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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.


November 1, 1787

November 09, 2020 - 5 minute read


Freeman's Journal

On October 6, James Wilson delivered his “speech in the statehouse yard” to “a very great concourse of people,” explaining and defending the proposed Constitution. Immediately printed and distributed throughout the colonies, it was an impressive exposition, used widely by Federalists to prove their case.  It also provoked opponents of the Constitution to wield their pens under a variety of pseudonyms, including Brutus, Cato, and The Federal Farmer.  

On October 17, the Pennsylvania Herald printed a “Reply to Wilson’s Speech” by A Democratic Federalist, first taking issue with Wilson’s contention that the proposed national government could exercise only those powers given to it. Noting that the Articles of Confederation expressly provides that “each State retains its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power, jurisdiction and right which is not by the Confederation expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled,” he asked, “for what purpose” was that provision omitted in the Constitution? 

Under the Articles, the author continued, Congress is “merely an executive body,” with no power to raise money and without judicial authority. In contrast, the Constitution vests the federal government with legislative, executive, and judicial powers and declares “their laws to be paramount to the laws of the different States.” Should they “ever pretend to tyrannize over the people, their standing army will silence every popular effort. Mr. Wilson’s distinction will be forgot, denied or explained away, and the liberty of the people will be no more.”

To Wilson’s assertion that a standing army is necessary, the Democratic Federalist referred to James Burgh’s “Political Disquisitions,“ David Hume, the Scottish Enlightenment philosopher, and others who had commented on “this hackneyed subject.” They had opposed standing armies as threats to liberty. “Was it a standing army that gained the battles of Lexington, and Bunker’s Hill, and took the ill-fated Burgoyne?” the Democratic Federalist demanded. “Is not a well-regulated militia sufficient to every purpose of internal defense?  And which of you is afraid of any invasion from foreign powers that our brave militia would not be able immediately to repel?”

The author closed by noting he had “only traced the outlines of the subject,” having “written this in haste” and hoping that “some able hand will second my honest endeavors.”  His hopes were quickly and easily realized. On October 24, the Freeman’s Journal published a lengthy vitriolic attack on the drafters of the Constitution as well as the Constitution itself. Calling himself Centinel (later identified as Samuel Bryan, the former elected clerk of the Pennsylvania Assembly), he began by extolling freedom of the press and asserting that “abolition of that grand palladium of freedom in the proposed plan of government” is a “striking exemplification” of the history of “men of an aspiring and tyrannical disposition.” Freedom of the press, he asserted, was in serious jeopardy under the Constitution.

Like the Democratic Federalist, Centinel focused on the lack of a bill of rights and the Constitution’s explicit provision that the Constitution would be “the supreme law of the land.” As such, it “would be paramount to all State authorities,” he warned.  Emphasizing themes that will dominate Antifederalist arguments in the months to come, Centinel hearkened back to John Dickinson’s Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer, a series of essays written from 1767 to 1768 instrumental in uniting the colonies against the oppressive Townshend Acts. Opposing Britain’s imposition of internal taxes, Dickinson had asserted that if the taxes were allowed to stand, “the several colonial legislatures would soon become contemptible, and before long fall into disuse. Nothing, said [the Farmer],” continued Centinel, “would be left for them to do, higher than to frame bye-laws for the impounding of cattle or the yoking of hogs.” That Dickinson recently represented Pennsylvania in the Constitutional Convention and supported the Constitution was conveniently omitted in Centinel’s essay.

Centinel’s “Reply to Wilson’s Speech” will be followed by twenty-two additional critical essays published through the next year.  Assailing the “necessary and proper” and “general welfare” clauses as the foundation for unlimited federal power; the power of Congress to tax (which “will drain your pockets of every penny”); and unfair representation in the Senate (designed to become a “permanent aristocracy”), Centinel nevertheless was willing, given more time, to consider debating and even revising or “correcting” the Constitution. 

In the meantime, however, his rhetoric remained biting, concluding his first essay with a warning to his “fellow citizens.” “Are Mr. W-----, and many of his coadjutors in the late C----- the disinterested patriots they would have us believe?” he demanded. “Is their conduct any recommendation of their plan of government?”  Watch as they prevent “investigation and discussion,” and “in the most despotic manner endeavor to compel” the Constitution’s adoption as to “preclude the possibility of a due consideration - and they say whether the motives of these men can be pure.” Finally, he concluded, “such false detestable patriots in every nation have led their blind confiding country, shouting their applauses, into the jaws of despotism and ruin. May the wisdom and virtue of the people of America save them from the usual fate of nations.”

Others replied to Wilson. Arthur Lee, physician, diplomat, and opponent of slavery, addressed six essays to Wilson, using the name Cincinnatus, warning against those “smooth words, with which the most dreadful designs may be glossed over.”  William Findley, a leader of Antifederalists in the Pennsylvania legislature, chose to use the pseudonym An Officer of the Late Continental Army when writing several essays rebutting Wilson. Like Findley, George Bryan (a justice on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court and father of Samuel Bryan/Centinel) was born in Ireland. Writing under the name An Old Whig, his major opposition to the Constitution was its creation of a bicameral legislature.

Well underway, the “battle of the pens” has been joined. It has also begun to escalate in New York, where Governor George Clinton and New York Supreme Court Justice Robert Yates will be pitted against Federalist leaders Alexander Hamilton and James Madison.

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