John P Roche The Founding Fathers Analysis

Representative government was used in the form of Town Hall meetings, where officials would be elected once a year. In Limitations of Government, John Cotton wrote that “It is therefore most wholesome for magistrates and officers in church and commonwealth never to affect more liberty and authority then will do them good; and the people good.”(Doc H). Cotton’s purpose in writing this was to show that in is beneficial to limit the power of the government in order to allow for the good of the people. Puritans believed that no one should become too powerful, otherwise they might try to undermine the power of god. While this system of government promoted the liberty of the commonwealth, certain Puritan ideas withheld these liberties from a majority of the people. Since religion was a focal point in New England, only churchgoers could participate in these elections. Yet due to the belief that women should be subservient to their husbands, those churchgoers had to be men. These restrictions, followed by the requirement that these men be free and white, left a tiny fraction of the population able to exercise the right to vote. This system of government was, however, revolutionary for it’s time, and made great strides from England's own Parliamentary system.

Fisher Ames was one of the great founding fathers who helped start the United States of America. Although citizens today may not hear or know much about him he is as much a part of the history of this nation as other more known men such as Thomas Jefferson. Ames was a good man who did not want conflict and enjoyed the simple things in life. This is seen in the following quote: “…in his distaste for publick diversions, and his preference of simple pleasures” (Ames 1809, page ix). All in all, fisher Ames had an interesting background, important views on Christianity and the Bible and how they relate to government, as well as equally important views on government in general.

The foundation of the Constitution was a conflict based upon competing economic interests; interests of both the federalists and anti-federalists. “In the ratification it became manifest that the line of cleavage for and against the Constitution was between substantial personalty interests on the one hand and the small farming and debtor interests on the other hand.” According to Beard, the Federalists, the founders who supported a strong, centralized government

The first question concerned how the colony was to be governed, how "democratically" as we would say now. Here, the Puritan concept of the "covenant" with God, which bound them to His laws, led naturally into the idea that the people so bound should have a covenant among themselves about how to enforce God's laws.

Pennsylvania colony had about 6 different Native American tribes. Pennsylvania is one of the Atlantic coast colony. The Pennsylvania became a colony in the year 1681. The religion that Pennsylvania had was Quaker. The purpose of the Pennsylvania is for Quakers did not have strict rules. Pennsylvania is also called Penn Woods. Also Penn Woods was named After Admiral

The Founding Fathers: A Reform Caucus in Action, written by John P. Roche, addressed the difficulty that the Founding Fathers had in constructing the U.S. Constitution because of the high level of stress they received and the limited amount of time that they had to carry out the formation of this document while keeping the best interest of the country as a priority. John P. Roche starts of by commenting on why the creation of the Constitution was so effective and how the Articles of Confederation benefitted the ratification of the new U.S. Government. As it turns out, the delegates elected to attend Pennsylvania were mainly people who had served in Congress and had experience in the weakness of the Articles in granting too little power to the national government. In addition, the delegates were appointed by the state legislatures, not by the people, as justified by the Articles of Confederation.

The Constitutional Convention of 1787 was held to address problems in governing the United States which had been operating under the Articles of Confederation since it’s independence from Britain. Fifty-five delegates from the states attended the convention to address these issues. The delegates consisted of federalists who wanted a strong central government to maintain order and were mainly wealthier merchants and plantation owners and anti-federalists who were farmers, tradesmen and local politicians who feared losing their power and believed more power should be given to the states. The Constitutional Convention dealt with the issue of the debate between federalists and anti-federalists. The debates, arguments and compromises

The Puritans greatly impacted the political development of the New England colonies. Firstly, the idea of a representative government was derived from Puritan ritual. Much as the Puritans believed the congregation should elect the reverend, the Puritans also believed that the government should get its power from the people. This experiment in democracy was one of the hallmarks of Puritan influence on the New England colonies. Extending that idea was the idea of unity, politically speaking. As said by John Winthrop, “Wee must delight in eache other, make other’s conditions our own…” [Document A]. The concept of unity and

In the late 1700s, the United States had began to split into two factions: Federalists and Antifederalists. Factions are groups of citizens united by a common interest. The reasoning behind the differing views of how the government works across the world was best said by Locke “Men are equal in a natural sense, but society establishes many dimensions that are unequal”. (Barbour and Wright, 2017). In the states, Federalists wanted a strong central government while anti-federalists wanted a weak one. “The Georgians, for example, wanted a strong central authority to provide military protection for their huge, underpopulated state against the Creek Confederacy; Jerseymen and Connecticuters wanted to escape from economic bondage to New York; the Virginians hoped to establish a system which would give that great state its rightful place in the councils of the republic” (Roche, 800). The one thing they agreed on was having George Washington as president. George Washington tried to be a neutral leader of the United States and suggested for the states to stay together rather than divide into factions. “Thomas Jefferson is credited as stating: “North and South will hang together if they have you to hang on””(Jamison, 2016).

As our nation’s history has shown we have made mistakes in our past and been forced to learn from those mistakes. We have taken certain ideas and beaten them to death at times. The members of the constitutional convention of 1787 did the same thing as they were trying to decide what should be written in the constitution and how the government should be structured. Many plans were presented and rejected as the members argued until finally a great compromise was made and the structure our government for finally started to take shape.

When delegates met in 1787 they aimed to create a new constitution for a stronger central government. The delegates deemed the older Articles of Confederation weak because there was no court system and government didn't have enough power to tax the states. The delegates decided to draft a new governing document because they needed a stronger central government.The previous governmental charter, the Articles of Confederation, failed because did not guard against tyranny and had a weak stronger government..Anti-federalists and Federalists pushed for a government that was strong enough to hold the states and the people without letting

These people agreed on the Constitution as they believed that it would strengthen the federal government. The reason behind their belief of a stronger federal government was their fear of too much power given to the people. They wanted people who feared the Constitution to know that they will not regret the ratification of the Constitution. Most importantly on their side, they want both sides to be happy. The evidence that supports these claims are, “...not invested with more powers than indispensably necessary to perform the functions of a good government.” (Document 4), “These powers...are so distributed...that it can never be in danger of degenerating the monarchy.” (Document 4), and “Each individual then must contribute such a share of his rights as is necessary for attaining that security that is essential to freedom.” (Document 6). This evidence proves that the federalists are making sure that everyone is content with their rights. They are also assuring the anti federalists that the federal government will not abuse power and they will not take over their

The Constitution was written as a compilation of compromise. It was a compromise because all the states had to negotiate with each other be able to create a sovereignty. They also wanted too ratified the constitution by the states so every state had to get something they wanted. Compromises were also created because people fear a centralized government that was, “The framers also were deeply concerned that the new national government might invade the proper province of state governments or threaten the basic rights of the people”(pg 32). Landowners fear a powerful central government, so they came up with different solutions. For instance, in the Video they talk about representation, every state wanted to have fair representation big states

Although they had drastic differences in their opinions, they were able to hammer out a seven-article constitution. Perhaps it was these differences in opinions that made the citizens more trustworthy of the Constitution. For example, Patrick Henry, Governor of Virginia at the time, believed that the states should be independent of the national government and be more powerful as well. But Alexander Hamilton believed that the new national government should be very powerful, almost like another monarchy. So, almost every citizen’s opinion was represented at this convention.

The pillars of constitutional liberty are self-government, private property, representative government, and limited government. Self-government speaks of the individual who attributes common good to society and does not harm society through selfish actions. Vocation in the Christian worldview develops political liberty through the practice of self-government (Samson, 1994). James Madison thought that “the larger the society…the more duly capable it will be” to self-govern (Madison, 1788). The New England Puritans through practicality needed certain functions such as common defense to be attended to thus, they created political covenants. These political covenants gave them the opportunity for self-government in these vocations and helped develop modern federalism providing for unity and diversity to flourish (Samson S. A., 1993).