For years following the end of the war, national leaders were growing increasingly frustrated with the states running themselves increasingly separately, and with a Confederation Congress that did not have any power to regulate or enforce much of anything.
The Congress proved to be barely functional during the war, when the need to remain united against the British army focused the attention of delegates. In peacetime, without that enemy army to goad them along, states became even less willing to cooperate. Regional interests began to open more divisions between states. Those who dreamed of a truly United States grew frustrated. Some people believed that there was no way to keep this large number of people together without the unifying force of a king.
Commerce and Trade Problems
Back in Episode 337 we discussed the Mount Vernon Conference, where George Washington was trying to establish an interstate agreement to form a company that would create a commercial route to the west via the Potomac River. His frustrations in getting this done led him and others to consider a new conference that would look at proposals to strengthen interstate cooperation on issues of trade and commerce.
Many, however, wanted to address the broader issue of commerce that was creating growing conflict. There were many other examples of states creating policies that put more economic burden on their neighbors.
James Madison, who had worked closely with Washington on the Potomac project, noted that Connecticut and New Hampshire were being forced to pay fees to Rhode Island, New York and Massachusetts for goods that passed through those states. New Jersey similarly found itself dependent on imports that were using the ports of New York and Philadelphia and that those states were setting up rules for their own economic advantage. These conflicts could eventually lead to economic retaliation, or even civil war between the states. The only way to prevent this, Madison believed, was through strong national action to create a uniform and agreed set of rules.
Internal trade, however, was just one headache for leaders. The inability to establish trade deals with most of the major European powers, especially Britain, was holding back the economies of most states. The inability to trade with British colonies in the West Indies was destroying many local merchant-based economies. Many leaders like Madison believed that, just as with the war, the states had to present a unified front in foreign trade, or rivals would play them off against each other.
The situation was made even worse by the need to pay down war debt. Remember all that money that Congress borrowed during the war and needed to pay it back someday? Well, “someday” had arrived. Bonds were coming due and creditors, both at home and abroad were demanding repayment in full with interest.
Many states hoped to repay debts through the collection of duties. For example, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania imposed import duties to be collected at their ports to raise money. But since merchants could simply import the goods to neighboring states, and then smuggle the goods overland, it was pretty easy to evade these duties. To get 100% cooperation of all states on customs duties, there had to be a national system that everyone followed.
Beyond that, Congress needed authority to enforce its repayment quotas on the states. It also needed to have a system of enforcement to prevent smuggling, including a court system that was not tied to any particular state. All of this required more national power and authority.
Proposing a Convention
In the fall of 1785, months after the disastrous Mount Vernon Conference, John Tyler offered a resolution in the Virginia Assembly that appointed a committee that included James Madison to meet with commissioners that would be appointed by any other states in the Union. These men would review the current trade situation among the state, and consider a uniform system of regulations to handle commerce. Their report would then be presented to Congress for final approval and implementation.
James Madison was the man behind this initiative, but he had Tyler (who by the way was the father of future President John Tyler) make the resolution because Tyler was a prominent politician in Virginia who had never served in Congress. He was not seen as a nationalist. No one suspected he would be interested in implementing major changes to federal power over the states.
They might have suspected that if a nationalist like Madison had made the proposal himself. Instead, the proposal just looked like a regular committee of investigation that could look into trade and come back with a report.
Even so, some might have had an inkling. This was a conference of states, organized outside the Confederation Congress. The whole point of Congress was it was designed to be a seat for considering interstate issues. So why not simply have Virginia’s delegates to Congress propose changes in Congress that would make it more effective?
The main reason was that the nationalists saw that as impossible. Confederation rules requiring supermajorities, and in some cases unanimous votes, made it impossible to enact any real change. Further, term limit rules meant that some of the most effective leaders in the country were ineligible to serve in Congress. By 1786 the body was mostly made up of second rate actors who were less capable of leadership and brokering national deals.
Madison had larger plans, but wanted to present this meeting as a simple chance to review and discuss trade and commerce issues. He wrote to James Monroe that he secretly harbored more ambitious plans that he dared not announce publicly; "The expedient is no doubt liable to objections and will probably miscarry. I think however it is better than nothing and, as a recommendation of additional powers to Congress is within the purview of the commission it may possibly lead to better consequences than at first occur.”
Despite Madison’s caution, the proposal sat before the Assembly for three months, until the end of the legislative session in January, 1786. On the final day of the session, supporters pushed through the resolution. In the end, it went through with relatively little opposition.
After the bill passed and all the legislators went home, Virginia invited all the states in the union to attend this look at trade rules so that they could write a report on the matter. So while this went well beyond the creation of the Potomac Company to establish a trade route to the western territories, it was also not really seen as an attempt to replace the Confederation Congress.
A few months after the resolution went through, Madison wrote to Monroe again, informing him that the meeting would take place in Annapolis in September. Since Annapolis was not a major port city, it was seen as a relatively neutral meeting place to discuss trade issues. Madison confided in his friend that he hoped this would be part of a larger effort to make major changes to the Congress. Madison viewed the Convention as an experiment, to see if this might be an effective way to push through more extensive changes. At the time, Monroe was serving as a delegate in the Confederation Congress, but shared Madison’s frustrations with that body.
Even after the Convention plans were in place, commerce became even more of a mess. Connecticut, hoping to undercut Boston, as the primary port in the region, declared its ports free from import duties, thus hoping to attract more commerce from Massachusetts to Connecticut. New Jersey did the same thing against New York and Delaware did the same thing to undercut the port at Philadelphia.
The result was even less import duties being collected, and a growing inability to make payments on war debt. States were competing against each other in a race to the bottom. Under the rules of the Confederation Congress, a unanimous vote by all states would be required to create a uniform system of duties. That was never going to happen.
The Meeting
The Annapolis Convention delegates had planned to meet at the Statehouse, since the state legislature was not in session at the time. Only five states ended up sending delegates to Annapolis: New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia.
You might notice that one of the states that did not send delegates was the host state of Maryland. The state that hosted the convention did not vote to appoint any commissioners. Maryland had agreed to host the Convention when they thought it was a meeting of a few states to discuss the Potomac Company issues. When they learned that Virginia had changed this to a convention of all the states to discuss much broader issues, the Maryland Senate refused to appoint any delegates. They argued that a meeting of all the states outside of the Confederation Congress, might give offense to Congress, and could create concern and confusion as to who was really in charge, both among US citizens and foreign powers.
Similarly, Connecticut, South Carolina and Georgia did not appoint anyone. New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and North Carolina appointed delegates, but none of those delegates arrived in Annapolis in time to participate in the Convention.
The official title of the Convention was Meeting of Commissioners to Remedy Defects of the Federal Government. The title itself generated concern that this Convention might be focused on more than simple trade and commerce issues. Many states opposed to such changes felt it better not to participate at all.
James Madison arrived in Annapolis on Monday September 4, 1786, the day the Convention was scheduled to begin. At that time he arrived, only two other delegates were already there. They killed time at Mann’s Tavern, which offered room and board, waiting for more delegates to arrive. By Friday, a few more had arrived but nowhere near enough to do any business.
The men spend their days drinking and exchanging ideas on how to improve the union between the states. All of the delegates who did make the trip were in agreement that this discussion should go well beyond trade and commerce. Rather, it needed to address some pretty fundamental problems with the Articles of Confederation themselves.
By Monday, September 11, there were twelve delegates representing five states who showed up for the Convention. Most of these men were radical nationalists who all supported a much stronger central government. They all realized that most of the country did not accept this position, but they were pleased to find others at Annapolis who agreed on their goals. This was a great opportunity for members of this side of the debate to discuss strategy.
Some states had appointed delegates to the convention who were not nationalists. But the state-rights delegates did not bother to make the trip. Those who had traveled to the Convention constituted a group of men who were all strongly in favor of a much more powerful and effective federal government.
Most of those present were relatively young. The average age of the group was forty. Madison was only thirty-five at the time. New York delegate Alexander Hamilton was only twenty-nine.
Another person who notably was not at the Convention was George Washington. This was not out of any opposition or disinterest in the movement. Virginia had not added him to the delegation. That's the way Washington wanted it. Washington knew that he was far and away the only nationally known figure. Although he had begun this series of events with his efforts to form the Potomac Company, resulting in this convention, he knew that his presence at the convention would only raise its profile and increase the opposition to doing anything. Besides, Washington considered himself retired at this point. He could provide advice as an elder statesman, but had no plans to get involved in politics again.
Report
After giving up on getting a quorum, the delegates present decided they should at least write up a report. Even writing a report created several problems. Different states had given different instructions as to what the delegates could even consider. A large portion of the country was highly skeptical and suspicious of efforts to cede more power to a central government. Any report would have to give them an opportunity to address more issues, without raising the concerns of those who did not want a new convention of radicals giving a central government more power.
The delegates selected John Dickinson of Delaware as chairman of the convention. In his mid-fifties, Dickinson was one of the older delegates. He had a reputation as being a conservative or moderate. Most of us may remember Dickinson as the man who hesitated to support the Declaration of Independence in 1776.
Because of his moderation, the radical Pennsylvania government pushed him out of power for several years. Dickinson had returned to the Continental Congress as a delegate from Delaware. Since he owned properties in both Pennsylvania and Delaware, he could represent either one. Late in the war, he served as President of Delaware. Following the end of his term, Dickinson found that politics in Pennsylvania once again favored his more moderate views. He ended up serving as President of Pennsylvania for three years, covering the end of the Revolutionary War and the first years of peace. Dickinson was in favor of a stronger central government and was generally in line with the other nationalists. However, public perception of Dickinson was as a capable moderate leader without a strong agenda for radical change. He was the perfect face for this more radical group.
The delegates put together a committee to draft a public report. Edmund Randolph, who was the Attorney General of Virginia, headed the committee. Alexander Hamilton was not even on the committee, but somehow managed to take over the work anyway. According to one source, Hamilton’s first draft “set forth very elaborately and undisguisedly the grave condition of the country and the imperative necessity for a powerful government.” Madison and Randolph made suggestions to make the report’s language much milder.
The delegates decided that they really needed a new convention that would take a comprehensive look at the Articles of Confederation and suggest an entirely new approach. The delegates at Annapolis had neither the authority nor the numbers even to propose such a plan. They also knew that expressing their views directly would quickly raise national opposition to any such plan. The idea was to write a report that would give delegates to the next convention more authority to address a range of issues without actually saying that.
The final report simply laid out the facts that, while a majority of nine states had agreed to attend the convention, only five had shown up. This meant they could not really do much without a quorum, but it also showed that a majority of states recognized the need for such action.
Next, the report looked at the varying instructions that each state had given its delegates. Most of the instructions asked the delegates to consider a uniform system of commerce and regulations. Some states then said the report should be returned to state officials. Other instructions said the report should go to the Confederation Congress.
The authors of the report, however, seized on the instructions given to the New Jersey delegation, which were “to consider how far an uniform system in their commercial regulations and other important matters, might be necessary to the common interest and permanent harmony of the several States,” The four key words in those instructions were “and other important matters.” This essentially gave the delegates authority to discuss anything. Opponents probably would have simply considered those words a throw away line so that the state did not inadvertently prevent discussion of some related issue they had not considered. But the report emphasized the importance of giving greater latitude to delegates to have a more open ended discussion on any issue of national importance.
The report then suggested that, hey, this is not our idea. It was New Jersey’s idea. Regulating trade is such an important topic that touches on so many issues. We should allow delegates at a new convention next year to investigate and discuss a plan for fixing a wider range of defects in the current Articles of Confederation. These matters are serious and have been part of the public discussion for some time, so we won’t even attempt to enumerate them here.
Instead, we suggest that a new convention be held in Philadelphia, beginning in May of the following year to take up a discussion of these concerns and focus on the current situation of the United States.
The report ended with the delegates noting that they had no real authorization by their states to make this suggestion. Rather, the report should be sent back to each state where it could be considered as a suggestion to the state legislatures about what they should do next.
Aftermath
The delegates completed the report on Thursday, September 14, having met for four days. Each delegation agreed to carry a copy of the report back to their state legislature. Dickinson would take a copy to the Confederation Congress, which was meeting in New York. Three months later, Congress approved a resolution endorsing the call for a convention to meet in Philadelphia in May, 1787.
The week after the Annapolis Convention concluded its work, the Maryland Journal printed a public notice of the Convention. The Journal noted: "Should this Address have its Effect, we may hope to see the Federal Union of these States established upon Principles, which will secure the Dignity, Harmony and Felicity of these confederated Republics; and not only rescue them from their present Difficulties, but from that insolent Hauteur and contemptuous Neglect, which they have experienced as a Nation."
Next week: We'll take a look at the continued economic breakdown of the states threatens to break into political violence.
- - -
Next Episode 342 Paper Money Riots (coming soon)
Previous Episode 340 Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom
 |
| Click here to donate |
 |
| Click here to see my Patreon Page |
An alternative to Patreon is SubscribeStar. For anyone who has problems with Patreon, you can get the same benefits by subscribing at SubscribeStar.
| Help Support this podcast on "BuyMeACoffee.com" |
Signup for the AmRev Podcast Mail List
Further Reading
Websites
Annapolis Convention: https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/annapolis-convention
“Annapolis Convention. Address of the Annapolis Convention, [14 September 1786],” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Hamilton/01-03-02-0556
“From James Madison to James Monroe, 22 January 1786,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-08-02-0250
“From James Madison to James Monroe, 14 March 1786,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/01-08-02-0265
Free eBooks
(from archive.org unless noted)
Brant, Irving James Madison, the Nationalist 1780-1787, New York: Bobbs-Merrill Co. 1948.
Morse, John T. The life of Alexander Hamilton, Boston: Little, Brown & Co. 1876.
Books Worth Buying
(links to Amazon.com unless otherwise noted)*
Morris, Richard B. Witnesses at the Creation: Hamilton, Madison, Jay, and the Constitution, Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1996 (borrow on archive.org).
Williams, Tony. America’s Beginnings: The Dramatic Events That Shaped a Nation’s Character. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield, 2010 (borrow on archive.org).
* As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
No comments:
Post a Comment