than twenty members, few of whom in its closing years were men of any great influence. The evils of this lack of system were soon made evident, when, after some difficulty, twelve States had assented to a general system of import duties, and the thirteenth, New York, resisted, and thus alone was able to defeat a measure which was essential to the credit and security of the whole nation. So, too, articles in the treaty with England were set at naught by the different State governments, laws being passed by the various Legislatures in direct defiance of these articles, while Congress was unable to do more than merely to exhort them to annul these laws and to comply with the treaty. In this state of affairs, thoughtful men began to see that, if the United States were to exist as a nation, there must be a central government with direct power both in internal and external affairs, able to carry on foreign negotiations in the name of the nation, to create statutes operative upon all the citizens of the States, to enforce these statutes, and, if necessary, to punish those who neglected them. The first men clearly to perceive and boldly to declare this were Alexander Hamilton and James Bowdoin.
The Constitution. Though Hamilton had been among the most ardent supporters of American independence, he was not an advocate of the system of government that had been the immediate result of the war. He wished his countrymen to secure the advantages of a strong central government, and the model that he had in mind was the English system, without the monarchical principle. In 1785 an opportunity occurred of effecting, or at least of suggesting, a radical change. In that year commissioners were appointed by Virginia and Maryland to settle certain difficulties about the navigation of the Potomac River and Chesapeake Bay. They met at Mount Vernon, Washington's home, where a plan was proposed for settling commercial duties, and this led to the proposal, made by the Assembly of Virginia, for a general conference of commissioners from all the States to consider the state of trade. Hamilton, seeing that this conference might be made the instrument of more fundamental changes, persuaded New York to send commissioners, himself among them; and in 1786 commissioners from five States met at Annapolis, Md. (See Annapolis Convention.) Hamilton laid before them a report, giving reasons for calling a convention of delegates from all the States to consider the reorganization of the National Government. Such a proposal was adopted by the conference and submitted to Congress, by which it was indorsed, with the recommendation that each State should send delegates to a National Constitutional Convention. The suggestion was generally adopted, and the convention met at Philadelphia in May, 1787. Washington was chosen president of the body, which proceeded to create an entirely new scheme of government rather than to revise the existing plan as had been originally intended.
The two paramount questions at issue were the powers of the Federal Government and of the individual States and the system by which the States were to be represented in the Federal Legislature. Two tentative plans were laid before the convention, one by Edmund Randolph of Virginia, the other by William Paterson of New Jersey. The ‘Virginia Plan,’ as the former was commonly called, provided that in each branch of the National Legislature representation should be according to population, while the ‘New Jersey Plan’ provided for equal representation of the States in each branch. The practical question at issue was settled by the so-called ‘Connecticut Compromise,’ according to which in one branch of the National Legislature representation of the States should be according to population, while in the other branch it should be equal. Other compromises were also necessary in the convention, as a result of which Congress was to be given control over commerce, three-fifths of the slaves were to be counted in estimating the population of a State with reference to its representation in the Lower House, and the various States were given power to admit imported slaves for twenty years. The frame of government drawn up, with subsequent amendments, has continued to be the Constitution of the United States to the present day. See Constitution.
The difficulties incident to the ratification of the proposed Constitution were enormous. The old Congress was still in existence as the National Government, but it was in even lower repute, and of less influence, than it had been earlier in the decade, and it confessedly had neither the authority nor the power to take effective steps for the establishment of the new form of government. The convention accordingly determined to report its proceedings to the old Congress, which body was to submit the Constitution to each State for acceptance or rejection, the people of each State expressing themselves through a convention called for the purpose. All questions at issue were now revived in the vigorous and protracted discussions and contests which took place in several of these conventions. Two bitterly opposing parties arose, the Federalists (q.v.) and the Anti-Federalists, the former favoring the Constitution and the latter rejecting it. Some of the States ratified the Constitution promptly; but in others, especially Massachusetts, Virginia, and New York, the opposition was strongly developed and it was only after a protracted struggle that the opposition of such men as Patrick Henry in Virginia, and of Melancthon Smith and Yates in New York, was overcome. To this end the chief single contribution was made by the influence of The Federalist (q.v.), the series of essays produced by Hamilton, Madison, and Jay, in explanation and justification of the convention's work. Finally, on June 21, 1788, the ninth State, New Hampshire, ratified the Constitution, and, according to the terms of the instrument itself, by that event it went into force. The two important States of Virginia and New York followed with their approval on June 25th and July 26th, respectively, leaving only North Carolina and Rhode Island in the anomalous position of not being members of the new nation which claimed jurisdiction over their territory.
During the whole period of the Confederation Congress had enacted only one piece of legislation of extraordinary and enduring importance—the Ordinance of 1787 for the government of the Northwest Territory. (See Northwest Territory.) After the ratification of the Constitution by the requisite number of States, the old
