Gouverneur Morris and Contemporary America: The Scrivener's Ageless Views

• Author: Richard Brookhiser
• Position: National Review senior editor and author of many works of history and biographies of Founders, including Gentleman Revolutionary: Gouverneur Morris, the Rake Who Wrote the Constitution
• Pages: 51-65

Gouverneur Morris and Contemporary America:

The Scrivener’s Ageless Views

RICHARD BROOKHISER*

TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

I. RACE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

II. INFRASTRUCTURE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

III. SEX . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

IV. AFGHANISTAN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

CONCLUSION. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

INTRODUCTION

In his classic study of the Constitutional Convention, The Grand Convention,

Clinton Rossiter identified four delegates whom he judged to be indispensable:

James Madison, James Wilson, George Washington, and Gouverneur Morris.

Morris, Rossiter admitted, would be a surprising choice to those who find his

sense of humor too close to frivolity. But, he argued, Morris’s speeches, his com-

mittee work, and his final draft made a contribution that was “magnificent.”

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Anyone who reads Madison’s notes of the convention, or compares the wordiness

of the draft of the Committee of Detail with the clarity and concision of the draft

Morris produced for the Committee of Style, is bound to agree.

Now, in his subtle and provocative essay, William Treanor awards Morris

another distinction—secret lawgiver. By a series of editorial tweaks, Morris

made the Constitution a Federalist Party document before there was a Federalist

Party. Morris’s draft, like a baseball pitching machine, throws slow ones in the

strike zone for Team Federalist—President Washington, Treasury Secretary

Alexander Hamilton, and Chief Justice John Marshall—to knock out of the park.

This arguably makes Morris a trickster, pulling a fast one on his fellow delegates.

Morris’s defense, if he condescended to make one, might be that they all could

read. If they thought he had exceeded his remit, they could have objected.

*National Review senior editor and author of many works of history and biographies of Founders,

including Gentleman Revolutionary: Gouverneur Morris, the Rake Who Wrote the Constitution.

© 2023, Richard Brookhiser.

1. CLINTON ROSSITER, THE GRAND CONVENTION 248 (1966).

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