13. Benjamin Franklin had little participation in the Constitutional Convention
Benjamin Franklin is often cited as a source of the Iroquois influence in the American Constitution. He did attend the Convention, and no doubt offered sage advice when asked. But he seldom participated in the debates and discussions which shaped the document. His advocacy of a Grand Council form of government, as in the Albany Plan, was quickly dismissed when the delegates accepted the form of government in three branches, Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary. The adoption of a bicameral legislative, with an upper and lower house, further separated the Constitution from the Iroquois, which had a single deliberative body. Proportional representation in the lower house, the House of Representatives, has been linked to the Great Council. But the Constitution links representation to population, the Iroquois to hierarchy within the Confederation, based on geography. Geographic location determined the importance of a tribe to the defense of the Confederation.
Nor did the framers give consideration to hereditary positions within the government, at least no more than in passing. There is little doubt that George Washington could have assumed the role of a constitutional monarch, as in Great Britain. Titles of nobility and hereditary government positions were quickly dismissed by the delegates in Philadelphia. The closest they came to that was the establishment of two senators per state in the upper house, appointed by the states rather than elected by the people. None of the offices of the government were appointed along matrilineal lines. Nothing existed to preclude any citizen from directly addressing their representatives, senators, or even the Chief Executive on matters deemed pertinent to the citizen. Even the appointed Senators were limited to terms of six years, though they could be reappointed at the will of the individual states.