Dark Bargain; Slavery, Profits, and the Struggle for the Constitution

New York: Walker & Company, 2005. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Very good. vii, [3], 230 pages. Illustrations, Footnotes, Notes, Selected Bibliography, Index. From the author's website: "I started college at sixteen and by eighteen, I was out. I worked for a bit, then went back to school locally at Queens College. I was lucky enough to encounter an extraordinary, totally superb poli sci professor named Sol Resnik... and eventually got a Ph.D. from the New School for Social Research, writing my dissertation on the underemphasized role of slave economics at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. Thirty years later, I turned it into a book, Dark Bargain. ...at various times, I've been a lecturer, senior member of a Wall Street trading firm, taxi driver, actor, quiz show contestant, and policy analyst at the Hudson Institute. I started writing in my forties after watching Nancy do it and being overwhelmed with jealousy. My first real gig was a $10 op-ed column for a local weekly in the Berkshires. They let me write whatever I wanted and it was invaluable as both an outlet and learning experience. From there, I knew I simply could not do anything else. By now, I've written well over a dozen books of both fiction and non-fiction, six of which were co-authored with Nancy, who saved my life countless times and in countless ways. I've had articles, reviews, and opinion pieces that have appeared in, among other publications, the Atlantic, Salon, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, Miami Herald, Hartford Courant, New Republic, Tablet, Bloomberg, and Berkshire Eagle. I've also written for a number of magazines that have gone bust, although I deny any cause and effect." Lawrence Goldstone throws new light on the framing of the U. S. Constitution in this intriguing chronicle of the Constitutional debates, bringing to life the remarkable range of personalities and rivalries that forged the foundation of our country. The Constitutional Convention of 1787 is generally viewed as dominated by the likes of Madison, Mason, Gouverneur Morris, and a few others; in fact, as Goldstone shows, relative unknowns like Rutledge, Ellsworth, and Sherman took over the debate and forged its eventual outcome. He also reveals how the debate over slavery was not split along North-South lines. Derived from a Publishers Weekly review: This account advances the thesis that "sectionalism and slavery are key to understanding" the Constitutional Convention. Goldstone recreates the convention, focusing in particular on four delegates: George Mason, a Virginia planter who ultimately refused to sign the Constitution; John Rutledge, a South Carolina lawyer and statesman; Oliver Ellsworth, a dour Connecticut attorney turned judge; and Roger Sherman, a Massachusetts native transplanted to Connecticut, who had risen from cobbler and almanac maker to respected politician. Sherman was the architect of the so-called Connecticut Compromise, which included the plan that states' representation in the House, but not the Senate, would be based on population. Goldstone discusses the genesis of the three-fifths compromise (that for purposes of taxation and legislative apportionment, slaves would count as 3/5 of a person), the debate over the office of the president and the other key convention issues.