During the Philadelphia Convention, the New Jersey Plan was supported by

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Library of Congress, Manuscript/Mixed Material: //www.loc.gov/item/mjm023093/.

"Mr. Patterson, pursuant to his intentions as mentioned yesterday, read a set of resolves as the basis of amendment to the confederation."

--Robert Yates in his Notes of the Secret Debates of the Federal Convention of 1787

Friday, June 15, 1787: The Convention Today William Paterson introduced a plan now known as the The New Jersey Plan. Mr. Paterson's plan was designed to keep an equal vote in Congress for each state, an issue that would be fought over for the next month. The plan consisted of nine resolutions; as follows: 1. The Articles should be revised to make them "adequate to the exigencies of Government and the preservation of the Union." 2. The Confederation Congress should be authorized to raise money by taxing imports, by a stamp tax, and by postage, with tax evaders tried in state courts with appeal to a Federal judiciary. 3. Requests by Congress to the States for money over and above that raised by Federal taxes should by apportioned among the states based on free population plus 3/5 of slaves. If requisitions were not paid, a method of collecting from the delinquent states should be provided. 4. The Congress should be authorized to elect an executive [plural], to appoint all officers not otherwise provided for and to direct all military operations. The executive be removed on request of a majority of the state executive. 5. There should be a Federal judiciary, appointed by the Executive to hear and determine impeachments of Federal officers, and appeals in other cases. 6. All Acts of Congress made pursuant to the Articles of Confederation should be the supreme law of the land, with state judges bound to uphold them. 7. Provision should be made for the admission of new States into the Union. 8. There should be a uniform rule of naturalization. 9. Citizens of each state should be treated equally in state criminal courts.

Synopsis

• Wiliam Paterson (NJ) submitted a plan with nine resolutions designed to keep an equal vote in Congress for each state

• Dr. Johnson (CT) again dined "at home" (City Tavern), and walked around looking for less expensive lodgings. His expenses for the day were seven shillings and six pence.
• General Washington (VA) dined and drank tea at Mayor Powel's.

• The Street Commissioners met, all six members present, and paid for building stone,
• carpenters work for the sewer building in Fourth Street, and for "building a double stack of chimneys for negro Cato, in Filbert Street near Ninth Street."

Last updated: September 24, 2019

From May to September 1787, delegates to the Constitutional Convention hammered out the U.S. Constitution in Philadelphia.

Constitutional Convention delegates kept deliberations secret

The meeting, over which George Washington presided, rested on the reasoned dialogue and compromise of 55 representatives from the 13 original states, except Rhode Island.

To encourage delegates to make arguments without fear of recrimination and to discourage mob action in the city, those in attendance kept their deliberations secret during their lifetimes and did not inform the public of the resulting document until September 17, after most of the delegates had signed on to it.

Articles of Confederation gave too much power to the states

At the time of the convention, the Articles of Confederation, under which states wielded primary power, was the nation’s governing document. Article 2 specifically recognized the sovereignty of the states, and the federal government’s powers were mostly limited to foreign affairs and did not include control of interstate commerce.

If Congress needed taxes or military forces, it could request but not coerce state compliance. Although this alliance proved adequate for winning the Revolutionary War and providing government for new territories, it made it difficult to promote domestic prosperity and for the United States to assume equal status among other nations.

Delegates from five states who met in Annapolis in September 1786 to treat problems of interstate commerce called for a broader convention the following May. Partly prodded by the threat of Shay’s rebellion — an uprising of economically depressed farmers in Massachusetts that winter — the states responded affirmatively.

New constitution provided for three branches of government, rather than one

Although many of the delegates arrived in Philadelphia expecting to revise the Articles of Confederation, some had grander ideas. With the help of James Madison, fellow delegates from Virginia offered a new plan that set the stage for a fundamental transformation of the government. It proposed three branches, rather than one, and dividing Congress into two houses, both of which would be represented according to population rather than equally as in the unicameral Congress under the Articles of Confederation.

The Virginia Plan encountered opposition in the form of the New Jersey Plan, whose proponents were less devoted to a strong national government and more concerned with maintaining states’ existing equality in Congress. In time, the Connecticut Compromise resolved this issue by allocating representation according to population in the U.S. House of Representation while retaining equal state representation in the Senate.

The convention adopted other compromises, including one that essentially left slavery in place where it existed, allowed the slave trade to continue for 20 years, and provided for representation of slaves by designating each one as three-fifths a free person. Delegates also devised the electoral college for selecting the president and adopted a much more extensive list of powers for Congress than that body held under the Articles of Confederation.

Constitution addresses issues later covered in First Amendment

A few provisions of the Constitution addressed issues related to religion and other subjects later covered by the First Amendment.

• Article 6 outlaws religious tests for federal offices.
• By exempting Sunday from the 10 days counted in the time that a president has to veto a law, the document arguably recognizes in Article 1, section 7, that many Americans worship on that day.
• Benjamin Franklin proposed adopting the custom established in the First Continental Congress of having a chaplain open each day’s proceedings with prayer, but the delegates chose not to do so.
• Whereas the Declaration of Independence referred several times to God, the Constitution’s only mention of a supreme being is in the statements often attached to the end of the document indicating that it was adopted “in the Year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven.”
• The only explicit protection that the Constitution provides for freedom of speech is found within the provision in Article 1, section 6, guaranteeing that members of Congress cannot be prosecuted for any “Speech or Debate in either House.”

On Aug. 20, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina introduced proposals to the Committee of Detail that included a provision for liberty of the press similar to that later found in the First Amendment, but the convention did not positively act on it.

Five days before delegates signed the Constitution, Virginia’s George Mason, who had helped author the Virginia Declaration of Rights, proposed to preface the Constitution with similar provisions. This motion failed, as did one two days later by Charles Pinckney and Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts proposing “that the liberty of the Press should be inviolably observed” (Farrand 1966: 2:617).

Later, Connecticut’s Roger Sherman argued that no need existed for such a prohibition because “the power of Congress does not extend to the Press” (Ibid.: 618).

Hamilton argued that Constitution created system to protect rights

The Constitution created a governmental structure designed to protect rights through a separation of powers, checks and balances, federalism, and other mechanisms. Hence, in Federalist no. 84, Alexander Hamilton argues that “the Constitution is itself, in every rational sense, and to every useful purpose a Bill of Rights.”

The document also lists a number of restrictions on state and national governments, chiefly in Article 1, sections 8 and 9, where, for example, it prohibits bills of attainder (legislative punishments without benefit of trial) and ex post facto laws (retroactive criminal laws).

In the closing days of the convention, however, George Mason cited the omission of a separate bill of rights to protect the people against the new national government as one of his reasons for opposing the new document. This quickly became a rallying point for those who opposed ratification.

Federalist supporters of the Constitution initially argued against the necessity for a bill of rights because the convention had not delegated powers to the new national government to stem individual liberties.

Federalists agreed work on Bill of Rights for Constitution

Some further argued that listing specific rights might imply that rights omitted were therefore subject to governmental control. This position was undercut by the fact that the Constitution did list some governmental restrictions within its text and by arguments, supported by Thomas Jefferson, that even if such guarantees were not foolproof, they would be better than nothing.

In time, leading Federalists, including Madison, agreed to work toward a bill of rights if the Constitution were adopted, thereby helping to head off the threat of a second convention. Madison led the fight that resulted in the first ten amendments, earning him the moniker “Father of the Bill of Rights.”

John Vile is professor of political science and dean of the Honors College at Middle Tennessee State University. He is co-editor of the Encyclopedia of the First Amendment. This article was originally published in 2009.