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what was the primary determining factor for the ratification of the Constitution? what was the importance and meaning of enumerating individual liberties in the Constitution? how close was the ratification battle?

what was the primary determining factor for the ratification of the Constitution? what was the importance and meaning of enumerating individual liberties in the Constitution? how close was the ratification battle?

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what was the primary determining factor for the ratification of the Constitution? what was the importance and meaning of enumerating individual liberties in the Constitution? how close was the ratification battle?
A Constitutional Add-On: Ten Amendments to Protect the Horme Announcements Individual Rights of Citizens Bel Modules 145 Discussions A Constitutional Add-On: Ten Amendments to Protect the Individual Rights of Citizens Grades Of the delegates present a the end of te Constitutional convention, all but three signed the Constitution. Jarnes Madison was saddened that two of these three were his old uolleagues from Virginia, Governor Edmund Randolph and George Mason. They had come so far and yet still they withheld their approval-in large Syllabus part because while the document outlined the powers of the government, it did not specify its limitations. The Constitution was without that ultimate guarantee of ConferZoom personal liberties, a bill of rights: the idea had been proposed in committee but was voted down as unnecessary. Most of the delegates reasoned that the extent of government was clearly limited by the enurmeration of its powers-how could it exceed them? Eight states already had bills of rights, which were not affected by the constitution as it stood. Perhaps Mason, as principal author of the Virginia Bill of Rights-the first in the colonies-was simply being too cautious. Yet, as Chat before, his wisdom proved prophetic. The absence of a bill of rights from the Constitution became the major stumbling block for subsequent ratification of the states. This issue went right to the heart of the fears many revolutionaries had about establishing a strong central government, because guaranteed right were at the heart of the Revolution itself. The infamous Stamp and Quartering acts had been outrageous precisely because they had violated central tenets of the British Declaration of Rights: "No taxation without representation," and protection of the civilian populace from abuse by the military. The explicit preservation of individual liberties, the freedom from fear of the capricious of immoderate use of power by the government, were matters that few raised in the English tradition took lightly. Such freedoms had been hard won through hundreds of years of struggle dating back to at least to the summer of 1215 when King John put his forced signature to the Magna Carta on the field of Runnymede. The rights of the people, represented by and elected governing body, had been tested again and again, as the English suffered through a brutal civil war and the execution of a monarch in the seventeenth century: less than half a century later came the banishment of another. A Dutch ruler was imported only on condition that he submit to a new and much more extensive Declaration of Rights. It was a Hanoverian, George III, who broke this covenant again. There was no way the colonists, having fought so hard to regain their rights, were going to gamble them away now. Led by Patrick Henry and joined by Mason, the 3:07 PM a 9/28/2021 23 > Type here to search lyp
Transcribed Image Text:A Constitutional Add-On: Ten Amendments to Protect the Horme Announcements Individual Rights of Citizens Bel Modules 145 Discussions A Constitutional Add-On: Ten Amendments to Protect the Individual Rights of Citizens Grades Of the delegates present a the end of te Constitutional convention, all but three signed the Constitution. Jarnes Madison was saddened that two of these three were his old uolleagues from Virginia, Governor Edmund Randolph and George Mason. They had come so far and yet still they withheld their approval-in large Syllabus part because while the document outlined the powers of the government, it did not specify its limitations. The Constitution was without that ultimate guarantee of ConferZoom personal liberties, a bill of rights: the idea had been proposed in committee but was voted down as unnecessary. Most of the delegates reasoned that the extent of government was clearly limited by the enurmeration of its powers-how could it exceed them? Eight states already had bills of rights, which were not affected by the constitution as it stood. Perhaps Mason, as principal author of the Virginia Bill of Rights-the first in the colonies-was simply being too cautious. Yet, as Chat before, his wisdom proved prophetic. The absence of a bill of rights from the Constitution became the major stumbling block for subsequent ratification of the states. This issue went right to the heart of the fears many revolutionaries had about establishing a strong central government, because guaranteed right were at the heart of the Revolution itself. The infamous Stamp and Quartering acts had been outrageous precisely because they had violated central tenets of the British Declaration of Rights: "No taxation without representation," and protection of the civilian populace from abuse by the military. The explicit preservation of individual liberties, the freedom from fear of the capricious of immoderate use of power by the government, were matters that few raised in the English tradition took lightly. Such freedoms had been hard won through hundreds of years of struggle dating back to at least to the summer of 1215 when King John put his forced signature to the Magna Carta on the field of Runnymede. The rights of the people, represented by and elected governing body, had been tested again and again, as the English suffered through a brutal civil war and the execution of a monarch in the seventeenth century: less than half a century later came the banishment of another. A Dutch ruler was imported only on condition that he submit to a new and much more extensive Declaration of Rights. It was a Hanoverian, George III, who broke this covenant again. There was no way the colonists, having fought so hard to regain their rights, were going to gamble them away now. Led by Patrick Henry and joined by Mason, the 3:07 PM a 9/28/2021 23 > Type here to search lyp
O https://cos.instructure.com/courses/25793/pages/a constitutional add-on-len amendments to-protect-the individual-rights of-citizens James Wilson pursued another tack in questioning the need for a bill: the very act of detailing rights would have the effect of limiting them. "Who will be bold enough to enumerate all the rights of the people? And...if the enumeration is not complete, everything not expressly mentioned will be presumed to be purposely omitted." Washington agreed: liberty was too dynamic to be bounded by definition. But Jefferson's words sounded a stubborn reaction. "A Bill of Rights," he declared, "is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular." In the end, the Federalists realized that without the inclusion of a bill of rights the Constitution would not be ratified. And so, they promised to amend the document once the government had been elected and installed. Even so, the contest was close when it reached the states. Fistfights broke out in the Pennsylvania legislature when the Federalists forcibly kept those opposed in the hall in order to fix a quorum. In Massachusetts, out of 355 votes, the Constitution passed by only nineteen. In Virginia Madison faced the fury of Patrick Henry and the vote was uncertain-until Randolph, satisfied at last, rose and declared "I am a friend of the Union." It passed by a mere ten votes but pass it did. 145 The Constitutional convention, circumventing the Continental Congress, had decided that the approval of nine states was required for ratification, and by 1788 ten had been won over. After a bitter battle fought by Hamilton and John Jay against Clinton and his men, New York, the "eleventh pillar," finally went along by a margin of three votes. James Wilson wrote to his wife: "Last night they fired thirteen cannon...over the funeral of the Confederation, and this morning they saluted the new government with eleven cannon." North Carolina and Rhode Island, still committed to local paper currencies, refused to ratify but were not long in changing direction. The Federalists kept their promise. In his inaugural address, penned by Madison, Washington asked for suggested amendments. Out of the hundreds of submission, Madison narrowed the field to seventeen, working in the Congress with the help of Jefferson, Madison and others. Twelve amendments were adopted by the Congress and sent out to the states. The first two dealt with congressional details and were voted down; the other ten were adopted. Generally based on Mason's bill for Virginia, the amendments fell into four categories: the first was essentially a Jeffersonian restatement of the 'open society": the second, third and fourth grew directly out of the military and political struggles of recent history and prevented military infringement on the rights and privacy of the people; the fifth through eighth went back to the "Law of the Land," passed down from the Magna Carta, and protected the rights of the individual from abuse by the legal system; the ninth and tenth disposed of Wilson's objections, by guaranteeing to the people and the states any and all rights not expressly curtailed by the Constitution. As it turns out, the colonists' wary insistence on explicit protections of individual liberties proved to be brilliantly farsighted: throughout our history people have found refuge from injustice in the provisions that were then laid out. Nor did the impulse toward freedom stop with the first ten amendments. As the late Justice William O. Douglas suggested, the Bill of Rights now also includes the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth and nineteenth amendments, which abolish slavery and guarantee citizenship, the right to vote and equal protection under the law regardless of race color or sex. "Our Bill of Rights... subjects all departments of government to a rulc of law and sets boundaries beyond which no official may go," observed Douglas. "It emphasizes that in this country man walks with dignity and without fear, that he need not grovel before an all powerful government
Transcribed Image Text:O https://cos.instructure.com/courses/25793/pages/a constitutional add-on-len amendments to-protect-the individual-rights of-citizens James Wilson pursued another tack in questioning the need for a bill: the very act of detailing rights would have the effect of limiting them. "Who will be bold enough to enumerate all the rights of the people? And...if the enumeration is not complete, everything not expressly mentioned will be presumed to be purposely omitted." Washington agreed: liberty was too dynamic to be bounded by definition. But Jefferson's words sounded a stubborn reaction. "A Bill of Rights," he declared, "is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular." In the end, the Federalists realized that without the inclusion of a bill of rights the Constitution would not be ratified. And so, they promised to amend the document once the government had been elected and installed. Even so, the contest was close when it reached the states. Fistfights broke out in the Pennsylvania legislature when the Federalists forcibly kept those opposed in the hall in order to fix a quorum. In Massachusetts, out of 355 votes, the Constitution passed by only nineteen. In Virginia Madison faced the fury of Patrick Henry and the vote was uncertain-until Randolph, satisfied at last, rose and declared "I am a friend of the Union." It passed by a mere ten votes but pass it did. 145 The Constitutional convention, circumventing the Continental Congress, had decided that the approval of nine states was required for ratification, and by 1788 ten had been won over. After a bitter battle fought by Hamilton and John Jay against Clinton and his men, New York, the "eleventh pillar," finally went along by a margin of three votes. James Wilson wrote to his wife: "Last night they fired thirteen cannon...over the funeral of the Confederation, and this morning they saluted the new government with eleven cannon." North Carolina and Rhode Island, still committed to local paper currencies, refused to ratify but were not long in changing direction. The Federalists kept their promise. In his inaugural address, penned by Madison, Washington asked for suggested amendments. Out of the hundreds of submission, Madison narrowed the field to seventeen, working in the Congress with the help of Jefferson, Madison and others. Twelve amendments were adopted by the Congress and sent out to the states. The first two dealt with congressional details and were voted down; the other ten were adopted. Generally based on Mason's bill for Virginia, the amendments fell into four categories: the first was essentially a Jeffersonian restatement of the 'open society": the second, third and fourth grew directly out of the military and political struggles of recent history and prevented military infringement on the rights and privacy of the people; the fifth through eighth went back to the "Law of the Land," passed down from the Magna Carta, and protected the rights of the individual from abuse by the legal system; the ninth and tenth disposed of Wilson's objections, by guaranteeing to the people and the states any and all rights not expressly curtailed by the Constitution. As it turns out, the colonists' wary insistence on explicit protections of individual liberties proved to be brilliantly farsighted: throughout our history people have found refuge from injustice in the provisions that were then laid out. Nor did the impulse toward freedom stop with the first ten amendments. As the late Justice William O. Douglas suggested, the Bill of Rights now also includes the thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth and nineteenth amendments, which abolish slavery and guarantee citizenship, the right to vote and equal protection under the law regardless of race color or sex. "Our Bill of Rights... subjects all departments of government to a rulc of law and sets boundaries beyond which no official may go," observed Douglas. "It emphasizes that in this country man walks with dignity and without fear, that he need not grovel before an all powerful government
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