[77] as embraced in the Articles of Confederation, and afterward as revised, amended, enlarged, and embodied in the instrument framed in 1787, and subsequently adopted by the various states. The manner in which this revision was effected was as follows. Acting on the suggestion of the Annapolis Convention, the Congress, on the 21st of the ensuing February (1787), adopted the following resolution:
Resolved, That, in the opinion of Congress, it is expedient that, on the second Monday in May next, a convention of delegates, who shall have been appointed by the several States, be held at Philadelphia, for the sole and express purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation, and reporting to Congress and the several Legislatures such alterations and provisions therein as shall, when agreed to in Congress and confirmed by the States, render the Federal Constitution adequate to the exigencies of Government and the preservation of the Union.The language of this resolution, substantially according with that of the recommendation made by the commissioners at Annapolis a few months before, very clearly defines the objects of the proposed convention and the powers which it was thought advisable that the states should confer upon their delegates. These were “solely and expressly,” as follows:
1. To revise the Articles of Confederation with reference to the “situation of the United States”; 2. To devise such alterations and provisions therein as should seem to them requisite in order to render “the Federal Constitution,” or “Constitution of the Federal Government,” adequate to “the exigencies of the Union,” or “the exigencies of the Government and the preservation of the Union”; 3. To report the result of their deliberations—that is, the “alterations and provisions” which they should agree to recommend—to Congress and the Legislatures of the several States.Of course, their action could be only advisory until ratified by the states. The “Articles of Confederation and perpetual Union,” under which the states were already united, provided that no alteration should be made in any of them, “unless such alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and afterward confirmed by the Legislatures of every State.” The legislatures of the various states, with the exception of Rhode Island, adopted and proceeded to act upon these suggestions by the appointment of delegates—some of them immediately upon the recommendation of the Annapolis Commissioners in advance of that of the Congress, and the others in the course of a few months after the resolution adopted by Congress. The instructions given to these delegates in all cases conformed to the recommendations which have been quoted, and in one case imposed an additional restriction or limitation. As this
