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•At 18 and 19, Jay acknowledges the stopgap nature of the Articles of Confederation and the fact that they were barely adequate to the times. He believes that they are now totally inadequate to the challenges of governance. His perspective is that of an experienced jurist, a colleague of Robert Yates, who, as “Brutus”, was caustic in his condemnation of the entire enterprise. To what extent was Jay correct versus Yates?

Both men recognized that the Articles of Confederation were the result of reactionary pressures resulting from the Revolution. The people, although widely dispersed by this time did not seek to break ties with each other or the rest of the world for that matter. Some form of order needed to be established and it happened to take the form of the Continental Congress.

Until the writing of the Constitution, necessity was the driving force that was responsible for the articles of confederation .

The Constitution, on the other hand was an instrument to proactively determine the nations future, not to be driven by reactive forces. The assertion by Jay is that the Constitution is the correct solution. Brutus acknowledges the need but isn't convinced of its supremacy to other forms of union.

•At 21, Jay states that the people demanded the Constitutional Convention with one voice, but it was the businessmen and propertied class who demanded it in the aftermath of Shays’ Rebellion. Why does Jay see the need to shade the truth here?

The answer is in the very first line - "To the People". What we now call class warfare was at a peak of volatility and in an effort to quell any further actions we see the fluent use of similar statements designed to unite the readers and also create perceived threats where there were none (42,43), not unlike today's tweaked soundbites.

•At 23, Jay writes of “cool, uninterrupted and daily consultation,” which would have made the men who had been present at the Convention hoot in derision. He glosses over the heat, humidity and rancor of the proceedings, in which that rancor had been suppressed by both an oath of secrecy and the code of gentlemanly conduct of the era. Jay was not even there. To what extent is Jay altering history, and why?

As above, images in the peoples minds were being constructed to the advantage of his argument. A calm cool reasoned debate resulted in the instrument before you, aren't you lucky?

The alteration was intended as a 'talking point' to those who could influence the outcome. The factual comparison you make is interesting in that hindsight reveals underlying intentions of the author.