James Madison: Speech on the New Jersey Plan to the Constitutional Convention

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

Madison is often called the father of the U.S. Constitution. He attended the Annapolis convention, which issued the call for the Constitutional Convention, and helped persuade George Washington to attend the latter. In Philadelphia he participated actively in the debates and kept copious notes that continue to serve as a guide to the convention's proceedings. Prior to the convention, Madison read widely on the nature of government and composed two relevant essays. In “Of Ancient and Modern Confederacies,” he examines the weaknesses of prior confederations, and in “Vices of the Political System of the United States,” he examines problems of the state governments, many of which he observed firsthand in the Virginia legislature. As the first delegate to arrive from out of state before the Constitutional Convention, Madison spent his opening weeks in conjunction with other delegates from Virginia and Pennsylvania formulating a plan that the Virginia governor Edmund Randolph would introduce on May 29, 1787, the first day of convention deliberations. Although Congress had agreed to call a convention to “revise and enlarge” the existing Articles of Confederation, the Virginia Plan called for a completely new form of government. Among the more innovative features proposed were a tripartite division of powers at the national level and a bicameral legislature wherein both houses would be apportioned according to population.

After about two weeks of debate, William Paterson introduced the rival New Jersey Plan. Although Paterson was willing to accede to the division of the national government into three branches, he questioned whether the convention was authorized to make other changes, such as rearranging the balance of powers between the national government and the states. As a representative of one of the less populous states, Paterson also expressed an unwillingness to part with the equal state representation provided for by the existing Articles of Confederation.

Madison delivered his speech on the New Jersey Plan on June 19, 1787. In responding to Paterson, Madison directs much of his address to demonstrating the need for a federal government with the power to operate directly upon individuals rather than through the states. One of the greatest difficulties that the Confederation Congress faced under the Articles of Confederation was that it could requisition the states for money or for troops, but it could not directly compel individuals to comply. Given weaknesses such as this one, Madison argues that there was nothing to prevent the Constitutional Convention from seeking a new system.

Madison proceeds to compare the system proposed by the Virginia Plan with that proposed by the New Jersey Plan, posing a series of six rhetorical questions to show the superiority of the former to the latter. He questions whether the New Jersey Plan would give sufficient power to Congress to prevent treaty violations on the part of the states, to “prevent encroachments on the federal authority,” to “prevent trespasses of the States on each other,” to “secure the internal tranquility of the States themselves,” to “secure a good internal legislation & administration to the particular States,” or to “secure the Union ag[ain]st the influence of foreign powers over its members.” With a view to past experience, Madison argues that the Virginia Plan's provision for paying congressional delegates is better than the New Jersey Plan's leaving this pay dependent upon the states. He further warns that adherence to an impossible plan might result in the division of the continent into rival confederacies. Madison identifies the issue of representation as paramount and argues that any attempt to erase current boundaries and divide the states into equally populous entities would be impractical. He further suggests that the New Jersey Plan's provision for equal state representation would be an obstacle to the addition of new western states.

Not long after Madison's speech, the Constitutional Convention decided to proceed with the Virginia Plan. In time, however, delegates deleted Madison's proposal allowing for the congressional veto of state legislation, through which he had hoped to secure better internal state administration. Delegates further moderated the proposal for proportional representation in both houses of Congress through the Connecticut Compromise, which provided for equal state representation in the U.S. Senate. Once the compromise, which Madison strongly opposed, was adopted, constitutional deliberation went much more smoothly, and on September 17, 1787, thirty-nine of forty-two remaining delegates signed the new Constitution. The delegates then sent the document to the states for ratification by special conventions, a process they thought embodied the idea of popular sovereignty.