"The finish given to the style and arrangement of the Constitution, fairly belongs to the pen of Mr. Morris; the task having, probably, been handed over to him by the Chairman of the Committee, himself a highly respectable member, and with the ready concurrence of the others. A better choice could not have been made, as the performance of the task proved."
On September 8, 1787, the Constitutional Convention appointed a Committee of Style and Arrangement to finalize the Constitution's language. Five members: William Samuel Johnson, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, Rufus King, and Gouverneur Morris. The Convention delegated the actual writing to Morris. He finished the draft in four days.
The original draft of the Preamble read: "We, the People of the States of New Hampshire, Massachusetts..." — followed by a list of all thirteen states. Morris rewrote it as: "We the People of the United States." He could not list the states because it was unclear how many would ratify. The change made the document national rather than a compact of individual states.
We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
James Madison later wrote that "the finish given to the style and arrangement of the Constitution fairly belongs to the pen of Mr. Morris." Morris also wrote the letter from Washington as Convention president transmitting the Constitution to the Congress — the cover letter that accompanied the document when it was sent for ratification. Both documents are at the National Archives and Yale Avalon.
Morris was among the most vocal opponents of slavery at the Constitutional Convention. Madison's Notes — preserved at the Yale Avalon Project — record his speeches throughout the Convention. On August 8, 1787, when the Convention debated representation and the Three-Fifths Clause, Morris rose to speak against the inclusion of enslaved people in the apportionment of congressional seats. Madison recorded his words directly.
"He never would concur in upholding domestic slavery. It was a nefarious institution. It was the curse of heaven on the States where it prevailed."
Morris moved to insert "free" before the word "inhabitants" in the apportionment provision — a change that would have excluded enslaved people from the population count used to allocate congressional seats. The motion was not adopted. The Three-Fifths Clause remained. Morris's speech against it is recorded verbatim in Madison's Notes.
"The admission of slaves into the representation, when fairly explained, comes to this: that the inhabitant of Georgia and South Carolina who goes to the coast of Africa, and, in defiance of the most sacred laws of humanity, tears away his fellow creatures from their dearest connexions and damns them to the most cruel bondage, shall have more votes in a government instituted for protection of the rights of mankind, than the citizen of Pennsylvania or New Jersey, who views with a laudable horror so nefarious a practice."
This passage from Morris's August 8 speech states the constitutional contradiction of the Three-Fifths Clause in direct terms: that the act of enslaving people gave slaveholders additional political power within a government founded on the rights of mankind. The speech did not change the outcome. The Convention retained the Three-Fifths Clause. Morris signed the Constitution that contained it.
Morris spoke forcefully against slavery on the Convention floor. On August 8, 1787, he called it "a nefarious institution" and "the curse of heaven on the States where it prevailed." He moved to exclude enslaved people from the population count used for representation. The motion failed. The Three-Fifths Clause remained in the final document. Morris signed the Constitution anyway on September 17, 1787. The Constitution he signed also contained the Slave Trade Clause, which prohibited Congress from banning the importation of enslaved people until 1808, and the Fugitive Slave Clause, which required free states to return escaped enslaved people to their enslavers. Madison's Notes record both the speeches and the outcome. The archive holds the full record of both.
In January 1792, President Washington appointed Morris as Minister Plenipotentiary to France — the fourth person to hold that office. He presented his credentials to the French government on June 3, 1792. He was in Paris as the Revolution accelerated: the storming of the Tuileries in August 1792, the September Massacres, the execution of Louis XVI in January 1793, and the height of the Reign of Terror in 1793 and 1794. The French government eventually requested his recall, which took effect in April 1794.
Morris kept a detailed diary throughout his time in France and in Europe more broadly. That diary, along with his letterbooks and correspondence, is held at the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress as the Gouverneur Morris Papers — spanning 1771 to 1834. His letters to Washington during this period, held in the George Washington Papers at LOC, provide a firsthand account of the Revolution as observed by the American Minister in Paris.
That instrument [the Constitution] was written by the fingers which write this letter.
The Biographical Directory of Congress records Morris's service across his full public career: delegate to the New York Provincial Congress, 1775–1777; delegate to the Continental Congress, 1778–1779; Constitutional Convention delegate, Pennsylvania, 1787; U.S. Senator from New York, 1800–1803. The Department of State records his appointment as Minister to France: appointed January 12, 1792, credentials presented June 3, 1792, mission ended April 9, 1794.
Morris spoke throughout the Constitutional Convention — Madison's Notes record his interventions on representation, the executive, the judiciary, and slavery across the Convention's four months. He is among the most frequently recorded speakers in Madison's Notes. After the Convention he served in the Senate, managed his New York estate Morrisania, helped plan the Manhattan street grid in 1811, and died there on November 6, 1816.
Morris wrote the words that open the Constitution. He spoke against slavery on the Convention floor and signed the document that encoded it in three separate clauses. He observed the French Revolution from inside Paris and wrote about it to Washington. The archive holds the record of all of it — the speeches, the signature, the letters.
Morris's contributions were primarily textual and structural. Popular memory tends to favor dramatic biographies and signers of the Declaration. Morris did not sign the Declaration. He signed the Constitution. The archive records what he did. That record is below.
The primary sources document Morris's authorship of the Constitution's final text. They document his speeches against slavery on the Convention floor. They document his presence in Paris during the Reign of Terror and his correspondence with Washington about what he witnessed. None of this is contested. It is in the archive.
The popular memory of the founding tends to follow the Declaration rather than the Constitution, and the men whose biographies are dramatic rather than structural. Morris's contribution was primarily textual and structural. The archive records both kinds of achievement. This series goes to the archive. Every claim sourced. Every document linked. The archive is open.