Virginia’s Ratification of the U.S. Constitution, with a Proposed Declaration of Rights and 20 Other Proposed Amendments

“Whereas the powers granted under the proposed Constitution are the gift of the people, and every power granted thereby remains with them, and at their will; no right, therefore, of any denomination can be cancelled, abridged, restrained or modified by the Congress, by the Senate or House of Representatives, acting in any capacity, by the President, or any department or Officer of the United States, except in those instances in which power is given by the Constitution for these purposes: And among other essential Rights, liberty of Conscience and of the Press cannot be cancelled, abridged, restrained or modified, by any authority of the United States…

Sixth,   That Elections of representatives in the legislature ought to be free and frequent, and all men having sufficient evidence of permanent common interest with and Attachment to the Community, ought to have the right of Suffrage…

Twelfth, That every freeman ought to find a certain remedy by recourse to the laws for all injuries and wrongs he may receive in his person, property or character. He ought to obtain right and justice freely without sale, completely and without denial, promptly and without delay, and that all establishments or regulations contravening these rights, are oppressive and unjust.

Twentieth, That religion, or the duty which we owe to our Creator, and the manner of discharging it, can be directed only by reason and conviction, not by force or violence, and therefore all men have an equal, natural and unalienable right to the free exercise of religion according to the dictates of conscience, and that no particular religious sect or society ought to be favored or established by law in preference to others…”

Official attested copy signed by Virginia Ratification Convention President Edmund Pendleton and Secretary John J. Beckley. It is one of only three known surviving sets that the Convention ordered to be engrossed and sent to the other state executives or legislatures. The Convention also ordered that a set be sent to the Confederation Congress.

With Virginia’s ratification of Amendments 3-12, they became the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution, thereafter known as the Bill of Rights. Virginia was the eleventh state to ratify them, reaching the three-fourths threshold (since Vermont had become the 14th state in March 1791) required by Article V of the Constitution. Virginia had the distinction of being the final necessary state to approve the Bill of Rights.