Transcript
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Introduces the Great or Connecticut Compromise and explains how it blended the Virginia and New Jersey plans. It covers bicameral representation, population-based seats in the House, equal representation in the Senate, and why the compromise saved the convention.
Speaker A
Debate continued over the Virginia and New Jersey plans into the summer of 1787, and compromise was needed to move forward.Now there are three major compromises that we will discuss.And we're going to start with the great or Connecticut compromise.This is the one that essentially brought together the Virginia and New Jersey plans.It was proposed by the delegate, a delegate from Connecticut, Roger Sherman.
What Sherman cobbled together here as a compromise was that the legislative branch would be bicameral, two houses.The representation in the lower house would be by population.So this would favor the large population states.But the representation in the upper house would be equal with two representatives each and individual votes for both houses.So the large population states in the lower house would dominate because theoretically, because they have more delegates.It's based on population and each delegate has their own vote.And then in the upper house or the Senate representation would be equal to each and once again, individual votes, not voting by state, voting by member.
And there's other pieces to this, but that's the big one.It also reopened the question of how each branch is appointed.I told you how this one is, or at least how they're the number of them at least.This saved the convention as many were tired of arguing and there being no progress.So here once again are the points here.
And I'll have another comparison.
Compares the Virginia, New Jersey, and Connecticut compromises point by point, including how senators were originally chosen by state legislatures. The section closes by emphasizing compromise as a recurring feature of the new government.
Speaker A
So the three branches of government, that's the Virginia plan, no changes, two houses of Congress, bicameral Virginia plan.The lower, the House of Representatives would be based on population, which is the Virginia plan.And it would be chosen by the popular vote, which is Virginia plan.The upper house, the Senate would have equal representation, which is the New Jersey plan, but the senators would be chosen by state congresses.So each state would choose their two senators.
So it wouldn't be by vote.And that wouldn't change until the early 1900s here in the US from the the installation of the Constitution starting of that government 1789 until 1912.I think it is the 17th amendment.Senators were chosen by state congresses.It's not until the 17th amendment that they're chosen by popular vote.
This goes back to the Great or Connecticut compromise.So once again you can see what was taken from each one.
The chosen by state Congress is there for the Senate comes from a separate set of arguments.But once again, right down the middle three branches, VA plan, no changes, two houses of Congress by cameral.Virginia House of Representatives is the lower house by population by popular vote.Virginia plan, the upper house, Senate, Equal Representation, NJ Plan, and then chosen by state congresses.So you can See the evolution from articles to Virginia plan countered by the New Jersey plan and now the Great or Connecticut compromise.
This established a tradition of compromise to avoid danger or the collapse of debates or the government if things got too heated or couldn't be decided.Compromise will, will be something we talk about fairly regularly the rest of the way in this course.
Explains the conflict between North and South over counting enslaved people for representation and how the Three-Fifths Compromise was reached. It also describes the compromise's significance for congressional power and its long-term political impact.
Speaker A
But there were still major issues to contend with.So this is the first compromise, the Great or Connecticut compromise.The second is the three fifths compromise also proposed by Roger Sherman.
What this was is that the population, or where this comes from is the population of southern states was significantly less than the northern ones.Thus even with equal representation in the Senate, Southern states are worried about being dominated by the North.At this point slaves counted for 30% of the population of the South.If slaves counted as part of population then the south was just barely more populous than the north.Basically a 51, 49% split with 51 being the southern states population.
But if the slaves were not counted as part of that then the north was by far more populous.A 6040 split with 60% being the north.So the south understandably from their perspective, pushed for slaves to be considered solely for the purpose of determining representation in Congress.The House of Representatives in particular.Right, because that was based on population.
So they wanted the number of Representatives to include or be based off of not the free population but the free plus slave population which would give the south far more numbers like I showed you, 5149 population percent favoring the south if slaves were counted 6040 split if the slaves were not counted favoring the North.
The north countered this argument by saying that slaves were not citizens and could not vote.They also the north feared that this would give Southern states more power than they should rightfully have and they would inflate their power.The Southern states threatened to tank the entire new Constitution and convention.So something had to be done.
Do I have a chart or anything?Oh yeah.The compromise was that slaves would count as three fifths of a person for both representation.
Sorry, we count for 3/5 of the population for representation and taxation purposes.We're not really concerned with the taxation side, just the representation side.The slaves did not gain rights or status.Nothing for them changed.
But the representation changes were significant.
I feel like I had some charts or something in here that I was going to show but they're not here.
So either I didn't have them or I forgot to put them in and you'll never know because I'm going to go back and re Record this.We'll see.So if you're hearing this, I didn't have them.The significance of the Three Fifths compromise.
This is the only acknowledgement of slavery in the entire Constitution.And this is even indirect, right, because it's talking about representation.It's the only time slavery is even mentioned indirectly in the Constitution.It also kept the convention going and prevented the south from backing out.It like the Great Compromise saved this whole thing from collapsing, but it did give disproportionate power to in Congress to southern and or slave states.
It remained relevant to the political situation all the way up until the Civil War.I'll talk about it a few times here, several times here and there.There's at least one presidential election that would have had a different outcome if the Three Fifths compromise did not exist.We'll talk about it when we get there.So that's the second compromise.
Covers the compromise over the international slave trade, including the threat from Georgia and South Carolina and the 20-year delay on banning imports. The speaker then summarizes all three compromises and transitions to the mechanics of the new Constitution.
Speaker A
The third is the slave trade compromise.This isn't so much in the Constitution, but it's related to it.This is an actual advertisement for the sale of Africans as slaves coming over directly from Africa.
And you can even see them talking about the danger of smallpox and how the ones that had it were were quarantined.
11 of the 13 states at at this point in time had stopped importing slaves from overseas.They still traded within the states.But as far as buying slaves from Africa or trading for slaves from Africa, 11 of the 13 states had stopped.The two that had not were Georgia and South Carolina.Georgia and South Carolina threatened to walk out and again tank the whole thing if the international trade of slaves was banned as part of the new Constitution or on the national level.
So the rest of the delegates had to balance banning the slave trade, which they all wanted to do again, the international slave trade versus keeping the new Constitution.Constitution.So what they did was sacrifice the ban on the international slave trade.So the compromise, the slave trade was not banned by the new government or would not be.And they can't even discuss banning the slave trade for 20 years.
It's like kicking the can down the road.Instead of picking it up and dealing with it, you just kick it and deal with it once you walk forward and get to it again.So it wasn't banned and they couldn't even discuss banning it.The national government for 20 years, basically until the 1st of January 1808.Now on that day, President Thomas Jefferson requested that Congress ban it.
And they did.So these are the three compromises that effectively hold the held the whole thing together.The Connecticut or Great Compromise dealt with Congress representation and all of that.The Three Fifths Compromise dealt with representation in Congress as it relates to slaves.And the slave trade compromise dealt with two states wanting to prevent the ban on the international slave trade.And they did.They threatened to walk out.And Congress dropped or, sorry, the Constitutional Convention dropped the idea of banning it for 20 years.
So that's the basics of how we got to from discussing a plan to figuring out and settling the debates.What we're going to dive into next is the mechanics of the new Constitution.Beyond the basics of branches and all of that, there's some important things that we need to talk about as far as some of the basic workings of it.