Ratification

Hello.

I'm Frank Galeano, professor of American history at the University of Edinburgh.

In this lecture,

I'm going to talk about the debates within

the United States over the proposed federal constitution between

17 87 and 17 89 when a series of conventions were held across the United States to,

um to consider and approve or disapprove of the Constitution that came out of

the that arose from the constitutional Convention in the summer of 17 87.

So in this section, I want to say a few words about the ratification process.

As I intimated in my last lecture,

the Constitutional Convention itself didn't have any legal status,

Didn't have any legal standing, Um, when it met.

So it was basically, if you will, a meeting of interested parties.

These were politically engaged, um, influential figures, but

they didn't necessarily. They weren't they weren't meeting.

They weren't called to meet by anyone. They got together.

They produced a constitution,

and they then sent it to the United States Congress to consider.

And they recommended that the Congress should send it out to the various states.

There were then 13 states in the United States. The original 13 States

and

those states should hold special ratifying conventions.

And those ratifying conventions

should approve the Constitution. And when nine states approved the Constitution,

it would replace the articles of confederation

and come into force. And in that way, the Constitution.

The new constitution would replace the old Constitution,

the articles of confederation.

Again.

I want to stress they're changing the rules

here because the rules were essentially impossible.

Under the old articles of confederation,

Unanimous consent was required to approve changes to the system.

And what the Constitutional Convention was proposing was that

it totally a whole wholly new constitution should be

considered and that it should take effect once two thirds,

nine states out of 13 had approved it.

This is different from what the articles of confederation have required,

and so they're changing the rules in order as they see it,

to make sure that the Constitution would get a fair hearing.

The constitution, however, begins, and I in my prior lecture, I intimated this that

this is a strange document in the sense that it's a um

at some level can be read as an attempt to

curb democracy and democratic excess in the new United States.

Yet the framers of the Constitution recognised that they needed some kind of

popular support if the document were to have any kind of credibility,

and so they were appealing directly to the American people to get them to approve

this constitution, which essentially would take power away from the States.

It begins with an interesting statement,

though the preamble to the United States Constitution and the first letters.

If you go and look at it online, you can see them. The the the actual document.

The first letters are in kind of bold script, and they say it says we,

the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union,

establish justice,

ensure domestic tranquillity,

provide for the common defence,

promote the general welfare and secure the blessings

of liberty to ourselves and our posterity,

do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.

Now, on one hand, we can dismiss.

This is rhetorical nonsense of the type that politicians like to traffic in.

On the other,

there's an interesting kind of This is a very interesting and powerful statement.

Remember,

if you think back to the last lecture

when I talked about the Declaration of Independence,

asserting that all Americans were equal but also that they

that sovereignty derived from them,

that they had the government and governmental

authority derived from the people Well,

the Constitution begins with a similar statements saying that this document,

which we know is taking power away from some of

the states which the framers of the document believed,

or two Democratic still had to have a Democratic premise.

It had to receive the approval of the people. So we it begins with that statement.

We, the people of the United States,

are doing this in order to achieve the following things.

And so it's an assertion of popular sovereignty.

They can't say they're doing it in the name of the King anymore.

That's what documents used to say.

Um and so they're invoking the authority of the American people.

In order to do that, they have to appeal directly to the American people,

which is why they called for these special

ratifying conventions to be held so special.

Ratifying conventions were held between over, uh,

over the really the next 18 months from earlier from the latter part of 17 87 through

the summer of 17.

Well, actually not 18 months more like nine or 10 months to be fair,

through the middle of 17 88 to adopt and ratify this Constitution.

But it's crucially important that these special

conventions were held and in many states,

not all of them.

Elections were held and property requirements were waived.

People recognise that this was a unique moment.

Some property requirements were waived to allow people to

vote for delegates to attend these these ratifying conventions.

And so a series of ratifying conventions were held across the

13 United States or 13 states that comprise the United States,

the United States.

The United States is a lie as a name. The United States have never been that united.

Uh, it's the dis United States.

So there are these in the in the 13 states that comprise the United States.

Uh, these these ratifying conventions were held in the coming months,

and in many respects one should be rightfully sceptical about the nature

of the US Constitution and certainly the nature of its origin,

Madison said.

You know, if our if our debates were held in public,

these things never would have got off the ground.

Uh, but it does expose facto, um,

achieve a certain democratic legitimacy or a certain

popular legitimacy because of these ratifying conventions.

And we see Kendari and skullduggery and politics in these conventions.

But we also see fairly high minded debates.

And there's a kind of really important popular discourse and

debate over the Constitution that goes on across these conventions.

And these conventions will be crucially important both in, um,

considering the document, but also as far as a statement of, uh,

it's evidence of the quality of public discourse in the United States in

17 87 and 88 but also in order to give this document legitimacy.