18th Amendment. It,
therefore, follows that the date on which the governor approved the
ratification, or the date on which the secretary of state of a given
State certified the ratification, or the date on which the Secretary of
State of the United States received a copy of said certificate, or the
date on which he proclaimed that the amendment had been ratified are not
controlling. Hence, the ratification date given in the following notes
is the date on which the legislature of a given State approved the
particular amendment (signature by the speaker or presiding officers of
both houses being considered a part of the ratification of the
"legislature"). When that date is not available, the date given is that
on which it was approved by the governor or certified by the secretary
of state of the particular State. In each case such fact has been noted.
Except as otherwise indicated information as to ratification is based on
data supplied by the Department of State.

[b] Brackets enclosing an amendment number indicate that the number was
not specifically assigned in the resolution proposing the amendment. It
will be seen, accordingly, that only amendments XIII, XIV, XV and XVI
were thus technically ratified by number. The first 10 amendments along
with 2 others which failed of ratification were proposed by Congress on
September 25, 1789, when they passed the Senate [1 Ann. Cong. (1st
Cong., 1st sess.) 90], having previously passed the House on September
24 [_Id._, 948]. They appear officially in 1 Stat. 97. Ratification was
completed on December 15, 1791, when the eleventh State (Virginia)
approved these amendments, there being then 14 States in the Union.

The several State legislatures ratified the first 10 amendments to the
Constitution (i.e. nos. 3 to 12 of those proposed) on the following
dates: New Jersey, November 20, 1789; Maryland, December 19, 1789; North
Carolina, December 22, 1789; South Carolina, January 19, 1790; New
Hampshire, January 25, 1790; Delaware, January 28, 1790; New York,
February 27, 1790; Pennsylvania, March 10, 1790; Rhode Island, June 7,
1790; Vermont, November 3, 1791; Virginia, December 15, 1791. The two
amendments which failed of ratification (i.e. nos. 1 and 2 of those
proposed) prescribed the ratio of representation to population in the
House, and specified that no law varying the compensation of members of
Congress should be effective until after an intervening election of
Representative