Download or read book What Did the Constitution Mean To Early Americans? written by Edward Countryman and published by Bedford Books. This book was released on 1999-01-15 with total page 200 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What did the Constitution mean to early Americans? Ostensibly the foundational document of a sovereign American people, the U.S. Constitution affected different kinds of Americans in very different ways. Modern historians have investigated its impact on various groups in an effort to determine what the Constitution meant to the founding generation of Americans. Exploring how early Americans shaped, responded to, and debated the document, this volume's 5 selections attempt to gauge the Constitution's ultimate success in forging a government based on the consent of the American people.