This collection of documents on the creation of the Constitution attempts to accomplish five objectives.

First, it draws attention to the American colonial experience. Why study the colonial past? Beginning with the French Revolution (1789–99), which ended in a dictatorship, revolutions have tended to ignore the past as a source of authority for the present and as a guide to the future. Americans, while acknowledging the importance of 1776 as the start of something new, showed a decent respect for the opinions and actions of their forefathers from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In particular, they showed a concern for the forms of government under which they had lived. To secure these forms, charters were created and then signed by their creators. Two colonial charters (The Fundamental Orders of Connecticut (1638–39) and The Pennsylvania Charter of Privileges (1701)) highlight the connection between the colonial experience of developing forms of government and the Constitution written in 1787, which continues to structure our government and laws today.

Second, this collection draws attention to the problems Americans confronted during the 1780s. Between 1776 and 1780 (Virginia Declaration of Rights and Constitution (June 12 and 29, 1776) and Articles of Confederation (1781)), Americans created a new kind of republicanism at the state level after due deliberation by elected representatives. Each of these republican forms had its own peculiarity, but all shared the premise that there should be a separation of powers, with the legislative branch being dominant, the executive branch dependent on the legislative, and the judicial branch practically nonexistent. (Massachusetts was a notable exception: its executive was elected by the people and the judiciary could issue advisory opinions.) These republican governments existed alongside a federal government of limited powers, established in 1781 (Articles of Confederation (1781)), whose legislative sessions were irregularly attended by state delegates. The documents thus highlight the problem of active and powerful state governments operating within a league with limited ability to direct the mutual affairs of its members. “Vices of the Political System…” is James Madison’s account in 1787 of the vices of this political system.

Third, the collection addresses how the delegates to the Constitutional Convention responded to the problems in the American political system. What should be done to correct them? Should the powers of the Confederation be increased and the structure kept the same? Was there an intrinsic problem – a systemic deficiency – or a problem that could be settled with a few improvements here and there? And who should authorize changes and by what authority should these alterations be adopted? Thus the collection introduces the reader to the several alternative plans discussed over 88 days at the Convention by up to 55 delegates (for example, The Virginia Plan (May 29, 1787), The Revised Virginia Plan and the New Jersey Plan (June 13 and 15, 1787), and The Hamilton Plan (June 18, 1787)).

Fourth, the collection allows the reader to grasp the personal dynamics at work during the Convention. Some delegates were eloquent and thoughtful; others petulant and shortsighted. Some stayed until the end, revising their views as the debates continued; others stuck to their original positions, leaving early in frustration. Still others rode out the entire convention, announcing only at the last minute the scruples that prevented them from signing the agreed-upon plan. Put differently, for the first time in the history of the world, a genuine democratic conversation took place over an attempt to secure a regime dedicated to liberty and justice. All previous regimes had been founded by one or a few persons and eventually collapsed because of the violence of faction. And none of these previous regimes had sought liberty as a defining principle. To reveal the personal dynamics and what was at stake, the collection covers the debates during several crucial days in the life of the Convention as well as the difficulty involved over the creation of the presidency and the meaning of the necessary and proper clause. Is the case for executive independence the same as the case for judicial independence? Is the necessary and proper clause an enabling or a restraining clause?

Fifth, the collection addresses the clauses of the Constitution that refer to slavery, which provoked controversy at the Convention and have continued to do so ever since. The collection traces the origin and development of the three slavery clauses of the Constitution: the Three-Fifths Clause; the Slave Trade Clause; and the Fugitive Slave Clause. When and why did these three clauses appear during the constitutional debates? How does the language used when the clauses were introduced change before their insertion in the Constitution? How do these changes affect the interpretation of the slavery clauses?

Thirty-nine delegates signed their names to the Constitution on the “Seventeenth Day of September in the Year of Our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven and of the Independence of the United States of America the Twelfth.” The conscious attempt to join together the old and the new represents an example of the American mind at work. We wonder whether the colonists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries would have recognized and applauded the work of the Founding Fathers? To be sure, even though several of the Framers of the Constitution had different ideas about what should be done to secure the blessings of liberty – see the variety of plans – 39 reached sufficient agreement through a mixture of principle and compromise to sign the document. Aristotle might well call that prudent statesmanship. Others might well criticize their compromising as unacceptable and embarrassing.

But we need to remember that, unlike previous foundings in history that were the work of powerful individuals who could enforce their will, the American founding occurred through the civil deliberations of citizens from a variety of backgrounds, representing a variety of regional interests and philosophical positions. Never before had such a task been accomplished.

A Note on Usage

We have modernized spelling and some punctuation but not capitalization. On occasion we have divided longer speeches into paragraphs.

In recording the debates at the Convention, Madison uses the terms “house” and “branch” interchangeably with reference to what would become the House of Representatives and the Senate. To modern ears, “branch” connotes the three divisions of our government (legislative, executive, and judicial). However, to respect the language used by Madison and the delegates, in this volume we generally use the term “legislative branches” when speaking of the two houses of Congress.

While a few delegates, following the British way of thinking, used the terms “upper” and “lower” to distinguish between what we call the House and the Senate, most delegates preferred to speak of the House of Representatives as the “first” branch of the legislature and of the Senate as the “second” branch. The terms “upper” and “lower” carried an aristocratic connotation. Madison and many other delegates preferred the more democratic terminology of “first” and “second.”