University of Wisconsin Center for the Study of the American Constitution, Second North Carolina Convention: Fayetteville

North Carolina held two state ratifying conventions. The first was in Hillsborough in the summer of 1788. Of the 270 delegates, Antifederalists outnumbered Federalists two to one.  Although the Federalists were strategic in their campaign, North Carolinians' resistance to anything that they perceived would threaten their sovereignty or limit their freedoms prevailed.  As is depicted in the first map found here,  by a vote of 184 to 84, the Antifederalist majority decided to neither ratify nor reject the Constitution.  However, by November 1789, when North Carolina held their second ratifying convention in Fayetteville, public opinion had significantly shifted. George Washington had been elected president of what appeared to be a stable government, Madison had handed Congress a proposed Bill of Rights, and Federalist controlled state newspapers had effectively discredited their Antifederalist opponents. As a result, as the second map shows (which is also the one shown on this site) less than one-third of the 272 seats at the Fayetteville convention went to Antifederalists and the Constitution was ratified 194 to 77.