=The Question of Popular Election.=—­The method of selecting federal officers and members of Congress also produced an acrimonious debate which revealed how deep-seated was the distrust of the capacity of the people to govern themselves.  Few there were who believed that no branch of the government should be elected directly by the voters; still fewer were there, however, who desired to see all branches so chosen.  One or two even expressed a desire for a monarchy.  The dangers of democracy were stressed by Gerry of Massachusetts:  “All the evils we experience flow from an excess of democracy.  The people do not want virtue but are the dupes of pretended patriots....  I have been too republican heretofore but have been taught by experience the danger of a leveling spirit.”  To the “democratic licentiousness of the state legislatures,” Randolph sought to oppose a “firm senate.”  To check the excesses of popular government Charles Pinckney of South Carolina declared that no one should be elected President who was not worth $100,000 and that high property qualifications should be placed on members of Congress and judges.  Other members of the convention were stoutly opposed to such “high-toned notions of government.”  Franklin and Wilson, both from Pennsylvania, vigorously championed popular election; while men like Madison insisted that at least one part of the government should rest on the broad foundation of the people.

Out of this clash of opinion also came compromise.  One branch, the House of Representatives, it was agreed, was to be elected directly by the voters, while the Senators were to be elected indirectly by the state legislatures.  The President was to be chosen by electors selected as the legislatures of the states might determine, and the judges of the federal courts, supreme and inferior, by the President and the Senate.

=The Question of the Suffrage.=—­The battle over the suffrage was sharp but brief.  Gouverneur Morris proposed that only land owners should be permitted to vote.  Madison replied that the state legislatures, which had made so much trouble with radical laws, were elected by freeholders.  After the debate, the delegates, unable to agree on any property limitations on the suffrage, decided that the House of Representatives should be elected by voters having the “qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislature.”  Thus they accepted the suffrage provisions of the states.

=The Balance between the Planting and the Commercial States.=—­After the debates had gone on for a few weeks, Madison came to the conclusion that the real division in the convention was not between the large and the small states but between the planting section founded on slave labor and the commercial North.  Thus he anticipated by nearly three-quarters of a century “the irrepressible conflict.”  The planting states had neither the free white population nor the wealth of the North.  There were, counting Delaware, six of them as against seven commercial states.  Dependent for their prosperity mainly upon the sale of tobacco, rice, and other staples abroad, they feared that Congress might impose restraints upon their enterprise.  Being weaker in numbers, they were afraid that the majority might lay an unfair burden of taxes upon them.