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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sam who wrote (133236)	5/17/2004 1:29:20 PM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

You guys need to read up on your history of the Constitution. I recommend you start with "Miracle at Philadelphia, which both my kids had to read in the Tench Grade. amazon.com How on earth can you argue that a convention of the most prominent men of the time, including Adams, Franklin, Madison, Hamilton, presided over by Washington, convened in the state house of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, was secret? What you mean is that the deliberations were private, much as the deliberations of juries are today. They called this "secret", which, in the language of 1787, means that they were secreted, or sequestered. They did not discuss their deliberations with the public at large. Various delegates kept notes which have been published. Madisons are the most complete and the most famous. The delegates also communicated with persons who were not present via letter. Jefferson, who was in France, and Madison, discussed various aspects of the draft constitution via letter as regularly as one can do via Atlantic shipping. Was it wise to present the states with a fait accompli, to be accepted or rejected in toto? I can only point to a curious broadsheet printed in 1787, intended to stir up public sentiment against the Constitution which was in the process of being drafted, which alleges various things that did not turn out in the final draft. Who leaked the information? Did leaking the information have the effect the author intended, was public pressure brought to bear? I believe it's impossible to know. (Sorry, this collection won't give permalinks.) It points up the difficulties of secret deliberations about important public policies. We don't do things that way anymore, and we feel we are for the better because of that.