Charles Pinkney National Historic Site

Charles Pinckney National Historic Site is a rather unusual place. The park recognizes the life and contributions of Charles Pinckney. The grounds of the park were once part of his plantation, yet almost nothing on those grounds is from his lifetime. The grounds themselves are referred to as “Snee Farm” in reference to the family that owned the land after Pinckney. Nonetheless, a lot of information about Charles Pinckney and his family is available within the old house on the grounds.

You may wonder, as I did, who is Charles Pinckney anyway. If I mentioned the names of James Madison, John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas Jefferson, some might recognize them as primary authors of the U.S. Constitution. Yet Charles Pinkney played a major role in defining many of the ideals in that document. Concepts like a bicameral Congress with an “upper” and “lower” chamber, an independent chief executive (President) as its own branch of government, the separation of church and state by prohibiting a specific religious membership to hold public office, and several others were his contributions.

Pinckney did earn a right to be “at the table” discussing the new constitution. He had been active in the recent War of Independence. Fighting with the Charles Towne militia in battles at Savannah and Charleston, he was eventually captured in 1780. He spend a year as a prisoner of war before being exchanged for British prisoners.

After the war, Pinckney, already a lawyer, became involved in the South Carolina legislature and was chosen to represent the state in the 5th Continental Congress (as convened under the Articles of Confederation, the predecessor to the Constitution). He was very active in Congress, and soon recognized the weaknesses of the current Articles. He pushed for a convention to write a new constitution and ultimately was appointed as one of South Carolina’s representatives.

Early in the convention, he presented his own draft constitution. Unfortunately, this draft was lost to history, though some of his notes apparently survived among the papers of another delegate. In 1818, James Madison asked for Pinkney’s original draft, but Charles only had a copy which he thought was “substantially the same”. Scholars wondered if it was, or if he had embellished it to look like he made greater contributions. It doesn’t really make sense that he would need to embellish it as historians generally agree that 25-30 clauses in the final constitution can be traced to Pinckney.

Unfortunately, for all of the positive that Pinckley did over a lifetime of public service, he not only owned slaves but was ardently pro-slavery. He threatened to get the entire south to reject the very constitution he had helped create if it banned slavery. Following the Missouri Compromise of 1820, Pinckney gave a speech condemning Congressional interference in the slave trade. However, in the same speech, he acknowledged that he was fighting a losing battle and that the issue of slavery would only further divide the nation eventually leading to a horrific civil war. I doubt, though, that he could even comprehend how horrific that war would actually be when it did come 41 years later.

As I mentioned, the park itself is simply land where Pinckney lived. No original buildings remain. A few trails lead around the property past features of the subsequent farming, but I chose not to walk too far, as the legs were hurting. After taking in so much history I had not known, I headed south for more history at a post-Civil War site.

Steve