were, as was claimed by those who advocated them, of a general, and not a local character; but they were at the same time highly characteristic of the state. They may be divided into three classes. One of them embraced that general declaration which was afterwards incorporated with the amendments to the Constitution, and which expressly reserved to the states or the people the powers not delegated to the United States. Another class of them comprehended certain restraints upon the powers granted to Congress by the Constitution, with respect to elections, direct taxes, the commercial power, the jurisdiction of the courts, and the power to consent to the holding of titles or offices conferred by foreign sovereigns. The third class contemplated the two great provisions of a presentment by a grand jury, for crimes by which an infamous or a capital punishment might be incurred, and trial by jury in civil actions at the common law between citizens of different states.

The people of Boston, although in general strongly in favor of the Constitution, had carefully abstained from every attempt to influence the convention. But now that the ratification was carried they determined to give to the event all the importance that belonged to it, by public ceremonies and festivities. On the 17th of February there issued from the gates of Faneuil Hall an imposing procession of five thousand citizens, embracing all the trades of the town and its neighborhood, each with its appropriate decorations, emblems, and mottoes. In the centre of this long pageant, to mark the relation of everything around it to maritime commerce, and the relation of all to the new government, was borne the ship Federal Constitution, with full colors flying, and attended by the merchants, captains, and seamen of the port.' On the following day the rejoicings were terminated by a public banquet, at which each of the states that had then adopted the Constitution was separately toasted, the minorities of Connecticut and Massachusetts were warmly praised for their frank and patriotic submission, and strong hopes were expressed of the State of New York.

In this manner the Federalists of Massachusetts wisely sought to kindle the enthusiasm of the country, and to conciliate the opinion of the states which were still to act, in favor of the new

This was the first of a series of similar pageants, which took place in the other principal cities of the Union, in honor of the ratification of the Constitution.

Constitution. The influence of their course did not fail in some quarters. In the convention of New Hampshire, which assembled immediately after that of Massachusetts was adjourned, although there was a majority who, either bound by instructions or led by their own opinions, would have rejected the Constitution if required to vote upon it immediately, yet that same majority was composed chiefly of men willing to hear discussion, willing to be convinced, and likely to feel the influence of what had occurred in the leading state of New England. There was a body of Federalists in New Hampshire acting in concert with the leading men of that party in Massachusetts. They caused the same form of ratification and the same amendments which had been adopted in the latter state, with some additional ones, to be presented to their own convention.' The discussions changed the opinions of many of the members, but it was not deemed expedient to incur the hazard of a vote. The friends of the Constitution found it necessary to consent to an adjournment, in order that the instructed delegates might have an opportunity to lay before their constituents the information which they had themselves received, and of which the people in the more remote parts of the state were greatly in need. Unfortunately, however, for the course of things in other states, the occurrence of a general election in New Hampshire made it necessary to adjourn the convention until the middle of June. We have seen what was the effect of this proceeding in Virginia, where it was both misunderstood and misrepresented. But it saved the Constitution in New Hampshire.

Six states only, therefore, had adopted the Constitution at the opening of the spring of 1788. The convention of Maryland assembled at Annapolis on the 21st of April. The convention of

The form of ratification and the amendments introduced by Hancock into the convention of Massachusetts were drawn by Theophilus Parsons. They were probably communicated to General Sullivan, the president of the New Hampshire convention, by his brother, James Sullivan, an eminent lawyer of Boston, afterwards governor of Massachusetts. The reader should compare the Massachusetts amendments with those of the other states whose action followed that of Massachusetts, for the purpose of seeing the influence which they exerted. (All the amendments may be found in the Journals of the Old Congress, Vol. XIII., Appendix.) See also post, Chap. XXXV., as to the effect of the course of Massachusetts on the mind of Jefferson.

South Carolina was to follow in May, and the conventions of Virginia and New York were to meet in June. So critical was the period in which the people of Maryland were to act, that Washington considered that a postponement of their decision would cause the final defeat of the Constitution; for if, under the influence of such a postponement, following that of New Hampshire, South Carolina should reject it, its fate would turn on the determination of Virginia.

The people of Maryland appear to have been fully aware of the importance of their course. They not only elected a large majority of delegates known to be in favor of the Constitution, but a majority of the counties instructed their members to ratify it as speedily as possible, and to do no other act. This settled determination not to consider amendments, and not to have the action of the state misinterpreted or its influence lost, gave great dissatisfaction to the minority. Their efforts to introduce amendments were disposed of quite summarily. The majority would entertain no proposition but the single question of ratification, which was carried by sixty-three votes against eleven, on the 28th of April.

On the 1st of May there were public rejoicings and a procession of the trades, in Baltimore, followed by a banquet, a ball, and an illumination. In this procession the miniature ship Federalist, which was afterwards presented to Washington, and long rode at anchor in the Potomac opposite Mount Vernon, was carried, as the type of commerce and the consummate production of American naval architecture.' The next day a packet sailed from the port of Baltimore for Charleston, carrying the news of the ratification by Maryland. In how many days this "coaster"

This little vessel sailed from Baltimore on the 1st of June, and arrived at Mount Vernon," completely rigged and highly ornamented," on the 8th. It was a fine specimen of the then state of the mechanic arts. See an account of it in Washington's Works, IX. 375, 376.

There was then no land communication between the two places that could have carried intelligence in less than a month. A letter written by General Pinckney to Washington on the 24th of May, announcing the result in South Carolina, was more than four weeks on its way to Mount Vernon. (Washington's Works, IX. 389.) Washington had received the same news by way of Baltimore soon after its arrival there.

performed her voyage is not known; but it is a recorded, though now forgotten, fact among the events of this period, that on her return to Baltimore, where she arrived on Saturday, the 31st of May, the same vessel brought back the welcome intelligence that on the 23d of that month, "at five o'clock in the afternoon," the convention of South Carolina had ratified the Constitution of the United States. A salute of cannon on Federal Hill, in the neighborhood of Baltimore, spread the joyful news far down the waters of the Chesapeake to the shores of Virginia, and bold express riders placed it in Philadelphia before the following Monday evening.

Such was the anxiety with which the friends of the Constitution in the centre of the Union watched the course of events in the remaining states. The accession of South Carolina was naturally regarded as very important. Her delegates in the national Convention had assumed what might be thought, at home and elsewhere, to be a great responsibility. They had taken a prominent part in the settlement of the compromises which became necessary between the Northern and the Southern States. They had consented to a full commercial power, to be exercised by a majority in both houses of Congress; to a power to extinguish the slavetrade in twenty years; and to a power of direct and indirect taxation, exports alone excepted. Would the people of South Carolina consider the provisions made for their peculiar demands as equivalents for what had been surrendered? Would they acquiesce in a system founded in the necessities for local sacrifices, standing as they did at the extremity of the interests involved in the Southern side of the adjustment?

It is not probable that the people of South Carolina, at the time of their adoption of the Constitution, supposed that they had any solid reasons for dissatisfaction with such of its arrangements as in any way concerned the subject of slavery. A good deal was said, ad captandum, by the opponents of the Constitution, on these points, but it does not appear to have been said with much effect. No man who has ever been placed by the state of South Carolina in a public position has been more true to her interests and rights than General Pinckney; and General Pinckney furnished to the people of the state-speaking from his place in the legislature on his return from the national Convention-what he considered, and they received, as a complete answer to all that was addressed to

their local fears and prejudices, on these particular topics. When he had shown that, by the universal admission of the country, the Constitution had given to the general government no power to emancipate the slaves within the several states, and that it had secured a right which did not previously exist, of recovering those who might escape into other states; that the slave-trade would remain open for twenty years, a period that would suffice for the supply of all the labor of that kind which the state would require; and that the admission of the blacks into the basis of representation was a concession in favor of the state of singular importance as well as novelty, he had disposed of every ground of opposition relating to these points. And so the people of the state manifestly considered.

But there was one part of the arrangements included in the Constitution on which they appear to have thought that they had more reason to pause; and it is quite important that we should understand both the grounds of their doubt and the grounds on which they yielded their assent to this part of the system. South Carolina was then, and was ever likely to be, an exporting state. Some of her people feared that, if a full power to regulate commerce by the votes of a majority in the two houses of Congress were to be exercised in the passage of a navigation act, the Eastern States, in whose behalf they were asked to grant such a power, would not be able to furnish shipping enough to export the products of the planting states. This apprehension arose entirely from a want of information; which some of the friends of the Constitution supplied, while it was under discussion. They showed that, if all the exported products of Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia were obliged to be carried in American bottoms, the Eastern States were then able to furnish more than shipping enough for the purpose; and that this shipping must also compete with that of the Middle States. Still it remained true that the grant of the commercial power would enable a majority in Congress to exclude foreign vessels from the carrying trade of the United States, and so far to enhance the freights on the products of South Carolina. What then were the motives which appear to have led the convention of that state to agree to this concession of the commercial power?

It is evident from the discussions which took place in the legis