State Ratifying Conventions
Patrick Henry vs the Constitution: Ignored Anti-Federalist Warnings
This government “will swallow the liberties of the people, without giving them previous notice.” That’s the stark warning Patrick Henry gave us in 1788. In a series of fiery speeches, he laid out some of the most powerful anti-Federalist arguments against the...
Cato vs the Constitution: Forgotten Anti-Federalist Arguments
“A vile and arbitrary aristocracy or monarchy” – that’s what the Anti-Federalist writer Cato warned we’d get. In a series of seven essays, he laid out his strongest arguments against ratification of the Constitution, predicting all kinds...
How the New York Bill of Rights Helped Lead to the U.S. Bill of Rights
When Congressman James Madison drafted a proposed bill of rights in the First Federal Congress of 1789, he did not write on a blank slate. He took into account historic Anglo-American constitutional documents, such as Magna Carta (1215) and the English Bill of Rights...
Most Important and Most Ignored: James Wilson’s State House Yard Speech
Everyone’s heard of the Federalist Papers – Hamilton, Madison, Jay – but the most important Federalist speech in the entire ratification debate didn’t come from any of them. It came from James Wilson – a name most people have never even heard...