On This Day at the Convention of 1787: The New Jersey Plan Is Presented
On June 15, 1787, New Jersey's William Paterson offered an alternative to the Virginia Plan to preserve the equality of the states existing...
1787 Constitutional Convention
This Day at the Convention of 1787: Compromise, Compromise, Compromise
Three pivotal decisions were made on June 8: the Connecticut Compromise, the Three-Fifths Compromise, and the New Jersey Compromise. ...
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Rhode Island: First to Fight for Freedom, Last to Join the Union
Where is Rhode Island? That is not a question anyone at the Constitutional Convention of 1787 would have asked. Not because they didn’t...
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On This Day in 1787: Constitutional Convention Gets Down to Business
On day one of the convention, the delegates unanimously selected George Washington as president of the proceedings, and formed the rules committee, which...
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Virginians Prepare to Present New Plan of Government: What Is the Ideal Commonwealth?
The second article in our summer series on the 1787 Constitutional Convention looks at one of James Madison's meetings in preparation for the...
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Introduction to “The Business of May Next”: The Convention of 1787
In May 1787, our Founding Fathers undertook a “grand experiment” to construct a constitution that would avoid contracting the various diseases that destroyed...
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