Sept. 17 doesn’t draw as much attention as July 4, but the date is also important to our nation’s founding history. On Sept. 17, 1787, delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia signed the US Constitution, which is, along with our Declaration of Independence, a core founding document. It would replace the Articles of Confederation — but only if nine of the 13 states ratified it.
North Carolina had a key role in the ratification process: It resisted!
Surprisingly, North Carolinians had some good reasons for opposition, and our government is better for the debate that ensued.
North Carolinians were always an independent lot, especially those who lived in the western part of the state (in the 1780s, anyone living west of Raleigh). Most of them were farmers who owned only small amounts of land. As early as the 1760s, they were fed up with high taxes, corrupt officials appointed by the British governor, and the political dominance of wealthy eastern planters. Eventually they rebelled.
The Regulators’ rebellion was put down by the colonial governor’s army at the Battle of Alamance in 1771, but North Carolinians’ desire for independence didn’t wane. North Carolinians eagerly supported the revolution against Great Britain. North Carolina was the first state to formally call for independence.
When it came to the new constitution, in 1787, the issue was also independence — in this case, fear of losing it. Many in North Carolina were wary. How strong would this new government be? Would it be like British control, “déjà vu all over again” (to quote Yogi Berra)?
Historian Jeff Broadwater has written that those who opposed the Constitution feared that “the Senate would become a bastion of aristocratic privilege, that an imperial president would overawe a complacent Congress, and that an intrusive federal court system would engender costly and oppressive litigation.”
Indeed, the national government would have the right to tax the states (it didn’t have that right under the Articles — it had to beg). It would be allowed to have a standing army, to set the time and place of elections, and its Supreme Court could override state court decisions.
Most importantly, there was no declaration (that is, no bill) of rights.
Those who favored the Constitution, known as Federalists, thought that there was no need for such declarations. After all, most of the states had their own bills of rights. Furthermore, wrote James Iredell, one staunch North Carolina Federalist, the powers of the US government were clearly stated in the Constitution, and the government “certainly cannot act beyond the warrant of that authority.” The government’s hands would be tied even if it wanted to interfere.
And, when specific rights were mentioned, Iredell said of one: “The expressions ‘unusual and severe’ or ‘cruel and unusual’ [punishment] surely would have been too vague to have been of any consequence, since they admit of no clear and precise signification.” Adding a ban on cruel and unusual punishment wouldn’t protect anybody because no one would be able to define it.
But the Anti-Federalists were tough. The first North Carolina convention to vote on the Constitution was held in Hillsborough, in July and August of 1788. The delegates voted 184–84 to neither ratify nor reject, but wait.
Two things happened to win over the Anti-Federalists, those in North Carolina and elsewhere.
For one, the transition of the other states to government under the Constitution went smoothly. And second, James Madison insisted that the new Congress enact a bill of rights. Twelve amendments were passed in September 1789. By the time North Carolinians held a second convention, in November 1789, this Bill of Rights had been submitted to the states for approval (although only 10 were ratified).
At that convention in Fayetteville, the vote in favor was 194 to 77. North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the Constitution (the last one would be Rhode Island). And the nation soon had a Bill of Rights, which has served us well.