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To the People of the State of New York:

纽约州的各位人民：

After an unequivocal experience of the inefficacy¹ of the subsisting² federal government, you are called upon to deliberate on a new Constitution for the United States of America. The subject speaks its own importance; comprehending in its consequences nothing less than the existence of the UNION, the safety and welfare of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many respects the most interesting in the world. It has been frequently remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend for their political constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made; and a wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind.

在明确体验到现存联邦政府的无能之后，你们被要求为美利坚合众国审议一部新宪法。这一问题本身就很重要；其后果无非是关系到联邦的存在、联邦各组成部分的安全和福利，以及一个在许多方面都是世界上最令人感兴趣的帝国的命运。人们经常说，似乎只有这个国家的人民才能通过他们的行为和榜样来决定这个重要问题：人类社会是否真的能够通过深思熟虑和选择建立良好的政府，或者他们是否注定永远要依靠偶然和武力来制定政治宪法。如果这一说法有道理，那么我们面临的危机可以恰当地被视为作出这一决定的时代；从这个角度来看，我们错误地选择了将要扮演的角色，应该被视为人类的普遍不幸。