Three members of the Convention—Madison, Gorham, and King—were also Members of Congress. They proceeded at once to New York, where Congress was in session, to placate the expected opposition. Aware of their vanishing authority, Congress on September 28, after some debate, decided to submit the Constitution to the States for action. It made no recommendation for or against adoption.
Two parties soon developed, one in opposition and one in support of the Constitution, and the Constitution was debated, criticized, and expounded clause by clause. Hamilton, Madison, and Jay wrote a series of commentaries, now known as the Federalist Papers, in support of the new instrument of government.[n] The closeness and bitterness of the struggle over ratification and the conferring of additional powers on the central government can scarcely be exaggerated. In some States ratification was effected only after a bitter struggle in the State convention itself.
Delaware, on December 7, 1787, became the first State to ratify the new Constitution, the vote being unanimous. Pennsylvania ratified on December 12, 1787, by a vote of 46 to 23, a vote scarcely indicative of the struggle which had taken place in that State. New Jersey ratified on December 19, 1787, and Georgia on January 2, 1788, the vote in both States being unanimous. Connecticut ratified on January 9, 1788; yeas 128, nays 40. On February 6, 1788, Massachusetts, by a narrow margin of 19 votes in a convention with a membership of 355, endorsed the new Constitution, but recommended that a bill of rights be added to protect the States from Federal encroachment on individual liberties. Maryland ratified on April 28, 1788; yeas 63, nays 11. South Carolina ratified on May 23, 1788; yeas 149, nays 73. On June 21, 1788, by a vote of 57 to 46, New Hampshire became the ninth State to ratify, but like Massachusetts she suggested a bill of rights.
By the terms of the Constitution nine States were sufficient for its establishment among the States so ratifying. The advocates of the new Constitution realized, however, that the new government could not succeed without the addition of New York and Virginia, neither of which had ratified. Madison, Marshall, and Randolph led the struggle for ratification in Virginia. On June 25, 1788, by a narrow margin of 10 votes in a convention of 168 members, that State ratified over the objection of such delegates as George Mason and Patrick Henry. In New York an attempt to attach conditions to ratification almost succeeded. But on July 26, 1788, New York ratified, with a recommendation that a bill of rights be appended. The vote was close—yeas 30, nays 27.
Eleven States having thus ratified the Constitution,[o] the Continental Congress—which still functioned at irregular intervals—passed a resolution on September 13, 1788, to put the new Constitution into operation. The first Wednesday of January 1789 was fixed as the day for choosing presidential electors, the first Wednesday of February for the meeting of electors, and the first Wednesday of March (i.e. March 4, 1789) for the opening session of the new Congress. Owing to various delays, Congress was late in assembling, and it was not until April 30, 1789, that George Washington was inaugurated as the first President of the United States.
Notes
[a] The colonists, for example, claimed the right "to life, liberty, and property", "the rights, liberties, and immunities of free and natural-born subjects within the realm of England"; the right to participate in legislative councils; "the great and inestimable privilege of being tried by their peers of the vicinage, according to the course of [the common law of England]"; "the immunities and privileges granted and confirmed to them by royal charters, or secured by their several codes of provincial laws"; "a right peaceably to assemble, consider of their grievances, and petition the king." They further declared that the keeping of a standing army in the colonies in time of peace without the consent of the colony in which the army was kept was "against law"; that it was "indispensably necessary to good government, and rendered essential by the English constitution, that the constituent branches of the legislature be independent of each other"; that certain acts of Parliament in contravention of the foregoing principles were "infringements and violations of the rights of the colonists." (Text in Documents Illustrative of the Formation of the Union, pp. 1-5.)
[] Text in Documents Illustrative of the Formation of the Union, pp. 10-17.
[c] Ibid., pp. 19-20.