Episode 1 of 3

House agrees to consider amendments as full body

When
21 July 1789
Where
United States House of Representatives
Part of
US House of Representatives Adopts Bill of Rights Proposal

After initially forwarding the amendments to a select committee, the House agreed on 21 July 1789 to take up Madison's proposal as a full body.

Federalist representatives attacked Madison's proposal, fearing that amending the new Constitution so soon after its implementation would create an appearance of instability, and Fisher Ames warned that a prolonged "dissection of the constitution" before the public galleries could shake public confidence. A procedural battle followed: the amendments were initially forwarded to a select committee for revision, but the House then agreed to take Madison's proposal up as a full body beginning on 21 July 1789.

Sources

  1. United States Bill of Rights Wikipedia, revision of 2026-09-06

Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.