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Module 3: The Constitution

Introduction
Christy, Howard Chandler. Scene at the Signing of the Constitution of the United States.1940. United States House of Representatives. Washington, D. C. Wikimedia Commons. Web. 28 July 2016.

The Constitutional Convention

Following Congress's approval of a convention to address the defects of the Articles of Convention at the Annapolis Convention of 1786, a new convention was convened in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787. This would become known as the Constitutional Convention.

On May 25, 1787, members of various state delegations met in Philadelphia to revise the Articles in order to overcome the defects that had led to Shay's Rebellion in Massachusetts and threatened to bring disorder to the other states for similar reasons. This mandate was quickly abandoned, however, as the delegates decided to set aside their mission and start from scratch.

An overview: 55 men served at the Convention at one time or another. They came from every state except Rhode Island. The New Hampshire delegation showed up late, and 2 of 3 from the New York delegation left early because they thought the Convention was overstepping its mandate. Hamilton remained, but New York was without an official vote. 39 delegates ultimately signed the document. Of this number, 8 had also signed the Declaration. There were three present at the end who did not sign (Elbridge Gerry, Edmund Randolph, and George Mason). Many had served in Congress, and 1/3 had served in the Revolutionary War. Ben Franklin and George Washington, the most famous Americans of the day, were there, although they had little impact on the substance of the debate. Washington said nothing until the last day. As far as impact at the Convention is concerned, Madison, Gouverneur Morris, and James Wilson were the most important figures. Some famous Americans not present: Jefferson (Paris), John Adams (England), Samuel Adams (illness), and Patrick Henry (smelled a rat).

The rules were agreed upon on the first day, and called for secrecy and voting by state. Secrecy provided insulation from public opinion and public pressure. The Convention journal was not published until 1817, and Madison's notes, the most complete account of the Convention, did not surface until 1840. With surprisingly little debate, the Convention voted to abandon the Articles of Confederation in favor of a completely new approach to republican government.

Did the Convention overstep its authority right from the first? The Constitution was not a revision of the Articles in any real sense, but revision of the Articles required unanimous consent. Given that Rhode Island did not even send delegates, there was a deep legal problem with the entire affair. Making matters worse, only 9 states initially approved the Constitution, and the state legislatures were not involved in the ratification process. On the other hand, Convention delegates argued that the Articles were so deficient that it would be impossible for the Convention to meet its obligation of revising them. They simply declared the Articles null and void.

The upshot of this is that the men of the Convention were not sticklers for legal authority, they claimed a deeper responsibility and acted in the way they thought best to achieve the stated ends of the Convention (establishing effective governance) through different means (an entirely new Constitution).

Richardt, Ferdinand. Independence Hall in Philidelphia. 1858-63. The White House. Washington, D. C. Wikimedia Commons. Web. 28 July 2016.

Plans, Large and Small

The stakes were high at the Convention. The United States already had a failed constitution in the Articles, and it was not clear that there would be anything beyond one more chance at settling federal governance in the young nation. The stakes were not only high in this way. As soon as the delegates voted to scrap the Articles, debates over how the new constitution would operate broke out immediately. These centered around the various interest of different kinds of states, most significantly large and small. The Articles had, after all, treated each state the same regardless of size. The net effect of this arrangement was that the smaller states exercised a disproportionate amount of influence. The large states were determined not to let that happen again. This argument played out in terms of what the legislative body would come to look like under the new constitution.

In Module 3, you will study the following key concepts:

Republic
'Enlargement of the Orbit'
Faction

Module 3: Section 1 - The Large State Plan: The Virginia Resolutions
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Section Reading
The Virginia Resolutions: Read Now

The Virginia Resolutions were proposed on May 29, 1787 by Edmund Randolph. The most important elements of the resolutions called for a bicameral legislature in which states would be represented in each house according to the size of their population. This would have yielded thoroughly proportional representation across the states, and would have resulted in a system in which states would matter less as such. This plan would have changed the nature of representation in the United States quite radically to the benefit of the larger states.

You can read the Virginia Resolutions here

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Element 1.1: Incentives matter: Changes in benefits and costs will influence choices in a predictable manner.

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