Constitutional Convention

Constitution

In 1787 Mason was a very active participant at the Constitutional Convention. Mason was suspicious of centralized power, and he argued for limitations on such powers throughout the federal convention. Yet, he was also an effective nationalist and supported the Virginia Plan's third resolution, which called for a national government with "supreme" departments. He defended the popular election of the House and favored the direct election of the Senate. Mason advocated age restrictions on government service, offering a motion that set the minimum age requirement for election to the House after others had moved that there be no age restrictions of House members. He also helped broker the "Great Compromise," which broke a major barrier that had threatened to break up the Convention; his compromise converted the small states into enthusiastic supporters of national power.

However Mason finally refused to sign the document and spoke out in 1787 and 1788 against it because it lacked a Bill of Rights. To secure adoption in Virginia James Madison compromised and made the campaign promise to propose amendments, and the Bill of Rights was adopted in 1791. Mason was a close friend of George Washington until the 1787 Convention. After 1787, he and George Washington were no longer friends. Like his friends Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee, Mason was an anti-Federalist.

George Mason University, a state university in Virginia, is named for him. His home, Gunston Hall, is open to the public all year, except Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's Day.

Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence was influenced greatly by Mason's work on the Virginia bill of rights, and Mason's ideas also had an impact on the development of the Bill of Rights to the United States Constitution. He eventually opposed the Constitution because of the compromise concerning slavery (known as the 3/5 Compromise) and the failure of the delegates to include a Bill of Rights.