Ultra-Rare Copy of the U.S. Constitution, Found in a Filing Cabinet, Heads to Auction

If you’ve ever wanted to own a rare signed copy of the U.S. Constitution, now’s your chance. On September 28, 2024, Brunk Auctions in Asheville, North Carolina, will be accepting bids for an original copy (or “archetype”) of the United States Constitution signed by Secretary of Congress Charles Thomson. 

According to the auction house, the document is one of eight surviving signed copies of the proposed Constitution that were went to each of the 13 original states for ratification. It is also the only one currently held in private hands; the other seven are publicly owned. The last time such a document went up for sale was in 1891, when one sold for $400, or $13,837.19 when adjusted for inflation. 

The copy up for sale in Asheville is expected to bring in a whole lot more, with bids starting at an asking price of no less than $1 million. It’s possible the proceeds will exceed those of a 2021 sale of a rare first printing of the Constitution, which netted a record-breaking $43.2 million.

Seth Kaller, a historical documents expert consulting with the Brunk auction, claims that the archetype copy “is rarer and arguably more significant” than the item sold in 2021. Members of the Constitutional Convention, meeting in Philadelphia in September 1787, wrote a final draft of the U.S. Constitution and sent it to the Confederation Congress at Federal Hall in New York City for its approval. After resolving to send it to the 13 states for ratification, Secretary Thomson commissioned 100 printed copies of the document and signed the few delivered to the state legislatures. One of those signed copies is now being auctioned.

“This is a unique opportunity to own a cornerstone of our democracy,” Kaller said, “particularly at this time in our nation’s history. It also reminds us of the crucial role New York played in the founding of America.”

Perhaps more fascinating than the document’s origins are the circumstances of its discovery in 2022, at a 184-acre plantation estate in Edenton, North Carolina, known as Hayes Farm. Formerly owned by governor of North Carolina Samuel Johnston, the property switched hands in 1865. Its current owners found the document while clearing out the home in preparation for a sale. All these years, it had been lying inside an old filing cabinet. 

The document’s importance to American history has turned the upcoming auction into a hotly anticipated event. “James Madison wrote that the Constitution ‘was nothing more than a draft of a plan, nothing but a dead letter, until life and validity were breathed into it by the voice of the people, speaking through several State Conventions,’” auctioneer Andrew Brunk said in the statement. “This simple-looking version is what started breathing life into the Constitution.”

The auction date marks the 237th anniversary of the day that Congress passed its ratification resolution.

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