By taking the problems one by one and identifying solutions that would be accepted by all parties at that given time, the Founders identified a balanced approach to the entire issue of regulation. As lack of trust for a central government was high in virtually all states, a system of power-sharing was created in which the three branches of the state would control each other, thus creating an equilibrium in which none is stronger than the other two. In a system of checks and balances, the legislative, executive and judicial powers offered all representatives the assurance of a fair distribution of power. Besides this, federalism, as a concept of political culture was put in place, as to further reduce the fears of a centralized government.
Obviously the Constitution was not perfect from a modern point-of-view, and one could argue that some of the Founders should have pushed more for ending slavery immediately. This would not have been possible, as those states would have opted out of the system and the entire construction would have crashed. It was not the ideal Constitution, but it was the best common denominator that could have been voted.
Citizenship and democracy, another constitutional key concepts...
In order to offer citizens of large and small states equal opportunities to engage in the democratic process, the Founders negotiated a bicameral Congress in which both small and large states would have an equal opportunity to create policy and politics. Similarly, in the case of pro and anti-slavery states, a compromise was created as to offer states with slaves a three-fifth of a citizen for representation.
One of the most significant flaws in the construction of the new Constitution was the ordered liberty which did not suffice to reduce the social and political pressures that later on lead to the American Civil War. Yet, without the compromise that Madison and the other did, the current Constitution would probably never had existed.
Bibliography
McDonald, F. (1985) Novus Ordo Seclorum: The Intellectual Origins of the Constitution. University Press of Kansas
National Constitution Center (2006) Key Constitutional Concepts: Creating a Constitution The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands. Available at http://www.annenbergclassroom.org/Files/Documents/LessonPlans/CreatingAConstitutionLessonPlan.pdf
