Nicole Brennan AP US History- Pd. 9 October 15, 2010 To what extent was the United States Constitution a radical departure from the Articles of Confederation? The Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation to establish the laws and government of the newly independent country of the United. The Articles of Confederation however proved to be quite flawed. They were far from perfect leaving many people unhappy with them.
Since the government could not set up a national currency, and states were allowed to make their own, this caused trade between states to be very difficult. In Joseph Jones letter to George Washington (DOC C), he wrote how war veterans felt mistreated when they were not paid and the pay that was earned did not have much value. Jones wrote “One ground of discontent in the army is the delay in complying with their requests.” By never giving congress the power to establish a set currency for the nation, money traded between each state had
THESIS : Because of its lack of stability , good decision making , and inflexibility of an amendment regarding the states during the years 1781-1789 , the Articles of Confederation , did a poor job in insuring the security of the United States' economy The Articles of Confederation did a poor job in insuring the security of the United States economy. In a letter from the Rhode Island assembly to the members of Congress , they expressed their disagreement regarding the recommendation for taxes on imported goods , which could ulitimatley damage their economy, With the Articles , Congress had no power to regulate commerce , which left states free to establish conflictiong laws regarding tariffs and navigation. Another crippling handicap to Congress was the fact that they also could not enforce its tax-collection program. Despite their attempts for asking the states to contribute theri share , Congress failed to ever meet its quota. During the time period of the Articles of Confederation , Congress lacked much power and was never capable of contributing the money to get the United States out of their war debt.
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.
The Articles of Confederation – DBQ The Articles of Confederation failed to provide proper leadership and government to the United States economically, politically, and socially. The Confederation’s lack of control over their states led to disarray and confusion among trade and taxes. There was also an issue convincing state officials to participate in the government as well as settling disputes between the states and even other countries. The Articles of Confederation had problems getting a hold on their economic situation. The nation was quite poor from the Revolution and had loans from the French that it was unable to pay back.
While Concord was part of the revolution, it could be said that the city was split, and were very hesitant to rebel. The leaders eventually decided to join the Revolution due to the framework of their society being threatened, such as the enactment of the Intolerable Acts. The colonist's felt like “they were losing control of their political lives as well” (p107) According to several passages from the book “The Minute Men and Their World” by Robert Gross. They were originally fighting to gain representation in English parliament, when Concord suddenly changed into becoming to spearhead of the revolution with the minutemen. Prior to, and including on the eve of the American Revolution, the colonists in Concord had many problems of their own inside their society.
The main weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation are that it legislated for states but not for individuals. Congress had no power to tax or regulate trade. It lacked power to control commerce. And it was too difficult to change any of the articles. Then the Constitution was put into place 1787 to overthrow the Articles of Confederation.
What were the major arguments that surfaced in opposition to the new Constitution proposed in 1787? How did supporters of the Constitution counter those arguments? Before the Constitution was proposed in 1787, under the Articles of Confederation, there was no control of the country; debt was piling up and there was no enforcement of taxes. Many arguments surfaced in opposition to the new Constitution, but the main concern had to do with the concept of a “president” where there was a single executive leader and centralized government, and that there was no bill of rights. Supporters of the constitution countered these arguments by adding some safeguards in some cases and also by thoroughly explaining the limited powers that the leader and government would have and the necessity for a strong central government.
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
Declaration of Independence. The |United States, was written in 1777, it was not adopted until 1781. Thus the second | |Congress |Second Continental Congress took place in the wake of the Seven Years’ War |Continental Congress continued to govern until that time. Given that the Congress had | | |between Great Britain and France (1756–1763), which left Britain deep in debt. |started as an ad-hoc body, that the colonists had no history of working together toward a| | | |common goal, it was clumsy and inefficient.