The Process Of Amending The Us Constitution

Though the articles did account for a President, he did hardly more than preside over the Congress, there was no power in the Presidency. The Constitution on the other hand gave power to the executive branch headed by the President to choose the Cabinet and be another check to the judiciary and legislature. The Amending document was changed as well between the two, before 13 out of 13 colonies were needed to amend an article, while later 2/3 of both houses of Congress as well as ¾ of State legislature or National Convention were needed. The representation of the States was drastically changed, under the articles each State received one vote regardless of size, in the Constitution the upper house (Senate) has two votes from each state and the lower house would be based upon population.

Using information from the evidence below as well as your knowledge of the period, discuss the development of the United States Constitution as a document which ensured popular sovereignty.

After the Founding Fathers of America wrote our Constitution there was one more step they had to each achieve in order for it to go into effect: ratifying it. In order to ratify the Constitution nine out of the thirteen states had to agree to adopt it. The process of ratifying the Constitution turned into a debate between two groups: the Federalists and the Anti Federalist.

Article Five of the Constitution gave the procedure for amending the Constitution, that little did the founders know would be used almost immediately. In order for an amendment to be proposed either two-thirds of Congress must deem the amendment necessary or two-thirds of the state legislatures must call for a convention to propose an amendment. Once the amendment was proposed it would take three-fourths of the states to ratify the amendment. This article also ensured that no amendment could be passed that deprived a state of its equal vote in the senate. The interesting part of this Article is

It is important to understand the process of amending the Constitution in order to fully understand the level of difficulty of the procedure. One of the main reason that there are only a few amendments is due to Article V, where the framers made the formal amendment process (Sidlow, Henschen 45). There are two methods in proposing an amendment and two methods for ratifying an amendment. For proposing an

The Articles of Confederation became the first guiding principles of the original thirteen states. However, the weaknesses embedded in the articles became obvious, outweighing its positive impact and they were ratified in 1781. George Washington sated that the articles were "little more than a shadow without the substance."1 They limited the central government’s ability to work smoothly and adversely affected the economy. Lack of power left the government in dismay and they sought a fix to their problems without becoming a tyrannical monarchy. The founding fathers believed that replacing the articles with The Constitution was the best way to give the central government enough power to carry out its tasks. In 1787 delegates from all 13 states met in Pennsylvania to begin amending the articles. This process revealed many of the similarities and differences that were contained within The Articles of Confederation and The Constitution.

If an issue raises between states Articles states to use the system of negotiation. Now the federal court deals with state to state issues. With passing laws before the Constitution, the Articles wanted 9/13 to pass any law. After it states 50%+1 of both of the houses plus the president needs to sign it. Also in the Articles term limit for legislative office is no more than three out of every six years. In the constitution there isn’t a term limit. The Chair of legislature is the president according to the Articles but in the constitution, the speaker of the House of Representatives, Vice President of the Senate.

The Articles gave too much power in the wrong places and the Convention fixed that. Some of the Constitution's amendments are; Congress has right to levy taxes on individuals, Court system created to deal with issues between citizens, Congress has right to regulate trade between states, 2/3 of both houses of Congress plus 3/4 of state legislatures or national convention, and Congress can raise an army to deal with military situations. Some of the Articles of Confederation amendments were; Congress could request states to pay taxes, no system of federal courts, no executive with power, each state received 1 vote regardless of size, and 9/13 needed to approve

Central to this discussion are the twin dynamics - the yin and yang - of fundamental constitutional revision and the accumulation of piecemeal changes. Attempts at constitutional revision usually occur during extraordinary times, when the nature of the existing political system is thrown into doubt. Despite the tumult that inspires their work during such times, constitutional designers never completely rewrite the constitution with which they start. Fundamental and piecemeal changes as well as carry-over from previous constitutions are clearly evident in the seven constitutions under which Texas has been governed.

The Articles of Confederation required unanimous assent from the thirteen colonies to be amended and ratified. This made it tedious and difficult to make changes to the Articles, making ratification and amendment of the Constitution a topic of to be considered when drafting the document. To be amended, amendments made to the Constitution required either a two-thirds vote from both houses of Congress or a two-thirds of agreement from the fifty states in a petition Congress would use to call a constitutional convention. For the amendment to be ratified, three-fourths of the fifty legislatures or of the convention called by the fifty states. This made amending the Constitution a lot easier than the Articles and also a lot more

Under this new system, the foreign affairs were now under authority of the executive branch, whereas the more important powers, such as treaty ratification, were under authority of the legislative branch. After numerous amounts of state ratification, the Constitution came into effect in 1789. It became and still is the basis of the US Government since then. The US Constitution has been amended 27 times since it was first ratified. These are called the Amendments.

Article VII of the Constitution requires it be passed by a minimum of nine states to become law, but the founders knew it would only gain real power with the ratification of all 13 colonies.

Article V expresses two ways an amendment can be proposed, and ratified. One of two ways an amendment can be proposed is by, two-thirds vote from both the upper and lower house of congress, which is a supermajority. The second way of proposing is, by calling a national convention, which requires two-thirds vote by state legislatures. Once proposed an amendment needs ratification, that is done in one of two ways. A three-fourths vote of all state legislatures, or acquiring a three-fourths vote from a state ratifying convention, when ratification is accomplished the amendment comes into effect. The 13th amendment was proposed by congress on January 31st, 1865, a two-thirds vote by both the senate and house or representatives: subsequently it

The founding fathers made it so difficult to amend the constitution for numerous reasons. The most obvious being that it was considered a safe guard for the Americans. It was meant to protect the people from tyranny. They wanted to insure no one can just come in and amend it without thinking of the common good of the people. The document was so very well written and thought out, they knew that they wouldn’t need many add-ins. To make the process complicated means that if what the future government wanted to change was that necessary, it would find its way to be decided, voted on, and added in.

In the initial years of the United States a meeting of delegates appointed by the several states met for the sole purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation. The result of this meeting was the creation of the U.S. Constitution that would soon become the ultimate directive for both Federal and State Governments. Since its birth it has been revised, amended, and ratified in order to solidify the allocation of power between the separate branches of government. Although this may be the case, distribution of the powers has been disputed ever since the formation of the Constitution. These political, legal, and quasi-legal constitutional disputes triggered civil unrest and led to explicit acts of opposition involving nullification and