Convention and Ratification
Three methods, named
- Delegates from the states participated in the Constitutional Convention and through negotiation, collaboration, and compromise proposed a constitution.
- The CED names the process — negotiation, collaboration, compromise — before naming any result.
- Proposed is exact: the Convention produced a proposal, and 3.8's last bullet is about whether it would be accepted.
Select all three methods the CED names for the Convention.
Named before any result.
What was compromised over
- The Constitutional Convention compromised over the representation of slave states in Congress and the role of the federal government in regulating both slavery and the slave trade, allowing the prohibition of the international slave trade after 1808.
- Three subjects of compromise: representation, federal regulation of slavery, and the slave trade, with a dated provision.
- After 1808 is a delay written into the document — a decision to postpone a decision, and it is worth naming as such.
Select all the subjects of compromise the CED names.
With a dated provision: after 1808.
Two sides in the ratification debate
- In the debate over ratifying the Constitution, Anti-Federalists opposing ratification battled with Federalists, whose principles were articulated in the Federalist Papers (primarily written by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison).
- The CED names the documents and the authors, and it names the opposing side first.
- So ratification was contested, not automatic — an important corrective to reading the Constitution as inevitable.
The process, a compromise, or the ratification fight?
Sort each element of the Constitution's making.
The Federalist Papers were primarily written by Alexander Hamilton and James ____.
The CED names the documents and the authors.
The Anti-Federalists won something by losing. Federalists ensured ratification by promising the addition of a Bill of Rights that enumerated individual rights and explicitly restricted the powers of the federal government — so the Bill of Rights is the price of ratification, not an afterthought.
Select both functions of the promised Bill of Rights.
Listing rights, and limiting powers — two different things.
The Bill of Rights as the price
- Federalists ensured the ratification of the Constitution by promising the addition of a Bill of Rights that enumerated individual rights and explicitly restricted the powers of the federal government.
- The CED makes it a promise made to secure ratification, which means the Anti-Federalists won something by losing.
- Enumerated and explicitly restricted are the two functions, and they are different: listing rights, and limiting powers.
Ratification was contested, not automatic.
An important corrective to reading the Constitution as inevitable.
Differing ideological positions
- The objective is the differing ideological positions on the structure and function of the federal government.
- Federalists: a stronger centre is needed for the difficulties 3.7 listed, and its powers can be structured safely.
- Anti-Federalists: a distant strong government is the danger the Revolution was fought about, so rights must be written down.
A clause that postpones a question to a fixed future date has not answered it; it has agreed that nobody present can. Reading such a clause as a settlement misses that it was written precisely because there was none.
Delegates... through negotiation, collaboration, and compromise proposed a constitution, compromising over the representation of slave states in Congress and the role of the federal government in regulating both slavery and the slave trade, allowing the prohibition of the international slave trade after 1808. Anti-Federalists opposing ratification battled with Federalists, whose principles were articulated in the Federalist Papers, and Federalists ensured ratification by promising the addition of a Bill of Rights that enumerated individual rights and explicitly restricted the powers of the federal government.