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The Great Compromise of 1787 | Background Essay

Written by: Nicholas P. S. Cole, Pembroke College, University of Oxford

Between 1776 and 1789 the state governments were united under a structure set out in the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union. While this Union provided for powers to be delegated from the states to this ‘league of friendship’, the Articles stopped short of providing the institutions that are now recognized as the defining features of American government. Reform of this system of government proved difficult, however, and the convention held in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787, ostensibly for the purpose of recommending revisions to the Articles of Confederation1, was only the latest in a series of efforts to change the federal system of government. Holding such a convention had been recommended by the Annapolis Convention, which had been held the previous year, and which had been asked to look at the much narrower issue of trade, an issue which the delegates realized touched on so many issues of government that it was impossible to solve without a broader revision of the system of government.

Nevertheless, the fifty-five delegates who attended the 1787 Convention disagreed on fundamental questions, and (as representatives of their various states) had been given differing authorities to negotiate. Perhaps the least controversial question of all was the decision, taken at the start of the 1787 Convention, to write an entirely new constitutional document rather than propose revisions to the existing Articles of Confederation. Beyond that, however, the differences between the delegates appeared—at the start of the process—impossible to reconcile.

Much of the disagreement rested on the question of the extent to which the federal union ought to be a sovereign government, drawing its authority directly from the people themselves, and with a right to legislate directly and impose its decisions without the cooperation and consent of state governments. Almost all delegates agreed that revisions of the Articles should tend in that direction, but they disagreed sharply about how far these revisions should go, and what constraints should be placed upon federal power or the freedom of federal officials.

Practical considerations and the circumstances of America in 1787 helped to shape the debate even more profoundly than these more theoretical concerns. Firstly, the size and population of the thirteen states differed radically (although by no means as greatly as in the modern United States). Secondly, regional specialization and differing infrastructures meant that the economic interests of the individual states varied widely across the union. Lastly, by 1787, the question of slavery had already begun to divide northern and southern states. It perhaps did not assist discussion that few federal unions of any kind had been long-lived or successful, and the diversity of America even in 1787 seemed greater than that of previous, failed political unions. Of all the delegates, James Madison had done the most careful preparation for his work at the Convention and had condensed a historical study of previousgovernments into a set of Notes on Ancient and Modern Confederacies,2 which he composed prior to the Annapolis Convention, and which can be found among his papers. This study persuaded Madison that a central controlling authority was needed to sustain any union, and meant that at the 1787 Convention he argued for a federal veto on state law—an invasion of state sovereignty that went far further than most at the convention would consider.

The range of disagreement is most famously captured in two documents that can be found in the Library of Congress, the ‘Virginia Plan’3 and the ‘New Jersey Plan’.4 Both of these were documents presented by state delegations for discussion close to the start of the Convention, and were intended to set out a broad framework within which a more detailed constitution could be written. Of the two, the Virginia Plan recommended a more powerful central state, with a bicameral legislature, an executive, and a judicial branch. The lower house of the legislature was to be elected by the people of each state, with seats allocated on the basis either of the f inancial contribution of each state to the Union, or of the number of free inhabitants, or on ‘some other principle’. The upper house and the national executive were to be chosen by the lower house. Although many of the details of this framework were left blank or explicitly left as issues to be decided, it was a plan that clearly envisaged a form of union that would have a powerful central government and within which the larger, richer states would have an advantage. By contrast, the New Jersey Plan would have gone further to preserve the looser structure of the union under the Articles of Confederation. It did not anticipate an election of members of Congress by the people directly, nor did it propose to remove the equal vote that all states currently exercised in Congress. A government designed within this framework would have been weak, with much more power (and, just as importantly, democratic legitimacy) reserved to the state governments.

It is tempting to view the resulting constitution as a compromise between these two plans, and that is the way that for generations many students have been taught to understand the Convention. The final text of the 1787 Constitution5 adopted Virginia’s proposal for an elected lower house in the Federal legislature, while in the Senate the states were represented equally, regardless of their size. Madison’s proposal to allow federal veto over state laws was dropped, and so too were many of New Jersey’s proposals to limit the authority of federal officials. As a way of understanding the ‘compromise,’ this narrative has a tidiness about it, and is represented by the artefacts preserved in the papers of the Convention—the draft Virginia and New Jersey Plans. Presented in the right way, it seems as if the delegates to the convention reached compromise essentially by adopting elements of the two different plans.

But this story – however convenient – is flawed. The convention did not reach its conclusions in this way, and these plans represent only a very small part of the journey towards a final agreement that was able to command the support of not only an overwhelming majority of the members of the convention, but also the ratifying conventions of the individual states. Introduced for discussion at the start of the convention, the Virginia Plan was debated in a detailed, line-by-line reading that fleshed out and revised.

Questions:

  1. Briefly summarize the context for the 1787 Convention.
  2. According to the author, what was the least controversial question on the table at the 1787 convention? Where did most of the disagreement occur?
  3. What were the three practical factors that most shaped the debate at the Convention?
  4. Who does the author argue was the most prepared of the delegates and how did he prepare for the Convention?
  5. Summarize the Virginia Plan.
  6. Summarize the New Jersey Plan.
  7. Why does the author argue it is a mistake to understand the Constitution as a compromise between the Virginia and New Jersey Plans? How does the historical record of the Convention preserve this “convenient” conclusion?
  8. Rather than a convenient blend of two rough-draft plans, how does the author maintain that the Convention approached its work?
  9. Explain what the author means when he says: “The 1787 Convention, then, should be celebrated for the constitutional text that it produced…But it should be celebrated most as a triumph of what members of the modern Congress now call ‘regular order’.”

Citations:

1 “Articles of Confederation (November 15, 1777).” Constitutional Sources Project. https://www.consource.org/document/articles-of-confederation-1777-11-15/20160229233530/

2 Madison, James. Ancient & Modern Confederacies. May 1787. Library of Congress. http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mjm.02_1036_1063

3 “Variant Texts of the Virginia Plan, Presented by Edmund Randolph to the Federal Convention, May 29, 1787. Text A.” The Avalon Project, Yale Law School. http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/vatexta.asp

4 “Variant Texts of the Plan Presented by William Patterson – Text A.” The Avalon Project, Yale Law School. http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/patexta.asp

5 “United States Constitution.” Constitutional Sources Project. https://www.consource.org/document/united-states-constitution/20130122212832/