North Carolina waited until November 21st, and little Rhode Island, the last State of all, did not come in until May 29, 1790.

But, as the adherence of nine States sufficed, the affirmative action of New Hampshire on June 21, 1788, constituted the legal beginning of the United States of America.
No test could be more winnowing than that to which the Constitution was subjected during more than eighteen months before its adoption.

In each State, in each section, its friends and enemies discussed it at meetings and in private gatherings.

In New York, for instance, it was only the persistence of Alexander Hamilton and his unfailing oratory, unmatched until then in this country, that routed the Anti-Federalists at Poughkeepsie and caused the victory of the Federalists in the State.

In Virginia, Patrick Henry, who had said on the eve of the Revolution, "I am not a Virginian, but an American," still held out.
Nevertheless, the more the people of the country discussed the matter, the surer was their conviction that Washington was right when he intimated that they must prefer the new Constitution unless they could show reason for supposing that the anarchy towards which the old order was swiftly driving them was preferable.
During the autumn of 1788 peaceful electioneering went on throughout the country.