Posted: May 13th, 2021

The Constitution in Flames

The Constitution in Flames:
Partisan violence in the Pennsylvania debate over ratification, 1787-89
[Author]
Prof.
Constitutional History to 1877
Date
While much attention is paid to the debates over ratification of the constitution in the states and the newspaper wars in which they manifested, we do not often acknowledge the blood shed by our nation’s first political debate. In the countryside, away from the serialized newspaper editorials, supporters and opponents of the constitution spoke of a looming civil war. In the streets of Carlisle, Pennsylvania, Federalists and Antifederalists abandoned ink and quill for bludgeons and bayonets. The intensity of the resistance to the constitution in the western counties and the willingness of Federalists to respond in kind cast the birth of our hallowed constitution in a new light. This paper will trace the violence over the ratification of the constitution in Pennsylvania from the election of representatives to the ratification conventions to post-ratification clashes in backcountry lots. It will show the lengths to which partisans were willing to go to achieve their respective goals and thwart the efforts of the other side, focusing on the actions of each party rather than the often-studied arguments advanced in newspapers and pamphlets of the time, which have acted as the basis for our perception of the ratification process.
After the “Assembly of Demigods,” as Thomas Jefferson, writing to John Adams from Paris during the convention, referred to the constitutional convention, adjourned in September of 1787, the Federalists, supporters of a new central government, still faced the challenge of getting the results approved by the required number of states. Foreseeing this difficulty, Federalists at the convention were able to mitigate it in the document itself, writing into the constitution ratification by special state conventions, rather than sitting legislatures thought hostile to the consolidation of power in a central government, and by the requirement of the assent of only nine states as sufficient for the new government to be set into operation. While the latter provision eased the process of ratification, it threatened to undermine the legitimacy of the constitution and opened the document up to impassioned objections as to the legality of abolishing the Articles of Confederation with only the consent of a portion of the states. The opponents of the constitution, the Antifederalists, largely choose to express their dissent through the constitutionally outlined processes. They slated candidates for the special ratification conventions in each state, for example. Historians argue this did much to legitimize the new constitutional government as one formed from the fair expression of majoritarian will. However, extralegal and extraconstitutional dealings put a stick in the spoke of this narrative. Violent reactions to Federalist celebrations and thuggish intimidation of elected representatives by supporters of the constitution speak to a population not entirely invested in the rules of the new compact, even after ratification.
In late September of 1787, only a day after the constitution was transmitted from the Confederation Congress to the states, the Pennsylvania legislature called for a state convention to meet. Thuggery began immediately. On the morning of the 28th of September, the Pennsylvania legislature took up the question of whether to call a special state ratification convention as outlined in the new federal constitution. The Antifederalists, opposed to the motion, feared they would be outvoted. In order to deny the body of a quorum, nineteen Antifederalist members did not return after the lunch recess for the vote. Frustrated by their inability to compel the recalcitrant members to attend by force, the remaining Federalist legislature adjourned for the day without deciding the issue. The Federalist members of the Assembly met again the next day, a Saturday, eager to vote, but the nineteen missing members stayed away, and the Assembly again failed to make a quorum. The sergeant at arms was dispatched to notify the missing Assemblymen of their duty. After unsuccessfully chasing two Antifederalist members through the streets of Philadelphia, the sergeant came back empty-handed. Shortly thereafter a mob of angry Philadelphians, who had heard of the stagnant state of the Assembly, “broke open [the members’] private houses, and dragged two of the members through the streets to the State-House, and then guarded the Assembly while they were passing the resolutions for calling the state convention.” The Assembly ignored the protestations of the two Antifederalists who complained they were being held against their will. When the Antifederalists attempted to act outside of the framework established by the constitution by boycotting the special convention vote, they were assaulted and locked in by a mob of unknown Federalists. The forced quorum would set an ever-escalating tempo of attacks and retaliations conducted by ordinary citizens and supported, not always passively, by government leaders.
The elections for the special convention were held on 6 November. The partisan nature of the election was illustrated by a riot in Philadelphia. At midnight on election night a mob attacked the houses of several Philidelphia Antifederalists and Major Alexander Boyd’s boarding house where many western assemblymen and member of the Supreme Executive Council had rooms. A few days after the incident, the Council issued a proclamation requiring judges and other law enforcement officials to apprehend the rioters. The Federalist members of the General Assembly responded by defeating a resolution asking the Council to direct the attorney general to prosecute the rioters. No rioters were ever apprehended. Perhaps fueled by the lackluster response of the Federalist-led Assembly, contemporaries noted the well-organized nature of the “mob” and accused Federalist officials of coordinating the attack. If the allegations are true, it shows an incredible willingness of the part of the Pennsylvania Federalist leadership to intimidate and threaten the opposition. If they are false, the entire event shows a dramatic level of polarization among the citizenry, prompting them to express their politics violently. Both cases challenge the traditional narrative of ratification as a heated but ultimately civil debate conducted passively through newspapers and pseudonyms, which ultimately convinced the opposition of the merits of the new government.
Ratification in Pennsylvania only ratcheted up the tension. Unlike the Constitutional Convention, the state ratification debate was a public affair; arguments were serially published in papers across the state. After the convention voted to adopt the constitution on 15 December 1787, the minority went so far as to publish a dissent, which emphasized the need to protect the rights and liberties of the people – the implication being the constitution did not – attacked the secrecy of the Constitutional Convention, and denounced both the forced quorum in the Pennsylvania Assembly and the behavior of the majority of the state Convention delegates. Federalists responded by accusing the minority of failing to respect democratic processes and trying to foment a civil war. The intensity of feeling generated by the public debate manifested itself in concrete ways. Carlise was the scene of the most dramatic. On 26 December 1787, a parade of Federalists marched through Carlisle drawing a cannon and intending to celebrate the adoption of the Constitution in the state by firing the artillery and burning effigies of leading Antifederalists. When they reached the town square, “a number of men armed with bludgeons” surrounded them. The Federalist Major attempted to have the cannon loaded but was cut short by “a number of blows from six or seven persons with bludgeons, who continued beating him after he fell.” The Federalists were driven off, and, on the bonfire started by the routed party, the men burned a copy of the constitution. In the warrant issued by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for the arrest of the assailants, three sitting judges were named. Shortly after the arrest and imprisonment of some of the Antifederalists involved, hundreds of Cumberland County militiamen, and a few from Dauphin and York counties, marched into Carlisle, occupied the public buildings, rang the bells and fired into the air, and demanded the release of the prisoners. Terms were quickly reached, and the imprisoned Antifederalists were freed. The presence of prominent public officials in the ranks of rioters speaks to the organized and centralized nature of the violence. Had the sheriff of Cumberland county refused to release the imprisoned Antifederalists, or had he drawn up a militia of his own to drive off the occupiers, backcountry war in the vein of Shays’ Rebellion could have easily erupted.
The events in Carlisle seemed to confirm the fears of many of a looming civil war. While that fear was never realized, the threat fomented for years. The violence was not limited to Pennsylvania. New York went through similar tumult during its ratification convention and afterward, with tensions lasting well into 1789. The threat of civil war in New York was so real to some, delegates to that state’s ratification convention began private calculations of military forces at hand in case the threats of southern county secession were carried out. We view the constitution today as a sacred document, crafted by god-like “founders” and uniformly accepted as the basis for American law and values. This was not the case at the time of the founding. Instead, the history of the constitution in the United States is one of dissent, violence, thuggery, and extralegal suppression of the minority. The role government officials played in the politics of intimidation speaks to a conception of political debate that encompassed violent suppression of dissenting opinion. The blood shed during the ratification era calls into question the legitimacy of an interpretation of the constitution as a unifying document.
Word Count: 1993

Bibliography
Primary
“An Old Man,” Carlisle Gazette, 2 January 1788, The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, Vol. II, “Ratification of the Constitution by the States – Pennsylvania,” IV:B., ed. Merrill Jensen, (Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin) 1976, pp. 670-1.
Armstrong, John Sr. To Benjamin Franklin, Carlisle, 25 December 1787, The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution, Vol. II, “Ratification of the Constitution by the States – Pennsylvania,” ed. Merrill Jensen, (Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin) 1976, p. 649.
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Jefferson, John to John Adams, Paris, 30 August 1787, accessed via teachingamericanhistory.org.
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Secondary
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