The Pros And Cons Of The United States Constitution

On July 3rd, 1776, the Second Continental Congress unanimously declared the independence of the thirteen United States of America from Great Britain. Determined to unify the thirteen colonies, the Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, the first constitution of the United States, on November 15, 1777. However, ratification of the Articles of Confederation by all thirteen states did not occur until March 1, 1781. Although the articles did not prevent the United States from winning independence, the innate flaws of the articles became apparent in the years following the revolution. The problems of the weak, purely legislative national government became too prevalent for agents of the revolution, such as James Madison and George Washington. Madison and Washington were strong supporters of a federal, or national, constitution, and on June 21, 1788, congress ratified the Constitution of the United States. And in doing so, violated the “Revolutionary Ideology” and the will of the American people.

The first amendment was ratified in 1791. The first amendment gives people the rights to religion, freedom of speech, press, assembly and petition. As many things in life the first amendment has its positives and negatives. For instance people who have other beliefs can now go out and practice those beliefs. Before it wasn’t like that, you had no choice of what religion you wanted. If you were born a Christian that’s what you would have to be. Now Christian’s become Catholics or Catholics become Christians. A negative about the right to practice religions is others practice religions for the wrong things. For instance they join Islamic religions to hurt others not saying it’s always the case it has happened. What I would do to make it better would be that if you would like to change you’re religious beliefs you’d have to take an oath. With the oath being you are practicing a new religion for a good cause. It doesn’t intervene with the amendment because they are still allowed to change there religion. Although freedom of religion is not what the amendment says. Colin Kaeprnjck was hated for not standing up for the flag. He was refused the first amendment. He did not want to stand up for a country that has shown no remorse to people of color. Civil disobedience by David Thoreau was written for a reason. Rules are meant to be broken, you should be allowed to not stand up for the national anthem of you don’t want to. Now we have the right of freedom of speech, some say what’s so great about that we won’t be heard anyway. Their wrong freedom of speech has helped us pass so many laws we didn’t even know about. Freedom of speech is used to fight for change all the rights we have today wouldn’t have been without the help of free speech. Freedom of speech is not only the ability to speak but also to hear others and what they believe. A negative out come on freedom of speech would be that people will feel over powered and believe they can overcome anything. They’ll think they are always going to get it their way and when they don’t chaos will occur. It has changed over the years before speaking out would lead to you getting arrested, beat, etc. I would try and change people’s perspective on how everything we fight

Summary: Some of the issues were the people that denied to agree or support the constitution. Some states did not favor the way the government limited the power for the federal government because they were scared it would overrule state laws and disliked how citizens were able to control as well. Analysis: There were issues because several of states took quite a while to ratify the constitution. The constitution needed at least 9 out of 13 colonies to ratify, however the states did not support the new system. It took 10 months for 9 colonies to ratify. Although, it took almost an year the constitution was

Created on November 15, 1777 and ratified by the first 13 colonies on March 1, 1781, the articles of confederation is known for being the first constitution of the united states. “The constitution provides a division of powers, meaning it assigns certain powers to the national government and reserves others for the states.” (crouse, slide 4) The constitution is needed because if we didn't have it the government would be weak and would most likely have no power. Framers of the constitution chose a system of government on a territorial basis, between a central government and several states. “ the framers were worried about the government being too powerful because; government power inevitably poses a threat to individual liberty. Therefore the

The Constitutional Convention was the gathering point of the fifty-six delegates from the twelve states where the latest Constitution was written. This historical event took place at the Annapolis Convention in Philadelphia. The Constitutional Convention met between May and September of 1787. They argued on almost everything, some delegates argued over the powers that the president should have, and other argued about the number of representatives each state should have. To settle these problems, compromises were proposed. The most important compromises that led to the creation and ratification of the Constitution of the United States were: The Great Compromise, The Three-Fifths Compromise, The Slave Trade Compromise, and The Massachusetts Compromise.

On September 25, 1789, Congress transmitted to the state Legislatures twelve proposed amendments to the Constitution. Numbers three through twelve were adopted by the states to become the United States (U.S.) Bill of Rights, effective December 15, 1791.

When the original Articles of Confederation was drafted in 1777, a bill of rights was considered unnecessary. The U.S government was not considered a single national government, but an alliance of independent states. Since the national government has no power to restrict people’s rights, there was no need for laws to prevent it from doing so. During the Constitutional Convention of 1787 the Constitution was passed without a bill of rights. When the constitution was sent to the states for ratification, a debate broke out between the Federalists, who supported a strong national government, and the Anti-Federalists, who supported retaining the spirit of the Articles of Confederation . Although the constitution was passed without a bill of rights, some Anti-Federalists felt that that it would be worthwhile to specifically protect through constitutional amendments such individual rights as free speech, religious exercise, and jury trials. Thomas Jefferson who sided with Anti-Federalists on this matter, sent a letter in 1789 to James Madison to pass the bill of rights . Madison submitted a draft of his proposed bill of rights several months later, and Congress passed it modified version by the end of the year. After ratification by the states, the Final Bill of Rights consisted of ten amendments that covered a wide range of topics, guaranteeing citizens individual rights such as freedom of speech and religious liberty and protecting them from excessive bail, unwarranted searches,

The Bill of Rights, written by James Madison in 1791, was a document to extend the rights of United States citizens. The Bill of Rights contains the first ten amendments of the United States Constitution. These ten amendments provided a backbone for the constitution and guaranteed the people certain individual rights. Each amendment protects a specific right and deals with a variety of issues. The second amendment states, “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” (United States Constitution). This amendment is one that has dealt with many misunderstandings, miscommunications, and conflicts. Many of the disputes over the second amendment have been brought to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court is the highest law of the land, and it consists of nine justices. The Supreme Court always has the final say on whether an issue is constitutional or not. An example of one of the second amendment controversies is that of the District of Colombia v. Heller. Which was a case involving the second amendment that made it to the Supreme Court.

Indeed, we got through the revolution. Our goal was not to make the same mistake as Britain, but to set an example for the rest of the world to follow. However, if we get stuck at this point, we will never achieve what we have been striving for since the beginning. Therefore, I, John Jay, believe it is necessary to ratify the Constitution for our own good. Prior to the talks of Revolution, I was a successful lawyer, and before that, studied at Kings College (Columbia University) (“John Jay”).

In 1787, many states hesitated to help ratify the new constitution. The anti-Federalists anonymously submitted essays in the newspapers that discouraged the new way of the government. Three men John Jay, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison put together eighty-five essays to help support the new constitution that were published in the New York newspapers. All essays were to persuade states, especially New York, to approve the new constitution. Federalist paper ten was written by James Madison.

The constitution first started to provide protection over tyranny in the summer of 1787 where fifty-five delegates met in Philadelphia to help readjust the national government for the better. The task of each representative was to come together to create ideas without letting one person or any one group be in hold of too much power in order for the central government to grow stronger. The constitution had help led by the Articles of Confederation with their influence on not having a court system to make the state force a pay on taxes. The main challenge was to generate a Constitution that would be strong enough to retain possession of power for each state to a minimum so not a single person was the only one to have power or control. The guard on tyranny was supported in 4 ways federalism,separation of powers, checks and balances and small/large state compromises.

The delegates were aware of the forces dividing the states and that is the main reason that they came to the gathering in Philadelphia. Furthermore, some of the delegates that came there already had the full intention of creating a new constitution, “James Madison had come to Philadelphia battle-ready, determined to steer the convention away from the limited task of amending and correcting the Articles of Confederation and toward designing an entirely new constitution” (page 31). To include, one of the many risks of creating a new constitution was the potential of more riots and even states going into war with each other which would cause delegates to be pulled from the convention and stop states from ratifying the new constitution, “Animated

The United States government needs a strong base and a government that will protect its people. The people will not survive if there are not officials. Anti-federalists wanted each state to have its own local government which in turn makes the states less unified. If each state has different laws and there is no centralized government than there is no similarity between the states other than being on the same continent. The states have to remain united and have a strong central government so that all Americans have the same rights and laws that they are governed by.

After gaining independence from the Crown, our own people of the colonies wish to completely abolish our current government in favor of a constitution that is full of many holes. This new Constitution has a strong executive branch that is controlled by one person whom they name the president. This president could easily become a monarch, which we have tried so hard to stray away from.

Any nationwide endeavor across the world over is always faced with a myriad of challenges when one factor in, the interest of different individuals or groups. During the early years of the USA, there were many problems that politicians at the time faced when trying to create and strengthen the country’s Constitution. In the early 1780’s the young country was in a deep depression, and this played a key role in influencing the exercise as it ultimately led to a heated debate about the powers of the National and State governments. Most of the conservative politicians at the time preferred a stronger federal government while state radicals believed that states should have more power since it was in a better position to determine what was best for their citizens (Jilson, 2009). More sticking points divided the founding fathers which threatened the stability and establishment of the USA, such as slavery and federalism.