Ratifying the Constitution

1
Ratifying the Constitution

• Federalists
• vs.
• Anti-Federalists

2
Articles of Confederation

• Article XIII
• Every State shall abide by the determination of
  the United States in Congress assembled, on all
  questions which by this confederation are
  submitted to them. And the Articles of this
  Confederation shall be inviolably observed by
  every State, and the Union shall be perpetual
  nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be
  made in any of them unless such alteration be
  agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and
  be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of
  every State.

3
Constitution of the United States

• Article VII
• The ratification of the conventions of nine
  states, shall be sufficient for the establishment
  of this Constitution between the states so
  ratifying the same.

4
Continental Congress

• Received the Constitution and a resolution
  letter of transmittal from the Philadelphia
  Convention on September 20, 1787.
• Nationalistically dominated 18 of 33 members
  present had come from Philadelphia
• Republicans attempted to attach amendments
  letting the states choose the original or the
  congressional versions. This was to be followed
  by another convention to work out a compromise in
  the various votes cast by the states.
• Though the Federalists probably had the votes to
  carry whatever motion they wanted they choose not
  to create a noisy time consuming fight over the
  proposed amendments..

5
Continental Congress

• Federalists recognized the danger of the attached
  amendments (to ratification) but realized that
  any debate would detract from the illusion of
  unanimity they were trying to create.
• Federalists also realized they needed to get the
  document to Pennsylvania as quickly as possible.
• On 28 September Congress chose to compromise
  sending the Constitution and the Report of the
  Convention to the states without any
  congressional recommendation.
• Once the resolution passed it was leaked to the
  newspapers in such a way that readers received
  the impression that the unanimous vote on the
  compromise had meant unanimous approval of the
  Constitution.

6
Pennsylvania

• Pennsylvania had in September 1787 a sitting
  legislature that was nationalist dominated but it
  was legally required to end on September 29.
• Nationalists wanted to get the Constitution
  before the Pennsylvania legislature for its
  approval the legislature could then call for a
  vote concerning ratification almost immediately.
• The quicker elections could be called, the less
  likely the Constitution would be available in
  print to the western back country where most of
  the opposition to the Constitution and to a
  national government was centered.
• If a delay occurred and a new legislature were to
  vote on the Constitution ratification could not
  be guaranteed and at the least would be delayed
  by several critical months.

7
Pennsylvania

• Nationalists in the Continental Congress provided
  a special courier to speed the Constitution to
  Philadelphia where the courier arrived Friday
  night hours before the legislature was to
  adjourn.
• Nineteen anti-nationalist members of the
  legislature in an attempt to prevent a quorum
  and thus approval of a ratification election
  disappeared.
• A huge band of men was sent to scour the city
  searching for the missing representatives.
• Just minutes prior to the expiration of the legal
  assembly time, two of the missing member were
  found, seized and forcibly dragged to the House.
• With a quorum achieved with the two
  anti-nationalists, the motion for a special
  ratification election in early November was
  passed.
• Federalists concentrated on Philadelphia and the
  surrounding county with its large swing vote.

8
Ratification
9
First Election

• Fall 1788
• Despite the fights and splits surrounding the
  Philadelphia Convention and the struggle for
  ratification the elections in the fall of 1788
  were uneventful and were held amidst an overall
  spirit of unity rivaling that of Seventy-Six.
• New York, however, faced some extreme
  difficulties. One faction controlled the upper
  house of the state legislature while the rival
  faction controlled the lower. As a result the
  two could not agree on a method of choosing
  electors for the Electoral College and thus New
  York had no electors for president.
• In Virginia anti-Federalists Patrick Henry
  continued to dominate the state legislature and
  both candidates to the US Senate were
  anti-Federalists Richard Henry Lee and William
  Grayson. So influential was Henry that James
  Madison was placed in a district that almost
  denied him a seat in the House of Representatives.

10
First Election

• George Washington was chosen as the first
  president and John Adams was selected as the
  first vice-president despite promises made to
  John Hancock during the ratification process.
• All states except Virginia and New York sent
  delegations to the first congress who were
  supporters of the Constitution.
• New York could not agree on a delegation and thus
  was not represented in the first US Congress.
• North Carolina and Rhode Island had not ratified
  the Constitution and they also had no delegation
  in Congress.
• The first Congress then consisted of over thirty
  Federalists and less than a dozen
  anti-Federalists.

11
First Congress

• March 4 was the day set for the first meeting of
  the First Congress.
• Both Houses failed to attain a quorum and five
  weeks would pass before Congress had enough
  members present to conduct business.
• The first order of business
• the proper form of address for the president.

12
First Congress

• Despite the gaining momentum of the
  anti-Federalists during the ratification process
  concerning a bill of rights the first congress
  continued to ignore the issue and began to
  consider the raising of a revenue by levying
  import duties, itself a critical issue.
• James Madison who truly appreciated the momentum
  of the anti-Federalists gave notice on May 4 that
  he would propose certain amendments to the
  Constitution on May 25.

13
The Bill of Rights

• Federalists opposed the idea of a Bill of Rights
  mainly because they thought such amendments as
  unnecessary if the Constitution laid out the
  powers of the government why enumerate the rights
  of the people.
• Anti-Federalists supported the amendments during
  the ratification but once congress met they
  realized that any chance of a second convention
  to redo the constitution would be lost if such
  amendments passed turned against the idea.
• Because many Federalists recognized that Madison
  was attempting to prevent just such a convention,
  his proposal passed with the support of the
  Federalists.

14
The Bill of Rights

• Madison took all the proposals made by the nine
  states concerning amendments to the Constitution
  except North Carolina and Rhode Island.
• Once completely assembled Madison had 186
  amendments 210 if one includes the preamble
  amendments forwarded from New York.

15
The Bill of Rights

• Madison combined duplicates cutting the number to
  80 proposals that he considered substantive.
• By dismissing the least popular and most
  impractical Madison cut the number to nineteen
  amendments.
• On June 8, the House sent the proposed amendment
  to a committee who returned 17 amendments
  differing little from Madisons originals and
  including applicability to the states as well as
  the national government.
• On September 2 the Senate took up the issue of
  the proposed amendments and immediately removed
  the applicability to the states but otherwise
  largely concurred with the House.

16
The Bill of Rights

• On September 25 a joint committee of the House
  and Senate met to resolve the differences in the
  two versions and further consolidated the
  proposed amendments to twelve the first two
  concerning the number and salaries of congressmen
  were never approved.
• North Carolina ratified the Constitution on
  November 21, 1789 and five months later Rhode
  Island followed its sisters into the union.
• On December 15, 1791 ten amendments were ratified
  and became the Bill of Rights, part of the
  Constitution.
• With that, the momentum for a new convention lost
  all significance and collapsed.