'A republic, if you can keep it.'

'A republic, if you can keep it.'

Summer was hot in Philadelphia in 1787, and delegates to the Constitutional Convention were cloistered in the Pennsylvania State House since May. “Cloistered” is the right word, since the doors and windows were closed to give the convention privacy as they worked. Designing a new country is hot, sweaty work, and it must have smelled like a locker room behind those doors. Opinion This was the delegates’ second attempt at forming our new governme…