DOCUMENTARY HISTORY OF THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 1787-1870 DERIVED FROM THE RECORDS, MANUSCRIPTS, AND ROLLS DEPOS- 53x2 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. The design of this work is to give a literal print of the documents deposited in the Bureau of Rolls and Library of the Department of State relating to the formation of the Constitution of the United States as adopted, amended, and now in force. The narrative, therefore, begins with the record of the proceedings of the Annapolis Convention, and will include all the papers in the Bureau bearing on the making and amending of the Constitution to the date of the latest amendment. The purpose in view being to avoid controversy and to meet the demand of historical scholars and students by presenting the contents of the papers themselves, as classed and filed in the Department, and as verified by the records, and nothing more, the editorial function is confined to the general form of the text, and to such notes as may be indispensable to clear display. For example, the official files of the Federal Convention were, by authority of the Convention, retained by Washington, its President. Those papers, as transferred by Washington to the Secretary of State in 1796, stand apart, and are so printed. The present, initial, volume, comprising the appendices to numbers 1 and 3 of the Bulletin of the Bureau, completes the first and second periods of the history as found in the archives. The remaining parts will appear from time to time in the same manner until the work is finished, and a bibliography of the Constitution from the Department's Library will be appended in order that the student may be afforded every facility at the command of the Department. Bureau of Rolls and Library, Department of State, Washington, D. C., May, 1894. |