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Inventiveness. The writers had little to go on \u2013 the other colonies-becoming-states were working on their own constitutions, and the U.S. Constitution was a decade in the future. They drew on a few European and American colonial political writers for ideas such as natural rights and government by consent of the governed. And they drew on their own experiences with colonial government.<\/p>\n
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Compromise. The constitution writers were fast. They drafted a document from scratch and finished it in about three months \u2013 approximately as long as the current state Legislature struggles every year to even pass a state budget by the legally established deadline, April 1 (a deadline it usually misses). The founders talked things through, put bickering aside and compromised. That\u2019s a good model for today, when political impasse is all too common.<\/p>\n
Brevity. The new constitution was around 5,000 words long, about a tenth of the length of the current state constitution. It laid out the parameters of state government and defined the role of the governor, the Legislature and the courts. The writers left the details to the Legislature.<\/p>\n
The document was far from perfect. Slavery, established in the 17th century, was left intact. Freedom of religion was protected, but not other civil rights. Voting was limited to men who met minimum property holding qualifications.<\/p>\n
These deficiencies were slowly addressed in subsequent years. A Bill of Rights was added by legislation in 1787. A law to gradually abolish slavery passed in 1799. Property qualifications for male voters were phased out in the 19th century; women finally got voting rights in 1917.<\/p>\n
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After finishing the constitution, its writers quickly arranged for elections. The first Legislature assembled in Kingston in September. The new governor, George Clinton, was also a general in the patriot army. The government got down to work, quickly passing laws to raise revenues for the war effort and deal with the loyalists, who supported the British.<\/p>\n
A British military force sailed up from New York City (which the British occupied) and burned Kingston on Oct. 16. The new state officials, warned about the coming attack, rowed across the Hudson and reestablished the capital at Poughkeepsie.<\/p>\n
Patriot troops at Saratoga stopped a British invasion from the north on Oct. 17. New York state was here to stay.<\/p>\n
The first state constitution proved to be a solid foundation to launch what would soon be called the Empire State. During the period from 1777 to 1821 period, settlement pushed westward, the Erie Canal was initiated and New York began on the road that would make it the nation\u2019s most populous and important state.<\/p>\n
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Many New Yorkers know little of the statesmen who started New York or of the enduring principles established in its founding document. New York history gets scant attention in the schools. This year could be an exception and set a precedent for the future.<\/p>\n
As we prepare to celebrate America 250, we should also look back to our own state\u2019s origins for models of inventiveness, courage and compromise for the public good.<\/p>\n
Bruce W. Dearstyne, a historian, is the editor of \u201cRevolutionary New York: 250 Years of Social Change<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\nArticle continues below this ad<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This undated engraving shows residents of Kingston listening as Robert Benson, secretary of the convention, reads the state…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":202437,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[18281,9,11,10,49,51,50,12522],"class_list":{"0":"post-202436","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-commentary","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-headlines","11":"tag-new-york-news","12":"tag-new-york-state","13":"tag-new-york-state-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-state-news","15":"tag-opiniontu"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=202436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202436\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/202437"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=202436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=202436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=202436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}