How a local Baptist preacher changed the course of U.S. history

On Sept. 15, 1787, George Mason and James Madison were delegates from Virginia to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, which was presided over by their fellow Virginian, George Washington.

That morning, Mason argued that the proposed Constitution had a “dangerous power and structure of the government” which “would end either in monarchy or tyrannical aristocracy.”

A few days earlier, on Sept. 12, Mason, author of the Virginia Declaration of Rights, had asked for a vote on whether to include a bill of rights, guaranteeing individual freedoms, into the Constitution.

There were many things about the Constitution that Mason did not like, but if it could be “prefaced with a Bill of Rights,” he said, it would “give great quiet to the people” and he could support it. But not even a single state delegation supported the concept of a federal bill of rights.

Mason’s argument did not win out, and late on the afternoon of Sept. 15, the Constitutional Convention voted, according to Madison’s succinct journal entry “on the question to agree to the Constitution, as amended. All the States Ay.”

A decade earlier, in 1776, John Leland began pastoring at his first church, the Mount Poney Church in Culpeper, a ministry that Leland said “was not a blessing to the people. … I was too young and too roving to be looked up to as a pastor. Difficulties arose, the church split, and I just obtained a dismission and recommendation. God had another man for Mount Poney church. William Mason became their pastor, and he has done wonders in the name of Jesus.”

The Lelands moved from Culpeper to Orange County, which was their ministry base for the next 13 years. There Leland became “probably the most popular [preacher] of any who ever resided in this State.”

From the fall of 1787 to 1789, a revival was spreading throughout James Madison’s congressional district, and Pastor Leland preached at revival meetings all over Orange, Culpeper, Spotsylvania and Louisa counties.

Meanwhile, the states were holding ratification conventions to decide on whether to accept the Constitution.

In the spring of 1788, James Madison was a candidate to be Orange County’s delegate to the Virginia Ratification Convention. His chances for success did not look good.

He was running as a Federalist (pro-Constitution) candidate in a strongly anti-Federalist county. George Mason, Richard Henry Lee and Patrick Henry did not want Virginia to ratify the Constitution.

Madison’s father and others wrote to him that the region’s Baptists, led by Leland, were also opposed to the Constitution. Leland’s two main concerns were that it lacked a Bill of Rights and “Religious Liberty is not sufficiently secured.”

On the day before the election, Madison spent a half-day with Leland, escorting him to speak to Baptist gatherings, with the result that Leland and the Baptists switched their position, supported Madison and Madison was elected with 80 percent of the vote.

The Virginia convention ratified the Constitution on a vote of 89-79. If Virginia had failed to ratify, George Washington, James Madison, Thomas Jefferson and all other Virginians would have been ineligible for office in the first national government.

Years later, on Jan. 3, 1802, two days after writing his famous “wall of separation” letter to the Danbury Baptists, President Thomas Jefferson invited Pastor Leland to preach before both Houses of Congress. In a wonderful demonstration of pastoral courage and political irony, Leland preached to Congress about Jesus Christ’s proclamation of His total wisdom, His constant presence, and His permanent sovereign authority.

Sharman’s column appears Tuesdays on the editorial page.