The Bill of Rights
On September 25, 1789, the First Federal Congress of the
United States proposed to the state legislatures twelve amendments
to the Constitution. The first two, concerning the number
of constituents for each Representative and the compensation
of Congressmen, were not ratified.*
Articles three through twelve, known as the Bill
of Rights, became the first ten amendments to the U.S.
Constitution and contained guarantees of essential rights
and liberties omitted in the crafting of the original
document.
*Note: The original second
amendment proposed by the First Federal Congress dealt
with the compensation of members of Congress. Although rejected
at the time, it was eventually ratified on May 7, 1992,
as the 27th amendment.
Library of Congress Web Site | External
Web Sites | Selected Bibliography
A
Century of Lawmaking for a New Nation
On
June 8, 1789, James Madison introduced his proposed
amendments to the Constitution, which would eventually
become known as the Bill of Rights. Additional debate
related to these proposed amendments can be located in
this collection by searching
on the words "amendments constitution" in the
First Congress.
A copy of the proposed
amendments to the Constitution submitted to the state
legislatures can be found in the appendix to the Senate
Journal, First Congress, First Session.
Information on ratification of the first ten amendments
to the Constitution by the various state
legislatures is available in the appendix to the Annals
of Congress, First Congress.
The Letters
of Delegates to Congress contains a letter from James
Madison to Thomas Jefferson from October 17, 1788,
that reveals Madison's views on the need for and role
of a Bill of Rights.
An
American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and
Other Printed Ephemera
Contains a copy of seventeen
proposed amendments to the Constitution passed by
the House of Representatives on August 24, 1789. These
amendments were subsequently reduced to the twelve
amendments passed by Congress and sent to the states
on September 25, 1789.
Includes a printed version of the
Bill of Rights from 1950.
Documents
from the Continental Congress and the Constitutional Convention,
1774-1789
Presents a copy of the twelve
amendments to the Constitution as passed by Congress
on September 25, 1789.
Browse
by subject in this collection to locate additional
documents related to the Bill of Rights.
George
Washington Papers at the Library of Congress
Contains a letter
from Washington to the Marquis de Lafayette, April
28, 1788 in which he discusses the prospects for ratification
of the Constitution and the need for a Bill of Rights.
The
James Madison Papers
Includes James
Madison's notes for his speech on the proposed amendments
to the Constitution. Also contains a letter written to
George
Washington on December 5, 1789, in which Madison discussed
the political situation in the state of Virginia as it
related to the ratification of the Bill of Rights.
Search
Madison's Papers to find additional material related
to the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.
The
Thomas Jefferson Papers at the Library of Congress
Thomas Jefferson received a copy of the Constitution
in November, 1787, while living in France. Beginning on
the second page of a letter to James Madison dated December
20, 1787, Jefferson expressed his opinions on the
new Constitution, including his belief that a Bill of
Rights was needed. He
replied to Madison's letter of October 17, 1788 (above),
on March 15, 1789.
Words
and Deeds in American History
George Washington's first
inaugural address called for constitutional amendments
to satisfy citizen demands for a Bill of Rights.
Jump
Back in Time: The New United States of America Adopted the
Bill of Rights, December 15, 1791
American
Treasures of the Library of Congress - Mason's Virginia
Declaration of Rights
George Mason, of Fairfax County, Virginia, wrote the
Virginia Declaration of Rights, on which the Declaration
of Independence and the Bill of Rights are partially modeled.
Mason refused to support the original Constitution because
it failed to protect essential liberties. This document
was also used by the Marquis de Lafayette in drafting
the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the
Citizen (1789).
American
Treasures of the Library of Congress - Madison's Copy of
the Proposed
Bill of Rights
In response to the demands of the Antifederalists for
amendments guaranteeing individual rights, James Madison
drafted twelve amendments to the Constitution. Seen here
in one of only two known copies of the preliminary printing,
these amendments were closely modeled on Mason's Virginia
Declaration of Rights. Articles three through twelve were
ratified by the required number of states in December
1791 and became known as the Bill of Rights.
Creating
the United States
This online exhibition offers insights into how the
nation’s founding documents were forged and the
role that imagination and vision played in the unprecedented
creative act of forming a self–governing country.
The exhibition includes a copy of the proposed
amendments to the Constitution (Bill
of Rights) prepared under the direction of John Beckley,
clerk of the House, which were sent to President George
Washington on September 25, 1789, for dispersal to the
states for ratification.
Madison's
Treasures
The documents presented in this exhibition are among
the most significant items in the Library of Congress'
James Madison collection, the largest single collection
of original Madison documents in existence. The majority
of these documents relate to two seminal events in which
Madison played a major role: the drafting and ratification
of the Constitution of the United States (1787-8) and
the introduction (1789) in the First Federal Congress
of the amendments that became the Bill
of Rights.
Religion
and the Founding of the American Republic
Explores the role religion played in the founding of
the American colonies, in the shaping of early American
life and politics, and in forming the American Republic.
Includes a section entitled Religion
and the Federal Government, which discusses references
to religion and the Bill of Rights.
September
17, 1787
Members of the Constitutional Convention signed the final
draft of the Constitution on September 17, 1787.
October
27, 1787
Known as the Federalist Papers, the first in a series
of eighty-five essays by "Publius," the pen
name of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay,
appeared in the New York Independent
Journal on October 27, 1787.
December
15, 1791
The new United States of America adopted the Bill of
Rights, the first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution,
confirming the fundamental rights of its citizens on December
15, 1791.
Bill
of Rights, The James Madison Center, James Madison University
Charters
of Freedom, Bill of Rights, National Archives and Records
Administration
Constitution
of the United States, Government Printing Office
The
Founders' Constitution, University of Chicago Press
and the Liberty Fund
Interactive
Constitution, National Constitution Center
Our
Documents, Bill of Rights, National Archives and Records
Administration
Cogan, Neil H., ed. The Complete Bill
of Rights: The Drafts, Debates, Sources, and Origins.
New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.[Catalog
Record]
Conley, Patrick, and John P. Kaminski, eds. The
Bill of Rights and the States: The Colonial and Revolutionary
Origins of American Liberties. Madison, Wis.: Madison
House, 1992. [Catalog
Record]
Hickock, Eugene W., Jr. The Bill of
Rights: Original Meaning and Current Understanding.
Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991.[Catalog
Record]
Labunski, Richard E. James Madison
and the Struggle for the Bill of Rights. New York:
Oxford University Press, 2006. [Catalog
Record]
Lewis, Thomas T., ed. The Bill of
Rights. Pasadena, Calif.: Salem Press, 2002. [Catalog
Record]
Veit, Helen E., Kenneth R. Bowling, and Charlene Bangs
Bickford, eds. Creating the Bill of
Rights: The Documentary Record from the First Federal Congress.
Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991. [Catalog
Record]
Banks, Joan. The U.S. Constitution.
Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishers, 2001. [Catalog
Record]
Faber, Doris, and Harold Faber. We
the People: The Story of the United States Constitution
Since 1787. New York: Scribner's, 1987. [Catalog
Record]
Heymsfeld, Carla R. and Joan W. Lewis. George
Mason, Father of the Bill of Rights. Alexandria,
Va.: Patriotic Education Incorporated, 1991. [Catalog
Record]
Meltzer, Milton. The Bill of Rights:
How We Got It and What It Means. New York: Thomas
Crowell, 1990. [Catalog
Record]
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