George Mason

George Mason's greatest accomplishment was being the founding father of the

national Bill of Rights. He was a planter from Virginia, had grown up rich on

one of the nicest and best plantations in Alexandria, Fairfax County, Virginia.

He was an important member of the town's church, had all the best tutors growing

up, and had been raised to be a Virginian aristocrat (Miers 39).

Mason married 'well' and had a large family of nine kids. He raised them in

Gunston Hall, a house which he had built himself (Miers 41).

He was the type of guy who, if he believed strongly enough, did not abandon his

beliefs. He strongly believed in the cause for the American Revolution (he had

given his son a plantation named 'Lexington'), in citizen's rights, and a

non-tyrannical central government (Miers 41). He was known as a great debater,

the best that James Madison had ever seen. Mason spoke up many times during the

constitutional convention, about different subjects he strongly believed in.

During the convention, Mason was directly and strongly involved with the topics

of the electoral college, slavery, the Bill of Rights, and a strong central

government (Solberg 280).

He was a bestfriend to George Washington, and around 1760, became involved in

Virginia's politics. Six years later, he was called to Williamsburg to help with

Virginia's Bill of Rights. He took the one that had been drafted before he got

there. The thing was incredibly weak, and he took it in hand. Mason proceeded to

reduce it to ten simple articles and declarations. It took only four weeks to be

rewritten and to go through the system of ratification, with only six more

articles added, and all of his big points left in (Miers 41-46).

The Declaration was taken to Philadelphia, to Thomas Jefferson, where he was

just about to finish up with the Declaration of Independence. Many of Mason's

ideas were 'decorated' and went into the Declaration of Independence (Miers

42-46). George Mason's Virginia's Declaration of Rights was used as the base for

almost every other states (Collier 250).

George Mason went to the Constitutional Convention of 1787 with writing a new

form of government in mind, though he did not believe in a strong central

government. He agreed with the Virginia Plan. The Virginia Plan had two houses

of our government, but the population of the state determined the number of

representatives from the state in both houses. He felt that the people would be

equally represented with this plan, but ended up agreeing to the Connecticut

Compromise, having representation in one house determined by population and the

other house had an equal number of representatives from each state (Delegate

Biography).

Slavery was another of his big issues. In this, he was slightly hypocritical.

During the debates over this topic, George Mason gave a pretty lengthy speech,

letting the other delegates know his view on the matter. He believed slavery was

wrong. Mason believed it took jobs away from the poor, and it prevented the

immigration of whites. He owned slaves on his plantation, but believed it to be

a necessary evil (Solberg 280).

The slave trade was a debatable topic for him. A few northern states prohibited

slavery completely and Pennsylvania declared blacks free. Virginia and Maryland

already prohibited the importation of slaves, and Mason thought it would be a

waste of law and time if South Carolina and Georgia were free to import as many

slaves as they needed or wanted. The western states were already saying they

wanted slaves for themselves and their area. Mason felt that the western land

would be filled with black slaves before anybody knew it (Solberg 280).

The Electoral College was just another example of his belief in the people being

involved in the government. He believed the people