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America’s First Constitutions and Declarations of Rights
the constitution as the supreme law. One factor contributing greatly to
the problem of legislative supremacy in the period between 1776 and
1787 was the common assumption that legislators were the sole judges of
their own constitutional powers. Too few lawyers of the day believed
that a State court had the right to declare a statute invalid on the ground
that it violated the State constitution.
Finally, it is worth noting that the constitutions of four States—New
York, New Jersey, Virginia, and North Carolina—contained no express
provisions providing for their amendment. The assumption seemed to be
that such provisions were unnecessary since the people were thought to
have the sovereign right to change their form of government. How they
were to exercise this right, and what the procedures would be, remained
a mystery. In two States, Maryland and Georgia, changes in the constitution were expressly authorized through the legislature only. The constitutions of Delaware and South Carolina authorized two methods of
amendment—through the legislature and by convention. Massachusetts and New Hampshire, on the other hand, specified the convention
method only. The means by which the people might change their constitution thus varied from one State to the next, and in more than one State
this basic ingredient of the republican principle was either neglected or
compromised.
Not all of the earliest constitutions contained bills of rights, but the examples set by such States as Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts
set the trend for future constitutions. The Virginia Declaration of Rights,
drafted by George Mason, was the most widely hailed and served as the
favored model for the rest of the nation. The provisions of this Declaration (and the other bills of rights) m