Who is this Guy?

Want to impress people next weekend during the Final Four? Give them a full brief on the life of George Mason (and no, he was not the George Mason of Twenty-Four)...

For Most Americans, his memory pales alongside that of Washington, Jefferson, Adams or Madison because he never held high office. But Mason was in the first rank of the founding fathers, having articulated the doctrine of the inalienable rights as formulated in the Declaration of Independence.

The owner of a vast plantation, Gunston Hall, along the Potomac River near Alexandria, Va., Mason drafted the Virginia Constitution and the Virginia Declaration of Rights in the spring of 1776. In the first draft, he wrote in the declaration that "all Men are born equally free and independant, [sic] and have certain inherent natural rights," among them "the Enjoyment of Life and Liberty...."

In 1787, Mason served as a delegate to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. In large part because the Constitutiondid not contain a statement on individual rights, Mason voted against its adoption. He was vindicated in 1791, a year before his death, with the adoption of the Bill of Rights.

He was reluctant to leave Guston Hall. Now, George Mason is going to Indianapolis. (Excerpt from NYTimes, 3.27.06, Richard Goldstein, pg. D5)