conference; in consequence of which, a deputation from five
or six state assemblies met at Annapolis, in Maryland, in 1786. This
meeting, not conceiving itself sufficiently authorised to go into the
business of a reform, did no more than state their general opinions of
the propriety of the measure, and recommend that a convention of all the
states should be held the year following.

The convention met at Philadelphia in May, 1787, of which General
Washington was elected president. He was not at that time connected
with any of the state governments, or with congress. He delivered up
his commission when the war ended, and since then had lived a private
citizen.

The convention went deeply into all the subjects; and having, after a
variety of debate and investigation, agreed among themselves upon the
several parts of a federal constitution, the next question was, the
manner of giving it authority and practice.

For this purpose they did not, like a cabal of courtiers, send for a
Dutch Stadtholder, or a German Elector; but they referred the whole
matter to the sense and interest of the country.

They first directed that the proposed constitution should be published.
Secondly, that each state should elect a convention, expressly for the
purpose of taking it into consideration, and of ratifying or rejecting
it; and that as soon as the approbation and ratification of any nine
states should be given, that those states shall proceed to the election
of their proportion of members to the new federal government; and that
the operation of it should then begin, and the former federal government
cease.

The several states proceeded accordingly to elect their conventions.
Some of those conventions ratified the constitution by very large
majorities, and two or three unanimously. In others there were much
debate and division of opinion. In the Massachusetts convention, which
met at Boston, the majority was not above nineteen or twenty, in
about three hundred members; but such is the nature of representative
government, that it quietly decides all matters by majority. After the
debate in the Massachusetts convention was closed, and the vote taken,
the objecting members rose and declared, "That though they had argued
and voted against it, because certain parts appeared to them in a
different light to what they appeared to other members; yet, as the vote
had decided in favour of the constitution as proposed, they should give
it the s