Skip to Main Content

Convention: A Daily Journal

Center for Civics Education

Convention: A Daily Journal

Convention: A Daily Journal is a day-by-day journal of the 1787 Constitutional Convention convened by twelve of the original thirteen states to amend the Articles of Confederation and create a “more perfect union.” It chronicles the daily activities of the Convention, profiles the delegates and their interactions with each other, and looks back to life in America in the 1780s. Writing in the first person, the story is told from an “observer” hearing events as told in contemporary newspaper accounts and delegates’ personal notes and letters.


January 1, 1788

January 13, 2021 - 5 minute read


Proclaiming the DOI

On December 26, 1787, the New Jersey Journal, one of three newspapers in New Jersey, carried a brief notice that “the people of the State of New Jersey, in Convention assembled, did assent to and ratify the Constitution…without a single dissenting voice after nine day’s deliberation.”  It further noted that “many supposed exceptions were agitated: but the Honorable Judge [David] Brearley, with a perspicuity of argument and persuasive eloquence which carried conviction with it, bore down all opposition.” The article concluded by advising its readers that “many people look upon the adoption of the new Constitution as the millennium of virtue and wealth…but it should be remembered that much depends on our own conduct.”

On December 18, New Jersey had become the third State to ratify the Constitution and had done so absent significant opposition or controversy.  At least three of its thirteen counties had held meetings to consider the Constitution: all three endorsed ratification. Half a dozen petitions had been circulated and sent to the General Assembly expressing the same sentiment.

News reports had been generally pro-ratification or gave the impression that momentum throughout the States favored ratification.  Most commentaries on both sides of the issue, including George Mason’s and Elbridge Gerry’s objections to the Constitution, originated outside of New Jersey rather than with its own citizens.

New Jersey’s ratification convention published a journal of its proceedings, including its rules of debate, but not the debates themselves. On December 19, the journal noted the convention had approved a resolution that “the Convention go in procession to the Courthouse this day at one o’clock, and that the Secretary be directed to read the Ratification of the Constitution in the hearing of the people, which was done accordingly.”

New Jersey’s dissatisfaction with the Articles of Confederation was well known. It had been one of only five States to send representatives to the aborted Annapolis Conference in September 1786. While the meeting had been called to address trade issues, delegates from New Jersey were authorized to discuss a much broader range of issues as well as needed reforms.  

Two months later, on November 23, New Jersey became the first State to select delegates to the proposed convention to amend the Articles.  It named David Brearley, Chief Justice of the State Supreme Court; William Churchill, clerk for the Court and participant in the Annapolis Convention; William Paterson, former New Jersey Attorney General; and John Neilson who had risen to the rank of Brigadier General and served in the Continental Congress.  Neilson was unable to attend due to ill health and on May 18, the following year, the legislature replaced him by electing Governor William Livingston and Abraham Clark.  As a member of the Continental Congress, Clark chose to decline his selection as a delegate and was replaced by Jonathan Dayton on June 7, nearly two weeks after the Convention had begun its deliberations.

From the beginning, the New Jersey delegation was unyielding in its insistence that States be given equal status in the new government.  Reacting to the Virginia Plan which proposed proportional representation, William Paterson proposed the New Jersey Plan as an alternative. Presented on June 15, it called for a unicameral legislature in which each State would have one vote. Although the New Jersey Plan was rejected, several of its elements were eventually accepted and the small States, including New Jersey, were satisfied with a bicameral legislature in which States would be equal in one branch. 

On December 11, thirty-eight of the thirty-nine delegates elected to the New Jersey ratification convention gathered together in the long room at the Blazing Star Tavern in Trenton. Three years earlier, Trenton had been the temporary capitol of the Confederation before the capitol moved on to New York City. At that time, the tavern was known as the “French Arms.” Built as a residence by John Dagworthy in the early 1730’s, it was constructed of stone and stucco with a gabled roof and considered to be the most beautiful building in the city. It was also the largest. Located at the corner of Warren and State Streets, its use as a tavern had begun in 1760. 

During its brief sojourn in Trenton from November 1 to Christmas Eve, 1784, Congress took little action, but elected Richard Henry Lee as President of the Confederation, and warmly received the farewell address delivered on December 11 by the Marquis de Lafayette.

Among delegates to the New Jersey ratification convention was John Witherspoon, the noted Scottish American Presbyterian minister and President of the College of New Jersey in Princeton. Witherspoon had been an early advocate for independence and, as a delegate to the Second Continental Congress, had voted for and signed the Declaration of Independence as well as the Articles of Confederation. As an educator he transformed the College of New Jersey and could count among his students James Madison, Aaron Burr, William Bradford, and three others who would become justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.  Of his students, ten became Cabinet officers, twenty-eight became Senators, and forty-nine became Representatives. 

Witherspoon’s acquaintances included the Reverend John Rosburgh, a graduate of the College of New Jersey who had studied for the ministry and been ordained a Presbyterian minister several years before Witherspoon arrived in America from Scotland.  At the outbreak of the War for Independence, General George Washington had written a letter to the citizens of Northampton, Pennsylvania, urging them to assist the Continental Army. Rosburgh read the letter to his congregation and followed it with a sermon from the Old Testament - Judges 5:23: “Curse ye, Meroz, saith the angel of the Lord; curse ye bitterly the inhabitants thereof, because they came not to the help of the Lord against the mighty.” 

Inspired by Rosburgh, men in his congregation moved to enlist, but only if Rosburgh would lead them as their commander. At the age of sixty-three, Rosburgh reluctantly slung his musket over his soldier and set out with his men for the Continental Army encamped in Philadelphia. Their new unit commander assigned Rosburgh to be the company’s chaplain. After Washington’s troops crossed the Delaware, defeated the Hessians, and took Trenton, Rosburgh was dining at a public house “at the corner of State and Warren,” when warned that Hessians were coming. Outside, he saw that his horse had been stolen and he found himself suddenly surrounded by a company of Hessians under the command of a British officer. Even though easily recognized as a Presbyterian chaplain, he was immediately bayonetted to death on the spot, becoming the first United States Army Chaplain in American history to be killed in battle - in the same place where years later New Jersey would become the third State to ratify the Constitution. 

Back to top