68 Days to Opening Day

Opening Day 2008 for the Timber Rattlers is April 3. That is 68 days from today. This off-season, the countdown will be based on books. Each day between now and Opening Day 2008, I will pick a random book out of my library and excerpt a passage off the page number corresponding with the number of days remaining to the first pitch of the new season. I will try not to repeat a book during the countdown.

Today’s book is The American System of Government (8^th Edition) by Ferguson and McHenry. It’s a civics textbook first written in 1947. The 8^th Edition is from 1965 and the excerpt is from a chapter on the U.S. Constitution.

Criticisms: The Federalists stressed the weaknesses of the Articles and labored to convince the people that the choice was the proposed Constitution or anarchy, chaos, and possibly civil war. Complaints were heard concerning almost every provision of the proposed document. The pious complained that the Constitution nowhere recognized the existence of God. Many who otherwise favored a stronger government strenuously objected to the fact that they must accept or reject the document with no opportunity to amend it prior to final action. Others were opposed because the Convention had exceeded its instructions and recommended adoption contrary to the method required by the Articles. Many contended that the President would become a monarch because he would serve an indefinite number of terms.

Patriots like Patrick Henry and Richard Henry Lee, noting that the document contained no bill of rights, dwelt upon dangers to liberty. The courts, it was feared, would usurp the powers and functions of state judiciaries. Paper-money advocates believed that the central government would upset the gains they had made through their state governments. Southerners were alarmed lest commercial interests of the North dominate the Congress and use the treaty, tax, and commerce powers to the detriment of their sectional interests. Northerners made a moral issue of concessions to the slave trade; while residents of larger states argued that too much had been conceded to the small states. The most persistent theme was that the states would be destroyed and the central government would become a tyrannical overload. To offset these objections, the Federalists yielded to the extent of promising the addition of a bill of rights as soon as the new government was organized. Without this concession, the Constitution might never have been adopted.

Put today’s excerpt in a baseball context.