DRAFT: DO NOT QUOTE OR CITE WITHOUT PERMISSION OF AUTHOR

Comments on Pauline Maier’s Paper

Richard Leffler, [email protected], Wisconsin Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution Project

1. “Washington did not favor the Constitution first and foremost as a check on the states.” More like Max Edling’s “fiscal-military state”

A. Makes nice point that GW summarized plans of JM, Jay, and Knox before the Convention met (note 11)

B. Their greatest aspiration was “to establish a nation that could in fact ‘assume among the powers of the earth’ a ‘separate and equal station’ as the Declaration of Independence promised.

C. But he sounds like Galloway, Franklin, Dickinson, and Madison when he says in the circular letter “That unless the States will suffer Congress to exercise those prerogatives they are undoubtedly invested with by the Constitution [Articles], every thing must very rapidly tend to anarchy and confusion. That it is indispensable to the happiness of the individual Sates, that there should be lodged, somewhere, a supreme power, to regulate and govern the general concerns of the confederated republic, without which the Union cannot be of long duration. That there must be a faithful and pointed compliance on the part of every State with the late proposals and demands of Congress, or the most fatal consequences will ensue.⎯That whatever measures have a tendency to dissolve the Union, or contribute to violate or lessen the sovereign authority, ought to be considered as hostile to the liberty and independency of America. . . .” (CC, Vol. 1, 65).

2. Unlike Madison, however, Knox saw the states not as too strong and in need of checking, but like the Confederation too weak in that they lacked ‘the essential concomitant of government, the power of preserving the peace; the protection of liberty and property of the states.’ ”

A. Knox to a member of Const. Convention: “the state systems are the accursed thing which will prevent our being a nation . . .the vile state government are sources of pollution which will contaminate the American name for ages . . . smite them in the name of God and the people.” (Jensen, Making of the Constitution, 37)

B. In footnote, quotes Knox as calling for “one government instead of an association of governments 2

3. Not, was the Constitution necessary but whether we needed the Constitution we got. RHL and Antifeds considered Constitution imperfect and in need of revision.

A. Suppose the Congress had fixed the Constitution before sending it out for ratification by adopting Lee’s amendments.” Mentions bill of rights, privy council, no v.p. , and giving Senate proportional representation.

A. The last provision was the killer

B. RHL doesn’t mention Antifed. proposal to allow states to raise direct taxes (requisitions) and give federal govt. power if states don’t or in case of war.

C. “Could the Constitution have been ratified with less division and less rancor, bottomed--like independence had been--on a broad national consensus [was it?]. If the Constitution had been amended as Lee proposed--with the provision on direct taxes added to his list--would the U.S. have become a ‘less respectable nation,’ unable to claim ‘an equal place’ in the community of nations? Or would the long-term result have been much the same or perhaps better?”

F. Federalists hated the idea of continuing the requisition system. How would this work?

1. Many legislatures would not be in session, depending on the timing, for a year.

2.If they refused to provide funds how would it be collected? By force of arms? A prescription for civil war.

G. How would amendments be achieved.

1. Couldn’t be done by Congress. States already had the Constitution proposed by the convention. If Congress does it as Congress they would have to abide by the Articles: unanimous ratification by 13 legislatures

2. Lee is calling for a second constitutional convention. Published letter to ER, 16 October: “the plan for us to pursue, will be to propose the necessary amendments, and to suggest the calling of a new convention for the purpose of considering them. To this I see no well founded objection, but great safety and much good to be the probable result.”

3. This would be a catastrophe from the Federalist point of view

4. Congress would call it for specified purposes

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5. States would elect delegates, perhaps with severe restrictions on their freedom of action

6. Who would be elected to the Convention

a. From Mass. Sam Adams, John Hancock, John Adams?

b. From NY: Lansing, Yates, and Clinton?

c. From Virginia: RHL, Patrick Henry; no JM? no GW

d. 2nd convention would undo everything that had been done by the first convention.

7. Result would be a catastrophic failure from the Federalist point of view. And if so, consult what GW said in his 31 March letter to JM:

a. “my wish is, that the Convention may adopt no temporising expedient, but probe the defects of the Constitution to the bottom, and provide radical cures, whether they are greed to or not.”

b. In same letter, comments on the growth of sentiment in North in favor of monarchy. Says “I am clear, that even admitting the utility;⎯nay necessity of the form⎯yet the period is not arrived for adopting the change without shaking the Peace of the Country to its foundation. . . . That a thorough reform of the present system is indispensable, none who have capacities to judge will deny. . . . I hope the business will be essayed in a full Convention. . . . I say after this essay is made, if the system proves inefficient, conviction of the necessity of a change will be dissiminated among all classes of the People. Then, and not till then, in my opinion can it [Monarchy] by attempted without involving all the evils of civil discord.”

8. The result of a second convention would be the ruination of the Constitution, which would have precipitated a coup d’etat by the nationalists led by Washington, Hamilton, Knox, Humphreys, Lincoln, Robert Morris, Gouverneur Morris, etc. The American Revolution would not only be over, it will have ended in tragedy.