But they were an important step forward in the notion that the purpose of governments was to serve the public interest while at the same time protecting individual liberty. Moreover, the Articles of Confederation failed to provide for a chief executive capable of giving energy and focus to the new central government.
The fifty-five delegates who met in Philadelphia between May 25 and September 17, , would not only reject the Articles of Confederation altogether, but they would produce the first written constitution for any nation in the history of the world.
Those gathered in the Assembly Room of the Pennsylvania State House during the summer of faced a formidable task. Yet somehow, in the space of slightly less than four months, they managed to pull off an extraordinary accomplishment. The Constitution they drafted has been successful for most of U.
And it has brought remarkable stability to one of the most tumultuous forms of political activity: popular democracy. The challenge that all nations in the world have faced not only in drafting a constitution, but also creating a form of government that both provides stability to its nation and sufficient civic responsibility and liberty to its people, is enormous. Indeed, among the more than constitutions presently operating in the world today, few have been as successful in creating that delicate balance between governmental power and personal liberty among the citizens ruled by their government.
The remarkable achievement of the fifty-five men gathered in Philadelphia during the summer of was by no means inevitable. Looking back on their work that summer, we can identify a few factors that enabled them to achieve their success. Certainly among the most important was the quality of leadership among those most committed to strengthening the American government.
The ringleader was the thirty-seven-year-old James Madison. Standing only a few inches over five-feet tall, scrawny, suffering from a combination of poor physical health and hypochondria, and painfully awkward in any public forum, Madison nevertheless possessed a combination of intellect, energy, and political savvy that would mobilize the effort to create an entirely new form of continental union.
The Pennsylvania and Virginia delegates then met frequently during the days leading up to May Together these men would forge a radical new plan, the Virginia Plan, which would shape the course of events during that summer of By seizing the initiative, this small group of nationalist-minded politicians was able to set the terms of debate during the initial stages of the Convention—gearing the discussion toward not whether , but how —a vastly strengthened continental government would be constructed.
On May 28, , the state delegations unanimously agreed to a proposal that would prove invaluable in allowing men like Madison, Wilson, and Morris to move their plan forward.
But the Constitution succeeded beyond even the hopes of its strongest advocates. We have become a nation. Why do you think the delegates voted to keep their discussions secret? Do you think they should have? What were the major debates over the Constitution? What compromises were reached in each? If you had been a delegate, would you have agreed to each of these compromises?
One of the major compromises in the Constitutional Convention was between the small states and big states. The small states wanted each state to have the same number of representatives in Congress. The big states wanted representation based on population. The compromise was to have one house of Congress the House of Representatives base its representation on population with each state having at least one representative and for each state to have two senators in other house the Senate regardless of population.
This compromise has worked for more than years. But critics claim that the Senate is undemocratic because it gives each state two senators regardless of population. Divide the class into small groups. Imagine that your group is a commission asked to make recommendations on the Senate.
Do the following:. Decide on one of these options: a Leave the Senate as it is, b Abolish the Senate, c Make the Senate based on population, or d Make up your own option. Alumni Volunteers The Boardroom Alumni. Curriculum Materials. Add Event. Main Menu Home. Representation in Congress The general outline of the Virginia plan was well received.
Giving Power to the President After arriving at a compromise on electing the legislature, the convention addressed the other parts of the Virginia Plan. As Madison noted: Mr. Stopping the Slave Trade A deep disagreement arose over slavery.
Why No Bill of Rights? What were the Articles of Confederation? What problems did the Articles have? What was the Virginia Plan? How did it differ from the Articles of Confederation? Do the following: 1. Supreme Court Nicknamed "Dictator John" "By doing good with his money, a man, as it were, stamps the image of God upon it, and makes it pass, current for the merchandise of heaven. Edmund Randolph August 10, - September 12, First United States Attorney General Second Secretary of State "The general object was to produce a cure for the evils under which the United States labored; that in tracing these evils to their origins, every man had found it in the turbulence and follies of democracy.
Oliver Ellsworth April 29, - November 26, Senator of Connecticut Third Chief Justice of the United States "The powers of congress must be defined, but their means must be adequate to the purposes of their constitution. It is possible there may be abuses and misapplications; still, it is better to hazard something than to hazard at all.
Supreme Court "Government, in my humble opinion, should be formed to secure and to enlarge the exercise of the natural rights of its members; and every government, which has not this in view, as its principal object, is not a government of the legitimate kind.
Nathaniel Gorham May 27, - June 11, 14th President of the United States under the Articles of Confederation Helped draft the Massachusetts Constitution "Any person chosen governor, or lieutenant-governor, counsellor, senator, or representative, and accepting the trust, shall before he proceed to execute the duties of his place or office, take, make and subscribe the following declaration, viz.
The United States Constitution was drafted by the Committee of Detail, who used bits and pieces from original Virginia Plan, the decisions of the Constitutional Convention on modifications to that plan, along with other sources including the Articles of Confederation, to produce the first full draft.
From August 6 to September 10, the report of the Committee of Detail was discussed, section-bysection, and clause-by-clause.
The most famous copies of this early draft are the ones annotated by President George Washington. This draft of the Constitution displays Washington's handwritten notes in pencil, recording the Convention's handling of each proposed clause.
In attempting to resolve such issues, as well as problems arising from the payment of debts from the Revolutionary War and other domestic issues, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention created a model of government that relied upon a series of checks and balances by dividing federal authority between the Legislative, the Judicial, and the Executive branches of government.
The framers of the Constitution had originally imagined a weak presidency and a strong legislature divided into a House of Representatives and the Senate. Under the Articles of Confederation, considerable minor paperwork had bogged down important business enough that legislators decided to establish an executive branch to deal with routine paperwork. When writing the Constitution, the framers expected the Senate to handle important issues, particularly the ratification of treaties, while the Executive would attend to matters of lesser consequence.
However, as deliberations continued, the Executive branch acquired more power to deal with some of the issues that had been a source of sectional tension under the Articles of Confederation—and so the President acquired the authority to conduct foreign relations.
The two-thirds clause for ratification of treaties in the Senate, as opposed to a simple majority, allowed the South a greater voice in these matters and assuaged concerns about the attempts to abandon navigation of the Mississippi.
The Constitution does not stipulate existence of departments within the executive branch, but the need for such departments was recognized immediately.
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