The First State Constitutions, 1776–1783
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Like the Declaration of Independence that Jefferson wrote shortly thereafter, the Virginia Declaration of Rights asserted that all authority is derived from the people, who have the inalienable right to reform the government if it fails to provide for their safety and happiness. As we noted
earlier, however, ‘‘the people’’ of Virginia had not authorized the assembly to write either a new constitution or a declaration of rights, and the
documents were not even submitted for popular approval. Moreover, the
Virginia legislature represented the extreme opposite of the ‘‘one-person,
one-vote’’ theory of representation. Following the English practice of
geographical representation, Virginia allowed each county, whatever the
size of its population, to send two members to the capital in Williamsburg, which gave the people in the aristocratic Tidewater section of the
State a distinct political advantage over inhabitants in the western part of
the State. Such sectional inequalities existed in other States as well, particularly Maryland and South Carolina.
By the words ‘‘the people,’’ then, the Virginians meant the gentlemen
freeholders, not the entire population equally apportioned. Indeed, a
complete democracy on a grand scale was widely regarded throughout
the colonies as a threat to law and order. The example of Pennsylvania,
which abolished all property qualifications for voting and holding office
and produced a document making a mockery of constitutional government in the eyes of some onlookers, confirmed the suspicions of many
colonial leaders that an unrestrained democracy would drive good men
out of public office and turn the affairs of state over to pettifoggers,
bunglers, and demagogues. They wanted representation of brains, not
bodies—and for a number of years the best minds in the country dominated American politics. Indeed, this probably worked to the advantage
of the country in the long run, for it is questionable whether the entire
public in 1776 was capable of exercising all of the responsibilities of selfgovernment. No doubt the Virginia Constitution and Declaration of
Rights, as well as the American Constitution of 1787, would have fallen
even shorter of perfection had they been written by popularly chosen assemblies of untutored and inexperienced deputies of the people at large.
‘‘The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God,’’ said Alexander Hamilton in the Philadelphia Convention, ‘‘and however generally this maxim has been quoted and believed, it is not true to fact. The