By Dr. Rick Chromey
On June 28, 1787, America’s future hung by a thread.
The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia had reached a feverish pitch. For nearly six weeks, delegates had argued behind locked doors over the future of a loosely confederated group of thirteen states. Large states demanded greater representation, which the smaller states resisted. Northern interests clashed with Southern concerns. Political philosophies collided, while personal pride and regional loyalties threatened to overwhelm the common good.
The delegates initially assembled in May to revise the Articles of Confederation. Instead, they found themselves confronting far greater questions. Could thirteen fiercely independent states become one nation? Could freedom survive without restraint, civility, and order? Could a stronger national government be created without sacrificing liberties?
By late June, frustration filled the room. Some delegates questioned whether the Convention should continue. Others wondered if it might be better to adjourn and admit failure.
Many felt if the gathering collapsed, the American experiment in self-government might fall with it.
The turning point
That’s when the eighty-one-year-old Benjamin Franklin slowly rose to speak.
Franklin was the elder statesman of the Convention. Age and illness prevented him from speaking at length, forcing him to have another delegate read his remarks. Yet whenever he stood to speak, the room listened. Few Americans possessed greater influence or international stature.
For weeks Franklin had watched the Convention drift toward failure.
Every day seemed to produce more disagreement than progress. Delegates spoke past one another. Old friendships strained under political pressure. The unity forged during the Revolution appeared to be slipping away.
The observation
Franklin began with an observation every delegate recognized as true: The Convention had been “groping” blindly “to find political truth,” he stated. Even worse was their inability to distinguish that “truth” when it was presented.1 That’s when Franklin asked a question that shifted the focus from politics to Providence:
“How has it happened, Sir, that we have not … once thought of humbly applying to the Father of Lights to illuminate our understandings?”2
Franklin reminded the delegates it wasn’t too many years ago, in the struggle for American independence, the Continental Congress had begun its sessions with prayer. “When we were sensible of danger,” he recalled, “we had daily prayer in this room for the Divine Protection.”3
Those prayers, Franklin insisted, had not been mere ceremony. Nearly every man present had witnessed what he called “frequent instances of a superintending Providence” favoring their cause. Their prayers, he declared, “were heard” and “graciously answered.”4
To the old Philadelphia printer, those words were not pious rhetoric. They were history. The Revolution had succeeded against astonishing odds. An inexperienced army had defeated the most powerful military on earth. More than once, the cause of independence appeared hopeless, only to survive.
Franklin believed those events bore the unmistakable fingerprints of Divine Providence.
The question
Then Benjamin Franklin asked a sobering question:
“Have we now forgotten that powerful Friend?”5
Quoting Matthew’s Gospel, Franklin continued, “If a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without His aid?”6 Essentially, if Divine Providence had guided America through a revolutionary war, why would these delegates now attempt to establish a nation without Heaven’s wisdom?
Franklin recommended that each day’s proceedings begin with prayers seeking “the assistance of Heaven” upon their “deliberations.”7 Not every delegate likely shared Franklin’s theology. But it’s clear the oldest Founder had reminded his colleagues it’s impossible to build a civic and orderly republic without reliance upon a Higher Intelligence.
The response
Franklin’s proposal was never adopted by the Constitutional Convention. No chaplain was appointed, nor did the delegates begin each day with prayer. Yet less than two years later, the First Congress under the new Constitution did precisely what Franklin had recommended. One of its earliest acts was the appointment of official chaplains to open each day’s proceedings with prayer – a tradition that continues to this day.
Within days, the Convention recessed for the Fourth of July celebration. Delegates returned home to visit family, attend church, and reflect upon eight years of American independence. When they reconvened in Philadelphia, the difficult issues remained. Large states still argued with small states. Northern delegates still negotiated with Southerners. Strong personalities still clashed. Yet the Convention gradually entered a different season.
Instead of walking away, the delegates stayed. Instead of defending only regional interests, they increasingly searched for national solutions. The Connecticut Compromise resolved the question of representation. Agreements emerged concerning the executive branch, while the framework for the federal judiciary gradually took shape. One by one, obstacles that had seemed insurmountable gave way to practical solutions that no single delegate – or even one political faction – could have crafted alone.
The signing
On September 17, 1787, thirty-nine delegates signed the Constitution of the United States.
They signed – not because they agreed on everything – but because they agreed on enough.
Among those delegates was Dr. Benjamin Rush, one of the most brilliant minds of the Founding Generation. He knew their convictions, rivalries, ambitions, and faults. He understood how unlikely it was that such a diverse collection of personalities could produce a document capable of uniting thirteen fiercely independent states. To Rush, politics alone could not explain what had happened in Philadelphia.
Years later, Rush reflected upon the Convention with words that have echoed through American history:
“I do not believe that the Constitution was the offspring of inspiration, but I am as satisfied that the Union of the States, in its form and adoption, is as much the work of a Divine Providence as any of the miracles recorded in the Old and New Testament.”8
Rush was careful. He did not claim the Constitution was written by God’s finger, like the Ten Commandments (Exodus 31:18). Rather, he believed Divine Providence had worked through imperfect men to accomplish an extraordinary purpose. In his understanding of history, that is often how God works – not by removing human weakness, but by accomplishing His purposes through it. Whether one agrees with Rush’s conclusion is, of course, a matter of historical interpretation.
A miraculous document
But history presents another remarkable fact. The Constitution completed in Philadelphia that September remains the oldest written national constitution still in continuous operation anywhere in the world. Since 1789, Americans have governed under one Constitution. Venezuela and El Salvador have each adopted thirty-six. The Dominican Republic has written thirty-two. Thailand has had twenty. France has had fifteen.
Political systems change. Governments rise and fall. Constitutions are revised, abandoned, or swept away by revolution.
Rush concluded that human brilliance alone could not explain the outcome. He believed, along with other Founding Fathers, that another Hand had quietly guided the Convention through its darkest days toward a result few thought possible.
Consequently, as the delegates finally emerged from Independence Hall on September 17, Philadelphia socialite Elizabeth Willing Powel approached Benjamin Franklin with a simple question that has become one of the most memorable exchanges in American history.
“Well, Doctor,” she asked, “what have we got – a republic or a monarchy?”9
“A republic,” Franklin replied, “if you can keep it.”
1NOTES:
Benjamin Franklin, “Speech in the Federal Convention,” June 28, 1787, in The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 45, digital edition, sponsored by the American Philosophical Society and Yale University; reprinted in Max Farrand, ed., The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787, rev. ed., 4 vols. (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1937), 1:450.
2Ibid., 1:451.
3Ibid., 1:451.
4Ibid., 1:451-52.
5Ibid., 1:451-52.
6Ibid., 1:452; cf. Matthew 10:29 (KJV).
7Ibid., 1:452-53.
8Benjamin Rush, quoted in John F. Watson, The Annals of Philadelphia and Pennsylvania in the Olden Time, enlarged ed., vol. 1 (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1898), 457.
9James McHenry, entry for September 18, 1787, in Bernard C. Steiner, ed., The Life and Correspondence of James McHenry (Cleveland: Burrows Brothers Co., 1907), 29–30.
Dr. Rick Chromey is a historian and theologian who speaks and writes on matters of religion, culture, and history. He’s a Lewis and Clark historian for American Cruise Lines (Columbia and Snake rivers) and leads overseas Bible and church history tours. Rick and his wife Linda live in Star. www.rickchromey.com
