The Convention had already voted that the Congress should consist of two parts, a Senate and a House of Representatives.

By a really clever device each State sent two members to the Senate, thus equalizing the small and large States in that branch of the Government.

The House, on the other hand, represented the People, and the number of members elected from each State corresponded, therefore, to the population.
As I do not attempt to make even a summary of the details of the Convention, I should pass over many of the other topics which it considered, often with very heated discussion.

The fundamental problem was how to preserve the rights of the States and at the same time give the Central Government sufficient power.

By devices which actually worked, and for many years continued to work, this conflict was smoothed over, although sixty years later the question of State rights, intertwined with that of slavery, nearly split the Nation in the War of Secession.