Convention: A Daily Journal

By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 3/8/2021 - 5 minute read

The representatives’ chambers in the Massachusetts State House were too small to accommodate the large number of delegates attending the ratifying convention as well as anxious observers watching from the galleries The convention had agreed to accept an invitation from a church on Brattle Street to use its facilities, but after only one day’s deliberations under wholly inadequate acoustics, the delegates were forced to return to the State House. They immediately authorized a second committee to find a more suitable location and on January 17 the convention moved to the Long Land Congregational Church

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 2/21/2021 - 4 minute read

Despite heavy snow in the dead of winter impeding travel for many delegates, the Massachusetts ratifying convention convened on time on January 9 in the Boston State House at the intersection of Washington and State Streets, the Council Chamber looking toward Long Wharf and the harbor. Built in 1713, it was the oldest public building in Boston and already considered one of the most important buildings in colonial America.

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 2/15/2021 - 5 minute read

On January 9, as delegates to the Connecticut ratifying convention were voting to approve the proposed Constitution, other delegates were gathering at the State House in Boston, Massachusetts, for their own ratifying convention. The decision was made in less than six days in Connecticut, but the convention in Boston would not adjourn for a month. For the first time, advocates of the new Constitution would face formidable opposition and an uncertain outcome. Still shaken by the spring 1787 uprising in western Massachusetts known as Shay’s Rebellion, a general sentiment prevailed that change was in order. But what kind of change and who would benefit bitterly divided the descendants of those who had first stepped into the New World at Plymouth in November 1620 and those who had resisted the British at Lexington and Concord in April 1775.

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 2/8/2021 - 5 minute read

While debate over ratification of the Constitution carried on in the newspapers of Pennsylvania was rousing and robust, opposition to the Constitution in Connecticut newspapers was all but absent. Pro-Constitution Federalists controlled all nine newspapers and were anxious to secure ratification as soon as possible. Oliver Ellsworth and Roger Sherman were ready to lend their pens to the effort, submitting essays many weeks before the Connecticut ratifying convention convened on January 3 where Ellsworth had been designated to give the opening address.

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 2/1/2021 - 5 minute read

On January 5, the day Georgia ratified the Constitution, the Connecticut ratifying convention was in its third day. The previous October, the Connecticut General Assembly had resolved that “the people of the several Towns of this State, who are qualified to vote in Town-Meetings,” meet on November 12 to choose delegates to meet in convention on January 3 for the purpose of considering ratification of the proposed United States Constitution. Each town would elect a number of delegates equal to the number it was entitled to have in the General Assembly. The convention would take place at the State House in Hartford.

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 1/25/2021 - 5 minute read

By the close of 1787, three States had ratified the Constitution.  On January 2, 1788 Georgia added its approval to those of Delaware, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey.  Connecticut would be next, ratifying on January 9.

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 1/13/2021 - 5 minute read

On December 26, 1787, the New Jersey Journal, one of three newspapers in New Jersey, carried a brief notice that “the people of the State of New Jersey, in Convention assembled, did assent to and ratify the Constitution…without a single dissenting voice after nine day’s deliberation.”  It further noted that “many supposed exceptions were agitated: but the Honorable Judge [David] Brearley, with a perspicuity of argument and persuasive eloquence which carried conviction with it, bore down all opposition.” The article concluded by advising its readers that “many people look upon the adoption of the new Constitution as the millennium of virtue and wealth…but it should be remembered that much depends on our own conduct.”

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 1/11/2021 - 5 minute read

On December 12, the Pennsylvania convention ratified the new Constitution. After an elaborate procession, ringing of bells, and firing of thirteen cannon, members of the ratifying convention “returned to the State House and subscribed the two copies of the ratification.” Thomas Hartley, a pro-Constitution member from York County, “hoped the opposition might yet be induced to sign the ratification” as a “fair and honorable acquiescence in the principle that the majority should govern.”  John Smilie would have none of it. “Speaking for himself,” he declared he “would never allow his hand, in so gross a manner, to give the lie to his heart and tongue.”

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 12/28/2020 - 5 minute read

With Delaware’s ratification of the Constitution on December 7, Pennsylvania lost its historic opportunity to have been the first.  Frustrated by the lengthy, repetitive debate in the Pennsylvania ratifying convention and further agitated by Delaware’s beating them to ratification, Thomas McKean announced his intention to call for the final vote on Wednesday, December 12. He followed his announcement with yet another protracted and “elaborate investigation of the leading objections made to the proposed constitution,” followed by “a loud and general tribute of applause expressed by the citizens in the gallery.”

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By Center for Civics Education
Posted on 12/21/2020 - 5 minute read

For three weeks delegates to the Pennsylvania ratifying convention argued strenuously over the merits of the newly proposed federal Constitution. Ironically, they often appealed to the same principles but differed over whether the Constitution met them.  Robert Whitehill, William Findley, and John Smilie took the lead opposing the Constitution while James Wilson and Thomas McKean were pressed to defend it.

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