ates should direct. The term of service was
reduced from seven years to four years, and the restriction of the
office to a single term was removed. Numerous other amendments and
additions were made in going through with the draft. This amended draft
was referred, for final revision, to a committee consisting of Messrs.
Hamilton, Johnson, G. Morris, Madison, and King. Several amendments were
made even after this revision; one of which was the substitution of a
two-thirds for the three-fourths majority required to pass bills against
the veto of the President. Another was a proposition of Mr. Gorham, to
reduce the minimum ratio of representation from forty thousand, as it
stood, to thirty thousand, intended to conciliate certain members who
thought the House too small. This was offered the day on which the
Constitution was signed. General Washington having briefly addressed the
convention in favor of the proposed amendment, it was carried almost
unanimously.

The whole number of delegates who attended the convention was
fifty-five, of whom thirty-nine signed the Constitution. Of the
remaining sixteen, some had left the convention before its close; others
refused to give it their sanction. Several of the absentees were known
to be in favor of the Constitution.

Some, as has been observed, were opposed to the plan of a national
government, contending for the preservation of the confederation, with a
mere enlargement of its powers; others, though in favor of the plan
adopted, believed too much power had been given to the General
Government. Some thought that not only the powers of Congress, but those
of the executive, were too extensive; others that the executive was
"weak and contemptible," and without sufficient power to defend himself
against encroachments by the Legislature; others, still, that the
executive power of the nation ought not to be intrusted in a single
person. Although some deprecated the extensive powers of the Federal
Government as dangerous to the rights of the States, "ultra democracy"
seems to have had no representatives in the convention; while, on the
other hand, there were not a few who thought it unsafe to trust the
people with a direct exercise of power in the General Government.

Sherman and Gerry were opposed to the election of the first branch of
the Legislature by the people; as were some of the Southern delegates.
Others, among whom were Madison, Mason, and Wilson, thought no
republican gove