REPORT OF SPECIAL COMMITTEE. 257 handed over to a special committee, consisting of Benson, Sherman and Sedgwick, with instructions to arrange and report them.1 Their report reached the Senate on the twenty-fifth 1 Annals, 808. REPORT OF THE SPECIAL COMMITTEE OF THREE, AUGUST 24, 1789. Third Draft of the Amendments. Senate Journal for August 25, .1789. Art. I. After the first enumeration, required by the first article of the Constitution, there shall be one representative for every thirty thousand, until the number shall amount to one hundred; after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress that there shall be not less than one hundred representatives, nor less than one representative for every forty thousand persons, until the number of representatives shall amount to two hundred, after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress that there shall not be less than two hundred representatives nor less than one for every fifty thousand persons. Art. II. No law varying the compensation to the members of Congress shall take effect until an election of representatives shall have intervened. Art. III. Congress shall make no law establishing religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; nor shall the rights of conscience be infringed. Art. IV. The freedom of speech and of the press and of the right of the people peaceably to assemble and to apply to the government for redress of grievances, shall not be infringed. Art. V. A well-regulated militia, composed of the body of the people, being the best security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed, but no one religiously scrupulous of bearing arms shall be compelled to render military service in person. Art. VI. No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner; nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law. Art. VII. The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause supported by oath or affirmation and partic 258 REPORT OF SPECIAL COMMITTEE. ularly describing the place to be searched and the persons or things to be seized. Art. VIII. No person shall be subject except in case of impeachment to more than one trial, or one punishment for the same offence, nor shall be compelled, in any criminal case, to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation. Art. IX. In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right of a speedy and public trial; to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; and to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defence. Art. X. The trial of all crimes (except in cases of impeachment, and in all cases arising in the land and naval forces, or in the militia when in actual service, in time of war, or public danger) shall be by an impartial jury of the vicinage, with the requisites of unanimity for conviction, the right of challenge, and other accustomed requisitions; and no person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous crime unless on a presentment of indictment by a grand jury; but if a crime be committed in a place in the possession of an enemy, or in which an insurrection may prevail, the indictment and trial may, by law, be authorized in some other place within the same State. Art. XI. No appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States shall be allowed when the value in controversy shall not amount to one thousand dollars; nor shall any fact, triable by a jury according to the course of the common law, be otherwise reexaminable than according to the rules of common law. Art. XII. In suits at common law, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved. Art. XIII. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. Art. XIV. No State shall infringe the right of trial by jury in criminal cases, nor the rights of conscience, nor the freedom of speech or of the press. Art. XV. The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people. Art. XVI. The powers delegated by the Constitution to the Government of the United States shall be exercised as therein appropriated, so that the Legislative shall never exercise the THE REPORT IN CONFERENCE. 259 of August, and consisted of seventeen articles.1 Of their reception and treatment by the Senate we have slight knowledge. Maclay, the republican Senator from Pennsylvania, records that on the day of their arrival, "they were treated contemptuously by Izard, Langdon and Mr. Morris. Izard moved that they should be postponed till next session. Langdon seconded and Mr. Morris got up and spoke angrily, but not well. They, however, lost their motion, and Monday was assigned for taking them up. I could not help observing the six-year class (of Senators) hung together on this business, or the most of them." 2 That the Senate strongly dissented from many of the articles; that it modified and amended them; that they went back to the House; that the House refused to recede; that the amendments were sent to a Committee of Conferences and that, on the twenty-fourth of September, the House receded from its disagreement, provided the Senate would acquiesce in alterations in two articles,3 and powers vested in the Executive or Judicial; nor the Executive exercise the powers vested in the Legislative or Judicial; nor the Judicial the powers vested in the Legislative or Executive. Art. XVII. The powers not delegated by the Constitution prohibited by it to the States are reserved to the States, respectively, or to the people. 1 Senate Journal, August 25, 1789. 2 Maclay's Journal, 134. 3 Annals, 948. THE AMENDMENTS OF 1789 AS THEY PASSED CONGRESS SEPTEMBER 25. (Fourth Draft). Senate Journal, 1789, Appendix. Art. I. After the first enumeration required by the first article of the Constitution, there shall be one representative for every thirty thousand, until the number shall amount to one hundred; after which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress that there shall be not less than one hundred representatives nor less than one representative for every forty thousand persons until the number of representatives shall amount to two hundred, after 260 RESULTS OF CONFERENCE. that on the following day the Senate concurred and the amendments were adopted,1 is about all we know of their history from the time the Special Committee of Three was appointed by the House. But meanwhile the amendments had undergone great changes. The seventeen had become twelve and, of these twelve, the last ten were destined to become the first ten of the Constitution.2 which the proportion shall be so regulated by Congress that there shall not be less than one representative for every fifty thousand persons. Art. II. No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect until an election of Representatives shall have intervened. Art. III. Same as Constitution, Amendment I. 1 Annals, 90. 2 Madison, writing of the Senate amendments: "Alterations which strike, in my opinion, at the most salutary articles. In many of the States, juries, even in criminal cases, are taken from the State at large; in others, from districts of considerable extent; in very few, from the county alone. Hence, a dislike to the restraint with respect to vicinage which has produced a negative on that clause. A fear of inconvenience from a constitutional bar to appeals below a certain value, and a confidence that such a limitation is not necessary, have had the same effect on the article." Letter to Edmund Randolph, September 14, 1789. They (the amendments) were far short of the wishes of our convention, but as they are returned by the Senate they are certainly much weakened. The most essential danger from the present system arises, in my opinion, from its tendency to a con assent. THE AMENDMENTS RATIFIED. 261 While they were before the States, North Carolina and Rhode Island ratified the Constitution. The first State to ratify the amendments was New Jersey, on the 20th of November, 1789; the last was Virginia,1 on the 15th of December, two years later. Massachusetts, Connecticut and Georgia are not recorded as giving them their The ratification of the amendments by Rhode Island was announced to Congress by Washington, on the last day of June, 1790.2 Rhode Island was the ninth State to approve them, and its act made them a part of the Constitution. Fourteen years passed before the Constitution was again amended. During the interim political parties were organized, great constitutional issues arose and the government passed into the control of the party which, in its early history, had opposed the ratification of the Constitution. Many amendments were proposed during these fourteen years. In order to simplify the narrative, I will next consider the causes and the adoption of the eleventh and twelfth amendments, and then return to the order of events and the organization of the federal government. solidated government instead of a Union of confederated States." Thinks the United States too extensive for a consolidated government; a new convention desirable. R. H. Lee to Patrick Henry, September 14, 1789. 1 The Virginia Senators, Lee and Grayson, to the Speaker of the Virginia House of Delegates, with copy of the XII Amendments: "It is impossible for us not to see the necessary tendency to consolidate empire in the natural operation of the Constitution, if no further amended than as we proposed, and it is equally impossible for us to be not apprehensive for civil liberty when we know of no instance in the records of history that shows a people ruled in freedom when subject to one undivided government and inhabiting territory so extensive as that of the United States and when, as it seems to us, the nature of man and of things pre |