[74] See on this subject Lieber on Civil Liberty, I. 209, edit. 1853.
[75] Connecticut upon this question voted with the majority.
[80] It was made at this stage by Dr. Johnson.
[81] The States opposed to an equality of suffrage in the first branch were Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia, 6; those in favor of it were Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, and Delaware. The vote of Maryland was divided.
[82] Mr. Baldwin of Georgia suggested this model.
[85] The question was put upon Ellsworth's motion to allow the States an equal representation in the Senate. The vote stood, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, _ay_. 5; Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, _no_, 5; Georgia divided. The person who divided the vote of Georgia, and thus prevented a decision which must have resulted in a disruption of the Convention, was Abraham Baldwin. We have no account of the motives with which he cast this vote, except an obscure suggestion by Luther Martin, which is not intelligible. (Elliot, I. 356.) Baldwin was a very wise and a very able man. He was not in favor of Ellsworth's proposition, but he probably saw the consequences of forcing the minority States to the alternatives of receiving what they regarded as an unjust and unsafe system, or of quitting the Union. By dividing the vote of his State he prevented this issue, although he also made it probable that the Convention must be dissolved without the adoption of any plan whatever.
FIRST GRAND COMPROMISES OF THE CONSTITUTION.--POPULATION OF THE STATES ADOPTED AS THE BASIS OF REPRESENTATION IN THE HOUSE.--RULE FOR COMPUTING THE SLAVES.--EQUALITY OF REPRESENTATION OF THE STATES ADOPTED FOR THE SENATE.
As the States were now exactly divided on the question whether there should be an equality of votes in the second branch of the legislature, some compromise seemed to be necessary, or the effort to make a constitution must be abandoned. A conversation as to what was expedient to be done, resulted in the appointment of a committee of one member from each State, to devise and report some mode of adjusting the whole system of representation.[86]