on sense was
hopeless.

There were a few persons who would have done away with the divisions of
States and establish in their place a central government. Those most
earnest in maintaining the autonomy of States declared that such a
government was, as Luther Martin of Maryland called it, of "a
monarchical nature." What else could that be but a monarchy? An
insinuation took on the form of a logical deduction and became a popular
fallacy. Yet those most earnest for a central government only sought to
establish a stable rule in place of no rule at all; or, worse still, of
the tyranny of an ignorant and vicious mob under the outraged name of
democracy, into which there was danger of drifting. Whether their plan
was wise or foolish, it did not mean a monarchy. Even of Shays's
misguided followers Jefferson said: "I believe you may be assured that
an idea or desire of returning to anything like their ancient government
never entered into their heads." As Madison knew and said, the real
danger was that the States would divide into two confederacies, and only
by a new and wiser and stronger union could that calamity be averted.

To gain the assent of most of the States to a convention was surmounting
only the least of the difficulties. Three weeks before the time of
meeting Madison wrote: "The nearer the crisis approaches, the more I
tremble for the issue. The necessity of gaining the concurrence of the
convention in some system that will answer the purpose, the subsequent
approbation of Congress, and the final sanction of the States, present a
series of chances which would inspire despair in any case where the
alternative was less formidable." He said, in the first month of the
session of that body, that "the States were divided into different
interests, not by their difference of size, but by other circumstances;
the most material of which resulted partly from climate, but principally
from the effects of their having or not having slaves. These two causes
concurred in forming the great division of interests in the United
States. It did not lie between the large and small States. It lay
between the Northern and Southern."

During the earlier weeks of this session of Congress, and, indeed, for
some months before, events had made so manifest this difference of
interest, coincident with the difference in latitude, that there seemed
little ground for hope that any good would come out of a constitutional
convention. The old questi