A DOCUMENTARY ON the short-lived State Of Franklin. “Its creators named it for a founding father, and it could have become young America’s fourteenth state. That didn’t happen but the State of Franklin’s four-year existence did change the United States Constitution. . . . Formed after the American Revolution, the State of Franklin existed before the State of Tennessee. When North Carolina ceded its western land to the federal government in the 1780s, pioneers in the area formed their own state. Named for Benjamin Franklin, the area included much of upper East Tennessee and spread from what’s now the Tennessee-Virginia border to present-day Sevier and Blount counties. While it failed its statehood bid by two Congressional votes, Franklin existed from 1784 to 1788.” I use the Franklin state constitution in my Advanced Constitutional Law class.