Captioning performed by vitac captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2008 each one is different. Each one has its own sets of governments and own sets of law, and ill use pennsylvania. This room was pennsylvanias legislature. Pennsylvania decides to write a constitution that is so radical for its day that they basically get rid of the position of governor. They are not going to have really a chief executive for pennsylvania anymore. They are going to have a fairly democratically run onehouse legislature as opposed to the standard two houses that most of the states are going to use, that the United States has known throughout its history so pennsylvania has a very different setup. It proves a little too radical to work and our 177 of pennsylvania constitution will last only 14 years. They will have to redo it, go to the traditional two houses of government and legislature setup. This is 1776 that each of these states is going to start itself over. Now, the problem is being al
Philadelphia serves as our temporary u. S. Capital. This room is for the house of representatives. The second floor was the United States senate. The house of representatives, each representative at that point in our history represented 30,000 people. We had a population around 3. 75 million. We had 106 members of the house he would sit in this room, and eventually from 16 states. The story of philadelphia as the u. S. Capital, we are taking the new constitution and doing things like adding new states to the original 13. Also the bill of rights would become a part of our constitution while philadelphia was the capital. In fact, secretary of state Thomas Jefferson would formally announce the amendments to the constitution by basically coming to congress here in this building and officially announcing that we have changed our constitution, which of course, the bill of rights is a huge part of our history and will be in the future a continuing talking point in our political life. But also
U. S. Constitution were debated and signed. This Program Featuring National Park Service Ranger matthew ifel is about one hour. We are in a building that was built in the 1730s, so about 48 years before there was any such thing as the United States and at that time, of course, pennsylvania was a british colony. And this was its Capitol Building. They would make laws for pennsylvania and each of the 13 colonies has its own government. These are the issues in a lot of ways that are going to lead to the creation of the United States, most of which will happen in this room, because the colonies as time goes forward or at least many people of the Political Class in these colonies will start to grow dissatisfied with the way the British Government is treating them, is affecting their lives locally. One of the other side issues is americans living in the colonies do not get to vote in british elections. When the parliament in london makes laws for americans, the most famous being the various
1800. Our guide as park ranger matthew. We are standing in the old house of representatives a building we Call Congress hall, although originally was billed as a county courthouse for philadelphia for most of its history, thats exactly what it was. But in the years that the city of washington d. C. Is being built, philadelphia serves as our temporary u. S. Capital. This room serves for the house of representatives, the second floor of the building we will see in a moment was United States senate, the house of representatives each representative at that point in our history represented 30,000 people. We had a population in our first census of about three and three quarters of 1 million. We had 106 members of the house, that would sit in this room. And eventually from 16 states, and the story of philadelphia as the u. S. Capital is a story that were taking a new constitution and actually operating it, doing things like adding new states to the original 13. Also, the bill of rights would
I would like to start from reading from doctor cheneys opening paragraph. Put the spike of a drawing compass into the map of virginia a dairy farm, George Washington home, extend the leg of the compass what reaches out 60 miles and draw a circle, within and it not only washington but thomas jefferson, james mattis and james rural were born leading to manhood and made their home. It is the story that evokes what the historian called the spirit of hope and perseverance that runs straight through the american experience. Doctor cheney is a longtime member of a site faculty and i want to take moment to acknowledge how much we all appreciate her scholarship and her intellectual contributions to ai, not to mention a service she is done for our country. This is the latest in a series of several works by doctor cheney that examine our countrys history, its consideration and rigor. Her last book, James Madison, became a New York Times best seller in 2014 and shed new light on the life of one of