The Constitution of North Dakota (1889) was written from July to August of 1889. The so-called ‘Omnibus’ Enabling Act of 1889 permitted the splitting up of the Territory of Dakota into two states, as well as the admittance of Montana and Washington into the Union. Following the passage of the Enabling Act, 75 delegates from 25 districts met at Bismarck on July 4 to draft the state’s foundational text.

Unlike the South Dakota Convention, which used the articles of the Sioux Falls constitution as the basis of the drafting process, North Dakota approached constitution-writing with a more open proposition format. Individual delegates presented files on specific subjects, which were numbered and referred to one, or occasionally multiple, of the 23 standing committees established to consider propositions relevant to their area of expertise. These committees prepared reports on the propositions in which they recommended indefinite postponement, adoption, amendment, or a substitute proposition on the same subject. These reports were then referred to the Convention to be taken up in the Committee of the Whole. The Committee of the Whole considered the standing committee reports, and drafted its own reports either recommending the adoption of the standing committee reports, or offering its own recommendations on the proposition or propositions under consideration. The Convention then voted to adopt or reject the Committee of the Whole’s recommendations. When a report recommending the passage of a particular file was adopted, the file in question was referred to the Committee on Revision and Adjustment, whose duty it was to order the propositions into a draft constitution, whilst ensuring that no one part of the Constitution conflicted with any other. The draft constitution was sent back to the Convention, where it was amended and voted upon section-by-section for the final time. Successful articles were ultimately enrolled as the Constitution of North Dakota, approved by the Convention, and ratified on October 1, 1889.

To construct the Quill timeline, the editors consulted the Proceedings and Debates of the First Constitutional Convention of North Dakota, and the Journal of the Constitutional Convention for North Dakota. Where relevant, both sources have been used to corroborate the events in the timeline. A full list of source materials can be found on the “Full Record” view. Future editions of this project could incorporate the accounts of the proceedings published in other contemporary newspapers as well.

Users may be interested in the how pieces of proposed constitutional text circulated throughout the Convention. This procedure is captured in a document event’s “Related Events” tab. A more general overview of documents’ journeys throughout the Convention is provided by the “Calendar View”. This negotiation is notable for the flurry of external petitions, received by the Convention in its final days, upon the subject of its controversial decision to designate the location of state institutions within the constitution. The “Document Library” view provides a zoomed out look at all documents that were introduced in the Convention and will be compelling to those users who are approaching the project with an interest in particular documents.

Elizabeth Green

Documentary Editor

Quill Project

Pembroke College, Oxford.

July 2023.