What shall become of the minority, in that case?
This is the only principle to seek--"the greatest good of all." [Footnote: Massachusetts Quarterly, June, 1849.] A few months after Mr.Adams' entrance into the Senate of the United States, a law was passed by Congress, at the suggestion of Mr.Jefferson, authorizing the purchase of Louisiana.

Mr.Adams deemed this measure an encroachment on the Constitution of the United States, and opposed it on the ground of its unconstitutionality.

He was one of six senators who voted against it.

Yet when the measure had been legally consummated, he yielded it his support.

In passing laws for the government of the territory thus obtained, the right of trial by jury was granted only in capital cases.