Page:The Records of the Federal Convention of 1787 Volume 3.djvu/540

 evidence on this subject, not within your own reach, must await a future, perhaps a posthumous disclosure.

One conjecture explaining the phenomenon has been, that Mr. Pinckney interwove with the draught sent to Mr. Adams passages as agreed to in the Convention in the progress of the work, and which, after a lapse of more than thirty years, were not separated by his recollection.

The resolutions of Mr. Randolph, the basis on which the deliberations of the Convention proceeded, were the result of a consultation among the Virginia Deputies, who thought it possible that, as Virginia had taken so leading a part in reference to the Federal Convention, some initiative propositions might be expected from them. They were understood not to commit any of the members absolutely or definitively on the tenor of them. The resolutions will be seen to present the characteristic provisions and features of a Government as complete (in some respects, perhaps, more so) as the plan of Mr. Pinckney, though without being thrown into a formal shape. The