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more influential in the ratification contest
were saying at the same time.
Portrait of a Patriot
Edmund Randolph (1753-1813) played leading roles in both the Philadelphia
Convention and the Virginia Ratification Convention of 1788. Despite presenting
the Virginia Plan (which was largely the work of James Madison) at the Philadelphia Convention's outset, Randolph came by the Convention's end to insist that a federal, not a
national, constitution was what was needed, and he refused to sign the document. In Richmond,
Randolph laid out a states-rights, federalist (not nationalist) version of the Constitution for his fellow delegates, insisting that Virginia would be as one of thirteen parties to a compact in the newly
invigorated federal Union. His reassurances explain Virginia's narrow decision to ratify the Constitution. The first U.S. attorney general, Randolph sided with Jefferson in the cabinet's Bank Bill debate
in 1791.
Who ratified the Constitution:
"The American people" or the sovereign states?
On this issue of nationalism versus federalism, James Madison's contributions to The Federalist are similarly perplexing. In Federalist 39, in
particular, he decides that the proposed government is to be neither
national nor federal, but an amalgam. This is, alas, an impossibilityunless, like Hamilton, one assumes that "sovereignty" means "authority
in a given area."
On the issue of most moment-the procedure by which the Constitution
would be enacted-Madison says, "The constitution is to be founded on
the assent and ratification of the people of America, given by deputies
elected for the special purpose, not as individuals composing one entire
nation; but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they
respectively belong. It is to be the assent and ratification of the several
States, derived from the supreme authority in each State, the authority of the people themselves. The act therefore establishing the Constitution, will
not be a national but a federal act." (Madison's emphasis)
A Book You're Not
Supposed to Read
The Anti-Federalists: Selected Writings and
Speeches, edited by Bruce Frohnen with
foreword by Joseph Sobran; Washington, DC:
Regnery, 1999.
What does it mean that ratification was to be a federal, not a national,
act-the act of "independent states," not of a nation? As Madison goes on
to explain, "Were the people regarded in the transaction as forming one
nation, the will of the majority of the whole people of the United States,
would bind the minority; in the same manner as the majority in each
State must bind the minority." So, "Each State in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body independent of all others, and
only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation then the new
Constitution will, if established, be a federal and not a national Constitution. "
Madison would have done well to leave off here. He goes on to state,
however, that the Congress will have one house apportioned by state and
another apportioned by population, which makes it, he says, partly
national and partly federal. He then notes that presidential elections are
to be through an electoral college whose apportionment is partly national
and partly federal, and makes several other confused and confusing statements of the same kind.
There was nothing in the Declaration of Independence, in the Articles
of Confederation, or in the ratification process of the federal Constitution
to enable an American people to create a national government. If the
states really were states, they would have had to cease to be so at some
time to have made themselves into a nation. When did they do that?
When did an "American people" ever assent to or ratify anything?
All of this talk about the Constitution making a "nation" must have
been very distasteful to the population of New York, good Patriots who
had vindicated their state's sovereignty in the Revolution. No
were saying at the same time.
Portrait of a Patriot
Edmund Randolph (1753-1813) played leading roles in both the Philadelphia
Convention and the Virginia Ratification Convention of 1788. Despite presenting
the Virginia Plan (which was largely the work of James Madison) at the Philadelphia Convention's outset, Randolph came by the Convention's end to insist that a federal, not a
national, constitution was what was needed, and he refused to sign the document. In Richmond,
Randolph laid out a states-rights, federalist (not nationalist) version of the Constitution for his fellow delegates, insisting that Virginia would be as one of thirteen parties to a compact in the newly
invigorated federal Union. His reassurances explain Virginia's narrow decision to ratify the Constitution. The first U.S. attorney general, Randolph sided with Jefferson in the cabinet's Bank Bill debate
in 1791.
Who ratified the Constitution:
"The American people" or the sovereign states?
On this issue of nationalism versus federalism, James Madison's contributions to The Federalist are similarly perplexing. In Federalist 39, in
particular, he decides that the proposed government is to be neither
national nor federal, but an amalgam. This is, alas, an impossibilityunless, like Hamilton, one assumes that "sovereignty" means "authority
in a given area."
On the issue of most moment-the procedure by which the Constitution
would be enacted-Madison says, "The constitution is to be founded on
the assent and ratification of the people of America, given by deputies
elected for the special purpose, not as individuals composing one entire
nation; but as composing the distinct and independent States to which they
respectively belong. It is to be the assent and ratification of the several
States, derived from the supreme authority in each State, the authority of the people themselves. The act therefore establishing the Constitution, will
not be a national but a federal act." (Madison's emphasis)
A Book You're Not
Supposed to Read
The Anti-Federalists: Selected Writings and
Speeches, edited by Bruce Frohnen with
foreword by Joseph Sobran; Washington, DC:
Regnery, 1999.
What does it mean that ratification was to be a federal, not a national,
act-the act of "independent states," not of a nation? As Madison goes on
to explain, "Were the people regarded in the transaction as forming one
nation, the will of the majority of the whole people of the United States,
would bind the minority; in the same manner as the majority in each
State must bind the minority." So, "Each State in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body independent of all others, and
only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation then the new
Constitution will, if established, be a federal and not a national Constitution. "
Madison would have done well to leave off here. He goes on to state,
however, that the Congress will have one house apportioned by state and
another apportioned by population, which makes it, he says, partly
national and partly federal. He then notes that presidential elections are
to be through an electoral college whose apportionment is partly national
and partly federal, and makes several other confused and confusing statements of the same kind.
There was nothing in the Declaration of Independence, in the Articles
of Confederation, or in the ratification process of the federal Constitution
to enable an American people to create a national government. If the
states really were states, they would have had to cease to be so at some
time to have made themselves into a nation. When did they do that?
When did an "American people" ever assent to or ratify anything?
All of this talk about the Constitution making a "nation" must have
been very distasteful to the population of New York, good Patriots who
had vindicated their state's sovereignty in the Revolution. No
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