“Unlocking Humanity: The Surprising Secret Behind What Makes Us Truly Human”
As Dr. Mary Sarah Bilder of Boston Law School would state in her The Soul of Free Government: The Influence of John Adams’s A Defence on the Constitutional Convention, “The apparent irrelevancy of the Defence to modern scholars arose, ironically, from its crystallization of then-conventional wisdom, the very feature that resonated with so many delegates and generated its significant influence on the Convention. Adams’s Defence thus provides one more example that the Convention’s decisions cannot be understood without including the larger Framing generation.”
Going back to the story of the formation of the U.S. Constitution, the first delegates to arrive were those from Virginia, including James Madison. It took some time before enough would arrive to form a quorum, and those delegates did not use their time idly. Madison, Washington, and co, spent many sessions in the Indian Queen tavern coming up with a much greater plan than simply amending the Articles of Confederation. But rather, to come up with a completely new constitution. In so doing, they began borrowing heavily from existing state constitutions, including, as mentioned Adams’ Massachusetts constitution.
When the necessary number of representatives had arrived, they then, despite it being the heat of the summer and they all dressed in their typical many layered outfits of the day, quite literally all shut themselves in, closing windows and all, to discuss something completely different. They also agreed on strict secrecy about what they were doing and with regards to anything that was said, so as to ensure that everyone could speak their minds freely without fear of the wider public learning of it. On this one, the secrecy was so tantamount that the only reason we really know much at all about the internal discussions and happenings was thanks to limited insights, such as James Madison’s notes, which were in turn by agreement kept secret until over a half century later in 1840 when most all involved were deceased.
