But when he found that public sentiment ran so strongly against the Cincinnati, he withdrew as its president and he told Madison that he would vote to have the Society disbanded if it were not that it counted a minority of foreign members.

Stronger than a desire for a private life and for the ease of Mount Vernon was his sense of duty as a patriot; so that when this was strongly urged upon him he gave way and consented.
Spring came, the snows melted in the Northern States, and through the month of April the delegates to this Convention started from their homes in the North and in the South for Philadelphia.

The first regular session was held on May 25th, although some of the delegates did not arrive until several weeks later.

They sat in Independence Hall in the same room where, eleven years before, the Declaration of Independence had been adopted and signed.

Of the members in the new Convention, George Washington was easily the first.