Was there a "secret" recording of the American founding fathers' deliberations?
score:27
Assuming you are talking about the Constitutional Convention...
It wasn't a "secret", but I suppose it is conveniently ignored by a lot of people that there were extensive records kept of the deliberations. They were delivered by the convention secretary to the convention "president" (George Washington, of course). Congress ordered them all printed in 1819.
Max Farrand in 1911 compiled them all and reprinted them together (in multiple volumes) as The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787.
I haven't read them myself directly, but they were from multiple sources, not just official proceedings notes. According to the link above, aside from the official notes the largest amount of material in there was written by James Madison. From the secondary sources I've read, it seems like rather a lot of the material in there was originally written by Alexander Hamilton as well.
Upvote:0
Charles Thomson was the secretary of the Continental Congress from 1774 to 1789. In addition to keeping the official journals of the Congress, Thomson kept a number of private notes, which in later years he attempted to compile into a manuscript. This work, tentatively titled "Notes of the Intrigues and Severe Altercations or Quarrels in the Congress", reportedly reached over a thousand pages in length. Unfortunately for historians, Thomson eventually decided against publishing the manuscript, and instead destroyed it.
Nathaniel Philbrick wrote about Thomson and his manuscript in the preface to his book Valiant Ambition, which is how I learned about it.
Upvote:2
You are likely thinking of The Federalist Papers (Wikipedia here),
Beginning on October 27, 1787 the Federalist Papers were first published in the New York press under the signature of "Publius". These papers are generally considered to be one of the most important contributions to political thought made in America.
The papers were actually written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, all under the single pseudonym Publius as noted above. They were never secret, and were published as they were written as part of the campaign to achieve ratification of the Constitution.
Upvote:12
In 2011, the New York Historical Society acquired the Constitutional Convention notebooks of John Lansing, Jr., a New York delegate to the 1787 Philadelphia Convention. According to this announcement:
The delegates’ vow of secrecy, which banned the taking of notes for publication, limited the amount of material created documenting the Convention proceedings. Although notes by a number of other delegates, including James Madison, survive, Lansing’s are among the purest and most detailed, providing a unique and unedited first-hand account of the period of Lansing’s attendance at the Convention.
The society also holds the notes of Massachusetts delegate Rufus King, and has on deposit those of South Carolinian Pierce Butler.
More post
- 📝 Can anyone tell me what military uniform this is?
- 📝 Can anyone identify this uniform from SE Asia?
- 📝 Until when did Russia occupy Paris after 1814
- 📝 Why were steering wheels so big, even in 20th century ships?
- 📝 Was Brown v Board of Education the only major decision that changed educational choice in America?
- 📝 Why were helmets and other body armour not commonplace in the 1800s?
- 📝 How do Tamahagane, Damascus, and Toledo Steel compare?
- 📝 Did any ancient polytheistic religion hold that theirs was the only pantheon?
- 📝 Which country traces its roots back to the oldest civilization?
- 📝 Dunkirk Little ship requisition documents
- 📝 Is there a standard authority on the textual history of the authors of antiquity?
- 📝 What was the fate of Gülbahar, the chief consort of Sultan Suleyman of 16th century?
- 📝 How did the Weygand Line collapse so quickly?
- 📝 What was the South actually afraid Lincoln or Congress would do that precipitated the Civil War?
- 📝 Why is Las Vegas located where it is?
- 📝 What is the explanation of president Gen. Yahya Khan's role in the general election of 1970?
- 📝 Marbury vs Madison, what about other midnight judges?
- 📝 How was early Indian history re-constructed?
- 📝 Was Kingdom of Cochin the only kingdom in South Asia to be a protectorate of (any empire of) China?
- 📝 Why did Sweden and Norway become the vassals of Denmark?
- 📝 In Georgian England, what was a water-party?
- 📝 Were there any drunk driving laws before the automobile?
- 📝 How can I identify this RAF pin badge?
- 📝 Could ancient Egyptians have done origami with papyrus?
- 📝 German invasion of Poland details
- 📝 What was the point of horse armour?
- 📝 Why did Puerto Rican families send their children to New York?
- 📝 Help identify this poster of early 1900's movie with a woman sitting on a bench and a man behind holding her arm
- 📝 How was Napoleon's military funded just a decade after the French Revolution ostensibly because of bankruptcy/mismanagement of funds?
- 📝 Is there a record of a rabid human attacking another human?
Source: stackoverflow.com
Search Posts
Related post
- 📝 Was there a "secret" recording of the American founding fathers' deliberations?
- 📝 Was there any genuine debate in the pre-1860 United States regarding Native American sovereignty?
- 📝 Was there any distinction between the 13 Colonies and the Canadian provinces prior to the American Revolution?
- 📝 Was there a state or kingdom in the Maghreb of North Africa that predates the founding of Carthage?
- 📝 Is there any evidence to support the claim that the United States was "suckered into WW1" by Zionists, made by Benjamin Freedman in his 1961 speech?
- 📝 Was there ever a treaty between 2 entities with significantly different translations to the detriment of one party?
- 📝 What led some people to (correctly) believe that there was no land under the ice cap at the North Pole?
- 📝 Why was there a surge in the US incarceration rate during the 1990s?
- 📝 Is there evidence to suggest the "war on drugs" was a cover for class warfare?
- 📝 Was there a tax in the fifties for British citizens traveling abroad?
- 📝 Was there an assassination attempt against Xerxes in the battle of Thermopylae?
- 📝 Was the American Civil War the “bloodiest civil war in history”?
- 📝 Was there a King of England, or an heir to the throne, in 1831 who idolized Michael Faraday?
- 📝 Was there a European response to the trail of tears?
- 📝 Why were there so few American deaths in the Bataan Death March?
- 📝 Was there really a navy officer named Picard at the Battle of Trafalgar?
- 📝 Was there a priest on the Titanic who stayed on the ship giving confession to as many as he could?
- 📝 Was swordsmanship important in the American Civil War?
- 📝 Was the concept of religious freedom in the early United States applied to native American faiths?
- 📝 Why was there lack of food during WW2 in the UK?
- 📝 To what extent was prohibition supported by the American public?
- 📝 Was there a Japanese equivalent of the Gestapo during WW2
- 📝 By mid-1945, was Japan capable of maintaining the war even in the absence of further direct American attacks?
- 📝 When was the American War of Independence first called a 'Revolution'?
- 📝 Was there a pre-determined arrangement for the division of Germany in case it surrendered before any Soviet forces entered its territory?
- 📝 Was there an increased interest in 'the spirit world' in the aftermath of the First World War?
- 📝 What was the Victorian opinion of the American Revolution?
- 📝 Was there any theological opposition to the lightning rod?
- 📝 Was there ever any doubt which side the USA would join?
- 📝 Was there a bronze age in the Americas?
