sea!" The Army and our other services will fare no better under this Regime.



Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!

Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)