In November, 1785, the convention to provide a permanent constitution for the state met at Greenville.  There was already much discontent with the Franklin Government.  The differences between its adherents and those of the old North Carolina Government were accentuated by bitter faction fights among the rivals for popular leadership, backed by their families and followers.  Bad feeling showed itself at this convention, the rivalry between Sevier and Tipton being pronounced.  Tipton was one of the mountain leaders, second in influence only to Sevier, and his bitter personal enemy.  At the convention a brand new constitution was submitted by a delegate named Samuel Houston.  The adoption of the new constitution was urged by a strong minority.  The most influential man of the minority party was Tipton.

This written constitution, with its bill of rights prefixed, was a curious document.  It provided that the new state should be called the Commonwealth of Frankland.  Full religious liberty was established, so far as rites of worship went; but no one was to hold office unless he was a Christian who believed in the Bible, in Heaven, in Hell, and in the Trinity.  There were other classes prohibited from holding office,—­immoral men and sabbath breakers, for instance, and clergymen, doctors, and lawyers.  The exclusion of lawyers from law-making bodies was one of the darling plans of the ordinary sincere rural demagogue of the day.  At that time lawyers, as a class, furnished the most prominent and influential political leaders; and they were, on the whole, the men of most mark in the communities.  A narrow, uneducated, honest countryman, especially in the backwoods, then looked upon a lawyer, usually with smothered envy and admiration, but always with jealousy, suspicion, and dislike; much as his successors to this day look upon bankers and railroad men.  It seemed to him a praiseworthy thing to prevent any man whose business it was to study the law from having a share in making the law.

The proposed constitution showed the extreme suspicion felt by the common people for even their own elected lawmakers.  It made various futile provisions to restrain them, such as providing that “except on occasions of sudden necessity,” laws should only become such after being enacted by two successive Legislatures, and that a Council of Safety should be elected to look after the conduct of all the other public officials.  Universal suffrage for all freemen was provided; the Legislature was to consist of but one body; and almost all offices were made elective.  Taxes were laid to provide a state university.  The constitution was tediously elaborate and minute in its provisions.

However, its only interest is its showing the spirit of the local “reformers” of the day and place in the matters of constitution-making and legislation.  After a hot debate and some tumultuous scenes, it was rejected by the majority of the convention, and in its stead, on Sevier’s motion, the North Carolina constitution was adopted as the groundwork for the new government.  This gave umbrage to Tipton and his party, who for some time had been discontented with the course of affairs in Franklin, and had been grumbling about them.