11]

Long and stormy debates occurred in the state conventions; and it was
not until the twenty-first of June, 1788, that New Hampshire, the ninth
state in order, ratified the constitution.[12] It then became the organic
law of the republic. The Congress, when testimonials of ratification
were received from a sufficient number of states, appointed the first
Wednesday of January, 1789, for the people of the United States to
choose electors of a president in accordance with the provisions of the
constitution; the first Wednesday in February following for the electors
to meet and make a choice; and the first Wednesday in March ensuing for
the new government to meet for organization in the city of New York.

While these discussions were going on, Washington remained at Mount
Vernon, a most anxious spectator of the progress of political events,
especially in his own state, where the opposition to the constitution
was very powerful and well organized. He took no direct part in the
proceedings of his state convention. "There is not, perhaps, a man in
Virginia," he wrote to General Lincoln, "less qualified than I am to
say, from his own knowledge and observation, what will be the fate of
the constitution here; for I very seldom ride beyond the limits of my
own farms, and am wholly indebted to those gentlemen who visit me for
any information of the disposition of the people toward it; but, from
all I can collect, I have not the smallest doubt of its being accepted."

Washington's views were freely expressed in conversations at Mount
Vernon and in his letters, and they had great weight; and when, finally,
the seal of approbation of the constitution was set by New Hampshire and
his own state, and that instrument became the supreme law of the land,
his heart was filled with gratitude to the Great Disposer of events for
his manifest protection of the American people from the calamities with
which they had so long been threatened. "We may, with a kind of pious
and grateful exultation," he wrote to Governor Trumbull, "trace the
finger of Providence through those dark and mysterious events which
first induced the states to appoint a general convention, and then led
them, one after another, by such steps as were best calculated to effect
the object into an adoption of the systems recommended by that general
convention; thereby, in all human probability, laying a lasting
foundation for tranquillity and happiness, when we had too much re