The Constitutional COnvention of 1787

The Constitutional Convention of 1787 was attended by more alumni of Princeton than any other American or British institution. Representing their states were nine men who had studied under Presidents Burr, Finley, and Witherspoon: Alexander Martin 1756 (North Carolina) William Paterson 1763 (New Jersey) Oliver Ellsworth 1766 (Connecticut) Luther Martin 1766 (Maryland) William C. Houston 1768 (New Jersey) Gunning Bedford, Jr. 1771 (Delaware) James Madison 1771 (Virginia) William R. Davie 1776 (North Carolina) Jonathan Dayton 1776 (New Jersey) Five of the college alumni at the …

…or in their own states. Most conspicuous, of course, was James Madison, who served the federal government twenty-four years as a member of the House of Representatives, secretary of state, and president. Although he had once said that his labors at the convention had ``almost killed,'' him, he outlived all the other delegates and spent his last years, in his eighties, at Montpelier, receiving visitors and answering letters, still explaining and expounding the Constitution.