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The Virginia Constitution, June 29, 1776

One mark of the revolutionary generation's greatness is seen in this
series of simultaneous events taking place in June 1776. One Virginian,
George Washington, was assembling an army to defend the new nation; two
Virginians, Richard Henry Lee and Thomas Jefferson, were leading the
congress to independence; and a third group, George Mason and the
Virginia Convention were constructing a new government for Virginia. Just
as Virginia was the first colony to declare independence, she was also
the first state to draft a new form of government.

The convention had charged Mason and his committee with writing "such a
plan as will most likely maintain peace and order in this colony, and
secure substantial and equal liberty to the people". Within two weeks
Mason had completed his task. It was not, however, a work of haste, for
Mason had contemplated for a long time the proper form of government. To
Mason and most Virginians the constitution must: 1) give life to the
liberties set forth in the Declaration of Rights; 2) prevent those
tyrannies of government which had undermined the once ideal English
constitution; and 3) preserve those elements which had been the strengths
of the old colonial government. The Constitution of 1776 achieved these
ends.

Virginia was made a commonwealth. As Robert Rutland tells us, "Mason's
choice of the word 'commonwealth' was no happenstance. Mason knew
passages of John Locke's Second Treatise on Government verbatim.
None struck Mason more forcefully than Locke's notion that a commonwealth
was a form of government wherein the legislature was supreme." There was
a consensus within the convention that there should be a separation of
powers between executive, legislative, and judicial functions, but no
equality of powers. The legislative function was to be supreme.

The residual power in the Constitution of 1776 is vested in the people
and exercised through the General Assembly. Within the General Assembly
the House of Delegates was to be supreme. The Assembly had two houses:
The House of Delegates, replacing the House of Burgesses, had two members
from each county and one from each town; and the Senate, replacing the
old royally-appointed council, had 24 members chosen from 24 districts
throughout the state. A peculiarity of this constitution was the use of
12 electors, chosen by the v