The ratification of the conventions of nine
states, shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Constitution between
the states so ratifying the same.
Done in convention by the unanimous consent of
the states present the seventeenth day of September in the year of our Lord one
thousand seven hundred and eighty seven and of the independence of the United
States of America the twelfth. In witness whereof We have hereunto subscribed
our Names,
George Washington, President and deputy from
Virginia
New Hampshire: John Langdon, Nicholas Gilman
Massachusetts: Nathaniel Gorham, Rufus King
Connecticut: William Samuel Johnson, Roger
Sherman
New York: Alexander Hamilton
New Jersey: William Livingston, David Brearly,
William Paterson, Jonathan Dayton
Pennsylvania: Ben Franklin, Thomas Mifflin,
Robert Morris, George Clymer, Thomas Fitzsimons, Jared Ingersoll, James Wilson,
Gouverner Morris
Delaware: George Read, Gunning Bedford Junior,
John Dickinson, Richard Bassett, Jacob Broom
Maryland: James McHenry, Dan of St Thomas Jennifer,
Daniel Carroll
Virginia: John Blair, James Madison Jr.
North Carolina: William Blount, Richard Dobbs
Spaight, Hugh Williamson
South Carolina: John Rutledge, Charles
Cotesworth Pinckney, Charles Pinckney, Pierce Butler
Georgia: William Few, Abraham Baldwin
The Conventions of a number of the States
having, at the time of adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order
to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and
restrictive clauses should be added, and as extending the ground of public
confidence in the Government will best insure the beneficent ends of its
institution;
Resolved, by the Senate and House of
Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled,
two-thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following articles be proposed to
the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the
United States; all or any of which articles, when ratified by three-fourths of
the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the
said Constitution, namely: