On September 17, 1787, the delegates agreed on the Constitution. You might be thinking, what is the Constitution? Well...

A constitution is a set of rules that guides how a country or state works. The constitution may tell what the branches of the government are, what powers they have, and how they work. It may also tell us the rights of the citizens, or people in America. 

Most of the delegates, who were people chosen to act for the ideas of others, liked the idea of the Constitution, and signed it. Now, they had to convince the states. The delegates agreed that 9/13 of the states would have to ratify, or approve, the Constitution. 

How would the states ratify the Constitution? The people of each state would vote for people who would go to something called a ratification convention. 

A ratification convention is a meeting of people to make an agreement on a topic.

To make sure the Constitution was passed, people known as the Federalists (because of their support of a federal government) spoke out and said good things about the Constitution.

Three Federalists in particular played a leading role. Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison took turns writing letters to New York newspapers to explain how great the Constitution is, and also to convince other people in New York to support it as well.

Alexander Hamilton

John Jay

James Madison