"The resolutions of Mr. Randolph, the basis on which the deliberations of the Convention proceeded, were the result of a consultation among the Virginia deputies, who thought it possible that, as Virginia had taken so leading a part in reference to the Federal Convention, some initiative propositions might be expected from them. They were understood not to commit any of the members absolutely or definitively on the tenor of them. The resolutions will be seen to present the characteristics and features of a government as complete (in some respects, perhaps more so) as the plan of Mr. Pinckney, though without being thrown into a formal shape. The moment, indeed, a real constitution was looked for as a substitute for the Confederacy, the distribution of the Government into the usual departments became a matter of course with all who speculated upon the prospective change." Letter to W. A. Duer, June 5th, 1835. The difficulty of the hour was not in draughting a constitution, but in draughting one which would not arouse the jealous antagonism of the several States. That difficulty did not trouble Pinckney. His plan contemplated having the people of each State fairly, _i. e._, proportionately represented in his House of Delegates, and in making the several States as States unequivocally submissive to the new national authority. Pinckney had been for two years immediately before the sitting of the Convention, a delegate in the Congress of the Confederation. He had been the representative of South Carolina in the "grand committee" appointed to consider the alteration of the Articles of Confederation. He had been chairman of the subcommittee which draughted the committee's report of August, 1786; and (as Professor McLaughlin has pointed out) "the introducing phrases, as appears by reference to the manuscript papers of the old Congress, were written in Pinckney's own hand." In witnessing the inherent weakness and increasing degradation of the Congress, he had learned to appreciate the incapacity of the confederate system, and the necessity of a National government. No member of the Convention better appreciated those two things, or was better equipped for the task which he undertook; and there was no man in the country, except Madison, who had been through such a preparatory course and had such a combination of resources at his command. He was young, talented, experienced, ambitious, wealthy, unemployed and a ceaseless worker. The index of Madison's Journal witnesses to the immense amount of work which Pinckney did irrespective of the draught. If we discard the draught--the original draught, the disputed draught, and the draught described in the Observations, the fact will remain that Pinckney was an important contributor to the work of framing the Constitution.