Hey everybody, welcome back. It is finally time to talk about the U.S. Constitution, so be sure to smash that like button and let's get right to it.
All right, so in the summer of 1787, 12 states have agreed to send representatives to the Constitutional Convention with the stated purpose to amend the Articles of Confederation. But as soon as they get there, it's very clear that James Madison has other ideas. and they begin to draft a new constitution to replace the Articles of Confederation.
The major focus of this section is negotiation and compromise, so we're going to see how several key portions of the constitution are the result of compromise. Remember, the sign of a good compromise is when nobody likes the outcome. First up is the Great Compromise. But before we get to the compromise, let's briefly discuss the two main plans known as the Virginia Plan and the New Jersey Plan. The Virginia Plan wanted a stronger central government, with a bicameral legislature in which both houses of Congress would be based on population, letting the large states receive more representation.
The small states were obviously like, no way man, we're not just gonna stand here and get stomped on by the big states. The New Jersey Plan said, hey, let's just do what we were sent here for and amend the Articles of Confederation. It wanted to maintain a unicameral one house Congress. in which each state had one vote, which gave the small states a big advantage in Congress.
So each side wanted what was best for themselves. Shocking, I know. Eventually, this leads to the Great Compromise, aka the Connecticut Compromise, and established a bicameral legislature with the House of Representatives based off population, while in the Senate, each state would be represented equally, with two senators per state. The Grand Committee, I mean, what a name.
was formed to work out this compromise. But how exactly did they get the large states to go along with equal representation in the Senate? They made a deal that all tax and revenue bills must originate in the House of Representatives, where the large states had a huge advantage. So they went along with the bicameral legislature.
Next, everybody's favorite, the Electoral College, was also the result of compromise. Some delegates wanted citizens to directly elect the president, while others believed Congress should choose the president. The Electoral College kind of takes a little from each of those ideas. Today, people in each state get to vote for who will represent their state in the Electoral College, and then the Electoral College elects the president. In Unit 5, I'll teach you all the ins and outs of the Electoral College, so stay tuned.
Next is the infamous Three-Fifths Compromise. which was the result of debate over whether slaves counted as people for the purpose of congressional representation. The southern states who always maintain that slaves are property, no no no, they're not people, so they don't have any rights, well, all of a sudden in this issue, the southern states are like, oh yeah, no, slaves are definitely people when we're counting the population to determine how many members we get to send to the House of Representatives.
Northern states were like, no way, you guys cannot have it both ways. They don't count as people for representation because you said they're not people and they're not going to be represented anyway. The outcome was the three-fifths compromise, which meant that every five slaves counted as three people for congressional representation purposes.
This led to the South being overrepresented both in the House and the Electoral College. Greatly empowering the South and protecting slavery until the Civil War. Next is the compromise on the importation of slaves, and this one's even more ethically challenging than the last one. Northern states wanted to ban the slave trade, but that was a line in the- the sand for southern states who would never ratify a constitution that banned the slave trade. The compromise was that the slave trade could not be banned for 20 years after the ratification of the constitution.
On the first day that it could be legally banned, Congress Congress did so, and Thomas Jefferson signed the ban into law. All four of those occurred at the Constitutional Convention, but this next one happened during the debate over ratification. Recall that the Anti-Federalists seized upon the lack of a Bill of Rights, and while Madison and Hamilton tried to defend the conspicuous absence of a Bill of Rights, eventually they relented and Madison introduced the amendments that became the Bill of Rights early in the first session of Congress.
So those are our big five compromises, but it's It's also important to point out that the framers left the door open to future changes, knowing that they didn't get everything exactly right the first time. Article 5 lays out the amendment process. Actually, there are two methods.
The primary one is that two-thirds of both houses of Congress propose the amendment, and then three-fourths of the states ratify it. Alternately, two-thirds of state legislatures can propose the amendment, which would then need to be ratified by three-fourths of the states. As we go further in this unit and this course, it'll be clear that while the constitution gives us a framework, there are still lots of issues that are left up in the air and lots of disagreement over what to do about things that aren't even mentioned in the constitution.
Alright, well, that's it for this one. Until next time, this has been a Lemony Production. Thanks again for watching.
Be sure to check out the Ultimate Review Packet if you haven't already, and I will see you in the next video.