052

  • The Independent Chronicle--Thursday, August 23, 1787, (Notice of the American Constitution)

  • 1787
  • Published by Adams and Nourse, Boston
  • Printed newspaper
  • 48.7 x 30.0 cm., 19-1/4 x 11-3/4" sheet
  • Catherine Carter Goebel, Paul A. Anderson Chair in the Arts Purchase, Paul A. Anderson Art History Collection, Augustana College 2010.46.a, b, c, d

Essay by David M. Dehnel, Professor of Political Science

Newspapers assume many things about their readers. They may assume that their readers are members of a community and therefore part of an on-going conversation. Their readers share certain needs, values, and interests, and a common body of knowledge. When we, as students, pick up a newspaper more than 200 years old, we can be sure that many of those assumptions do not apply to us. We struggle to make sense of the text, reading carefully and drawing on what we know, or think we know, about the historical context.

This newspaper in Augustana's collection was published in Boston in August of 1787. It contains an early report of the completion of a proposal for a new constitution for the United States. Indeed, the report, filed by an unnamed correspondent in New York but reporting events in Philadelphia, anticipates the actual completion of the work of the constitutional convention by a month. The report warmly endorses the proposal, though the author could not have yet seen the final document.

The newspaper containing the report is more akin to a present day journal like the New Yorker than the New York Times. It is a mixture of literary writing, social commentary, current events, and, of course, advertising. The political upheavals of the new American republic, as experienced in Massachusetts, are a prominent theme, and the inclination of the paper is clear. In the traumatic aftermath of Shays' Rebellion, the paper sides with the state government against the rebels. On the front page is an extended essay asserting that demands for radical democracy will only lead us back to monarchy and tyranny.

The reporter's favorable expectations for the new constitution stem from his belief that a stronger national government is needed to serve national purposes adequately. To a readership personally familiar with the original "Boston Tea Party," the author asserts, "It is undoubtedly the duty of a free people to be tenacious of their liberties and guard against encroachment-but does it follow that we should be suspicious of every public measure or character?"

The author reports that the next step is submission of the proposed constitution to the state legislatures for ratification. This was a matter of concern because the state legislatures were the very bodies that stood to lose power if a stronger national government was created. What the author did not know is that the politically astute founders had anticipated that problem and provided, as part of the constitution itself, that it be ratified by the people through special conventions called for the purpose, rather than by the incumbent legislatures. That plan, we know, carried the day.