Compromise, Convention & the Constitution | Julie Silverbrook | BRI’s Constitutional Conversations

0:00 so with all these different people with all these different economic and educational backgrounds and needs what-what allowed for them to come together what what what did compromise me and how did they come to the compromise that was the Constitution yes so I think it’s really important to understand that the Articles of

0:22 Confederation basically weren’t working out in the post-revolutionary context so you have this huge war debt I that you can’t figure out how to pay because states are issuing your own money and it’s different you have this sense you know the British are kind of still on the frontier you have other European powers that are

0:43 present in North America that there has to be something provided for the common defense for negotiation with foreign governments but at the same time states are kind of seeing themselves as they’re their own little country you’ve just loosely Confederated through the Articles of Confederation and some of the states are actually negotiating with

1:03 other foreign governments and so these economic eye issues emergencies in some case with Shay’s rebellion where you actually people go into open rebellion over debt and economic issues and really scare the the governing class during this time period and they decide that

1:26 they they need to call a special Convention to address the deficiencies of the Articles of Confederation but they actually decide very early on to set aside the Articles of Confederation and create a new government which is not an uncontroversial thing they do this over the course of the summer of 1787

1:48 they they create a completely new national government that draws heavily on the state constitutions state constitutional practice enlightenment you’re thinking they look to Europe both for positive and negative examples of things to do and not to do but in order

2:08 to actually make this work and again you have all of those and economic differences in place they have to compromise it’s the only way that they’re going to get this document together and I have some really great quotes on compromise during the convention if you don’t mind interviewed some of them so I one of my favorite

2:32 quotes is from Benjamin Franklin who actually says this during the convention he says when a broad table is to be made and the edges of the planks do not fit the artist takes a little from both and makes a good joint in like manner both sides must part with some of their demands and there are many other quotes

2:55 John Adams who is not at the Constitutional Convention writes to John Jay in December of 1787 saying that there was that the Constitution was the result of accommodation and compromise admirably calculated to cement all America and affection and interest as one great nation Jefferson talking

3:16 specifically about the Connecticut or Great Compromise says I am captivated by the compromise of the opposite claims of the great and little states of the latter to equal and the former to proportional influence and then just one more not to go too far into the importance of compromise there’s no too far with it Thomas Jefferson writes just

3:38 two years before he passes away on the importance of compromise for a democratic government a government held together by the bands of Reason only requires much compromise of opinion that things even salutary should not be crammed down the throats of dissenting brethren especially when they may be put into a form to be willingly swallowed

4:01 and that a great deal of indulgence is necessary to strengthen habits of harmony and fraternity so there’s this sense that compromise will they know from firsthand experience that compromise is necessary i we know that the people who participated either directly in the Constitutional Convention or the people who were being

4:21 correspondent with secretly because it was all meant to be secret I being correspondent with about the convention know that compromise is an essential part of the the Constitution is embedded in the DNA of the Constitution we wouldn’t have it without compromise at the same time the framers are realists and they know that we’re

4:42 not always going to be ruled by virtuous people in particular we’re not always gonna be ruled by the you know virtuous men who were in the room in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787 so I always go to Federalist 51 where Madison famously says ambition must be made to counteract ambition so the constitutional design of

5:04 separation of powers and checks and balances makes it so that the government is designed to drive toward compromise what does compromise mean just like I Franklin said it means that not everybody’s gonna be happy right so basically if everybody’s a little bit happy and a little bit unhappy you’ve

5:26 probably become successful in compromising if you think about it in your own life you know you want an entire pizza and your sibling also once an entire pizza and your mom says I’m gonna split it directly in half so you’re a little bit disappointed you can get a whole pizza but you still got half a pizza and as it turns out a half a

5:46 pizza is really actually all you needed you’ve compromised I and so I think we can all understand compromise in a very real and practical way and understanding that there are constitutional mechanisms that drive at trying to find compromise again by having those natural ambitions

6:08 counteract each other to to combat what Madison a lot of the framers were concerned about which was one faction a political faction kind of overriding the other it was to make sure that everybody has a voice that there’s some competition and because of that we always come up with a result that should be I in the best interest of the creator

6:32 good but we’ve all lost a little something in the process but by losing some things we’ve gained toward the good the greater good and I think that that’s a really important principle within the Constitution and I think our current political dynamic I compromise has become kind of a dirty word and I would

6:53 say you go back to our history and you read these words about compromise you understand it’s a preeminent place in the writing of our founding charter you may come to view compromise in a very different way