The LuLac Edition #5, 613, March 28th, 2026

 

GEORGE MASON

PASSIONATE VIRGINIAN

George Mason was an American planter, politician, Founding Father, and delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787, one of three delegates who refused to sign the Constitution. His writings, including substantial portions of the Fairfax Resolves of 1774, the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, and his Objections to this Constitution of Government (1787) opposing ratification, have exercised a significant influence on American political thought and events. The Virginia Declaration of Rights, which Mason principally authored, served as a basis for the United States Bill of Rights, of which he has been deemed a father.

Mason prepared the first draft of the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1776, and his words formed much of the text adopted by the final Revolutionary Virginia Convention. He also wrote a constitution for the state;   Thomas Jefferson and others sought to have the convention adopt their ideas, but Mason's version was nonetheless adopted. He served in the Delegates of the  Virginia Assembly, but to the irritation of Washington and others, he refused to serve in the  Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia, citing health and family commitments.

In 1787, Mason was named one of his state's delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, his only lengthy trip outside Virginia. Many clauses in the Constitution were influenced by Mason's input, but he ultimately did not sign the final version, citing the lack of a bill of rights among his most prominent objections. He also wanted an immediate end to the slave trade and a supermajority requirement for navigation acts, fearing that restrictions on shipping might harm Virginia. He failed to attain these objectives in Philadelphia and later at the Virginia Ratifying Convention of 1788. His prominent fight for a bill of rights led fellow Virginian James Madison to introduce the same during the First Congress in 1789; these amendments were ratified in 1791, a year before Mason died. Obscure after his death, Mason later came to be recognized in the 20th and 21st centuries for his contributions to Virginia and the early United States.

In October 1792, Thomas Jefferson visited his fellow Virginian and found Mason, then suffering from gout, needing a crutch to walk, though still sound in mind and memory. Additional ailments, possibly pneumonia, set in. Less than a week after Jefferson's visit, on October 7, George Mason died at Gunston Hall, and was subsequently buried on his estate, within sight of the house he had built and of the Potomac River.

Although Mason's death attracted little notice, aside from a few mentions in local newspapers, Jefferson mourned "a great loss". Another future president, Monroe, stated that Mason's "patriotic virtues through the revolution will ever be remembered by the citizens of this country".

In 1957 George Mason University (GMU) was founded. It is a public research university in Fairfax County, Virginia, United States. Located in Northern Virginia near Washington, D.C., the university is named in honor of George Mason, a Founding Father of the United States.