_ is in a peculiar manner critical," and "that
the radical source of most of our embarrassments is _the want of
sufficient power in Congress_ to effectuate that ready and perfect
cooperation of _the different States_ on which their immediate safety
and future happiness depend." Finally, in September, 1786, at Annapolis,
commissioners from several States, after declaring "the situation of the
United States delicate and critical, calling for an exertion of the
united virtue and wisdom of all the members of the Confederacy,"
recommended the meeting of a Convention "to devise such further
provision as shall appear necessary to render the Constitution of the
Federal Government adequate to the exigencies of the Union." In
pursuance of this recommendation, the Congress of the Confederation
proposed a Convention "for the purpose of revising the Articles of
Confederation and Perpetual Union between the United States of America,
and reporting such alterations and amendments of the said Articles of
Confederation as the representatives met in such Convention shall judge
proper and necessary to render them adequate to the preservation and
support of the Union."

In pursuance of the call, delegates to the proposed Convention were duly
appointed by the legislatures of the several States, and the Convention
assembled at Philadelphia in May, 1787. The present Constitution was the
well-ripened fruit of their deliberations. In transmitting it to
Congress, General Washington, who was the President of the Convention,
in a letter bearing date September 17, 1787, made use of this
instructive language:--

"It is obviously impracticable in the Federal Government of _these
States to secure all rights of independent sovereignty to each_,
and yet provide for the interest and safety of all. Individuals
entering into society must give up a share of liberty to preserve
the rest. The magnitude of the sacrifice must depend as well on
situation and circumstance as on the object to be obtained. It is
at all times difficult to draw with precision the line between
those rights which must be surrendered and those which may be
reserved; and on the present occasion this difficulty will be
increased by a difference _among the several States_ as to their
situation, extent, habits, and particular interests. In all our
deliberations we kept steadily in view that which appears to us
the greatest interest of eve