Brutus says in his essay that this power given to the federal government will take away all of the state government’s power to collect taxes and that the constitutions and treaties of the states will become null. Hamilton denies this by explaining that the structure of the proposed federal government will preserve the state constitutions. What Hamilton says about this seems to go against Article 6 of the Constitution, which says that the law of the Constitution will be supreme over the states. Brutus’ Essay V seems to say the same thing over and over again. Many of the things that he lists as problems to the nation are things that we love about our government today.
Professor of history Gordon S. Wood views the struggle for a new constitution in 1787-1788 as a social conflict between upper-class Federalists who desired a stronger central government and the “humbler” Anti-Federalists who controlled the state assemblies. He says that the writers and supporters of the Constitution were Federalists and they believed that the Constitution was a fulfillment. Which basically means, that those Federalists didn’t see anything wrong with the Constitution. Antifederalists said the Constitution was a denial of the principles of 1776. They were saying that the Constitution was didn’t honor the liberty nor the self-government.
I believe the Constitution did a better job of protecting liberties, specifically in the areas of the federal court system, representation of the people, and the levy of taxes. Alexander Hamilton, statesman and economist, proclaimed "Laws are a dead letter without courts to expound and define their true meaning and operation”. The Articles of Confederation which gave rise to the Confederation government that took effect in March 1781, did not give the national government any means to enforce the federal laws. The states could, and often did, choose to interpret or enforce federal laws in any manner they saw fit. This led to disputes amongst the states that could not be readily settled, as it relied on each state’s court system which invariably chose to discount the ruling of the other states.
Such a weak executive could hardly balance the power of the legislature, however. John Locke, addressing this difficulty in his Second Treatise, added a third power to the balance to strengthen the executive. The "federative" power, as he called it, concerned foreign relations (the ability to federate or ally with other countries). While this federative power was theoretically distinguishable from the executive, in practice it was inseparable from the executive, because it, like the executive, presupposed the united power of society. Circumstances would frequently demand that these two powers be exercised for the common good, but in the absence of a standing law and sometimes even against the law.
The controversy of the argument was on the basis that, “there was an inherent connection between the states and the preservation of individual liberty, which is the end of any legitimate government.” Their own argument have invariably created a national government instead of a federal government. This is because “the federal form, which regards the Union as a confederacy of sovereign states, instead of which, they have framed a national government, which regards the Union as a consolidation of the states.” Anti-federalists were against constructing a new constitution and they agreed that without valid amendments the constitution would give the government too much power. This power would then lead to confusion according to the (Centinel 1787) “ The new constitution instead of being panacea or cure of every grievance so delusively represented by its advocated will be found upon examination like Pandora’s box replete with every
2. Anti-Federalist * Disaproved of the Constitution for fears of it favoring an elite minnority. The anti-federalist also thought the Constitution would fail in safeguarding a large amount of individual freedoms. 3. Articles of Confederation * Enacted in 1781, these articles were designed to perserve each states independence while still
Antifederalists thought that increasing the national government’s power would doom the states, and that state governments were more responsive to popular will. This showed British-American’s fears of concentrated power. The federalists had popular figures like Washington and Franklin on their side. The constitution was ratified June 21, 1788. The last state to vote was New Hampshire.
The Federalist Papers written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay were influential in spurring the American people on to the idea of a stronger central government. The major Anti-Federalists were Patrick Henry and Sam Adams, who vehemently opposed a new Constitution being ratified until the Bill of Rights was introduced. All in all the Anti-Federalist argument was weakly put together and failed to convince the public to stick with a revised version of the Articles of Confederation. All of these various factors contributed to the new Constitution because of the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation the strengths of the new Constitution and the Federalists versus Anti-Federalists debate. Though we no longer go by the Articles of Confederation in today’s government this essay shows the many ways it was a major building block in today’s
Examples included voting rights and citizenship, and the founders passed this to the states to decide. According to Bowles, 2011, American History 1865 to present End of Isolation, though slavery was the underlying reason for the war, another central debate was the rights of states versus the powers of the federal government. While Republicans were strongly in favor of a stronger federal government, Johnson opposed this direction and wanted states to have more power, includ¬ing the southern states. Which basically meant, more blacks in the government ; Johnson disapproved. As Johnson and Congress wres¬tled with these issues, their clash came to somewhat of a head with a disagreement over the Freedman’s Bureau.
Many members of congress believed that individuals should have these rights regardless of having it formally written and didn’t want to create a Bill of Rights. In fact, some believed that implementing personal rights might actually take away rights (UMKC, 2012). These people were called federalists. James Madison had a different agenda though. The anti-federalists sought after a proposal that focused on passing laws, which protected the people as well as the government.