Worksheet # 43 Home Questions Puzzle Links Next

DEBATES OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL CONVENTION

Now, would those who once fought on the patriot side

Remember their cause: to let the people decide?

Indeed, some held their breaths and some worried out loud

That the changes in store would not make them proud.

While still others believed that this country would fail

Without firm hands on deck to keep steady Her sail.

And so new plans were drawn and laid on the table,

To be hashed and re-hashed by minds most venerable.

And a Republic, all agreed, this nation should be,

With its law-makers elected by majority.

Yet discord soon sounded and buzzed in men’s ears

As different sized states had much different ideas.

-- Those large like Virginia had hopes for a nation

Which allotted more votes for more population.

While small states were worried they’d get little to say

If equal votes all around did not carry the day.

But one Roger Sherman, with his wide open eyes,

Saw their angels appear in a Great Compromise:

A Congress, he offered, to be made in two halves,

With a Senate and a House of Representatives.

Hence our laws come served on two kinds of plates:

One chamber, The Senate, with equal members for states.

And one chamber, The House, in its proportions quite fair,

By the size of each state (how many people live there).

Ah, but a question still nagged, and gnawed and burned:

How to count all the people where slaves are concerned?

-- Slaves were given no rights, but in plantation state eyes

Their numbers should count in a state’s total size.

While others loudly proclaimed, and did shout and did bawl:

Let the slave trade be outlawed, once and for all!

But the southern gents balked when they caught word of this,

And in the end ‘twas agreed to count slaves as three-fifths.