The Ratification Of The U.S. Constitution. . . Richard

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.

The Articles of Confederation was the first constitution of the United States. They were written during the revolutionary war to create a more unified government, and to establish what the national government could and could not do. The Articles let each state keep “sovereignty, freedom, and independence,” and created a very weak central government. For example, Congress could not regulate commerce or impose taxes. The impact that the Articles of Confederation had on federalism for the next few years was: the federal government had very few powers, and most of the authority remained in control of each individual state.

The Articles of Confederation were the United State’s first constitution that was drafted in 1776 and set in motion a year later. The Articles of Confederation also known as “The Aoc”, ran the US government successful through the time of the American Revolution. However, the Aoc didn’t permit the national government with the power to levy taxes or regulate commerce, as a result of that all efforts at national cohesion was disheartened. So during the summer of 1787 they decided to create the “Supreme law of the land”, The Constitution. The constitution did everything the Aoc couldn’t do, it established more laws and provided increased federal authority while protecting the basic rights of it’s citizens.

The Articles of Confederation, although a big first step, had more weaknesses than strengths. In fact, the major downfall of the Articles of Confederation was its weakness. Under the Articles, the federal government had little power and was too weak to enforce any laws. The Articles gave Congress the power to pass new laws but they did not have any power to enforce them. If a state decided that they did not want to follow a law then they could just ignore it. Congress also had no power to regulate trade or levy taxes and without an executive leader or federal court system there was no way to enforce anything. Another large downfall of the Articles of Confederation is that to Amend it required a unanimous decision which in most cases is extremely difficult. Because the Articles of Confederation are often considered a failure, it’s easy to look past the achievements of the American government under those Articles. The most important piece of legislation passed under the Articles of Confederation is the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. This Ordinance provided the guidelines by which new states would use to be admitted into the Union. Judges and Governors appointed by Congress would oversee a territory until there was five-thousand free male citizens of voting age. The citizens would then elect a territorial legislature, which sent a non-voting delegate to Congress. When the population hit sixty-thousand, the territorial legislature would be eligible to submit a state constitution,

After fighting for our country against Great Britain in the American Revolution, the United States gained independence. We had to figure out how to govern ourselves since we would no longer be under the power of the monarch. The Articles of Confederation was the answer to our problems; even though it established a very weak central government and had many problems, it was our first constitution and our first step towards a solid government. Some of the problems with the Articles included that the Congress had no power to tax, no power to regulate commerce, no power to regulate domestic affairs, no power to enforce laws, and many more. The problems lead to troubles with the States which convinced the Continental Congress to create a convention of delegated people to revise them; this convention was called the Constitutional Convention. The Convention fixed these problems by throwing the Articles out altogether and creating a new Constitution.

The Articles of Confederation, which was considered the first constitution of the United States of America, and the US Constitution, which acts as the supreme law in the United States today, both are poles apart. In fact, it was only because of the weaknesses of the Articles that the present-day US Constitution was drafted. The Articles of Confederation or Articles was a written agreement which laid the guidelines for the functioning of the national government. It was drafted by the Continental Congress and sent to the thirteen original states for ratification in November 1777. Within a few years of its ratification, the Articles was subjected to severe criticism by the Founding Fathers of the United States. Problems with the document existed in plenty; the biggest issue being the fact that it left the national government at the mercy of states. Eventually, it was decided that this agreement had to be revised to suit the needs of the nation as a whole. The delegates at the Philadelphia Convention came to the conclusion that it was better to draft an entirely new constitution instead of revising the existing agreement, and thus came into existence the new US Constitution.

The federal government, under the Articles, was too weak to enforce their power. The major weakness of the Articles were the following: each state only had one vote in Congress, regardless of size; congress did not have the power to tax; congress did not have power to regulate foreign and interstate commerce; there was no executive branch to enforce any acts passed by congress; thee was no national court system or judicial branch; amendments to the Articles required a unanimous vote; laws required 9/13 majority to pass in Congress; and states could levy tariffs on other states’ goods. This means that, under the Articles, each state viewed its own sovereignty and power as paramount to the national good, which led to conflicts between them. States didn’t support the national government financially, each state

Finally, in 1787, many states gathered in Philadelphia to fix the Articles of Confederation. This meeting turned into the replacement of the Articles to the Constitution. Document 2 explains how the Constitution guarantees an independent and strong leader, a Supreme Court, a powerful congress, and valuable money which the Articles didn't have. Now, the Constitution only had to be ratified. This was a problem because anti-federalist, who didn't believe in the Constitution, wanted the Articles of Confederation to stay in place. This complication was fixed when the Bill of Rights was added into the Constitution as the first ten Amendments. As stated in Document 3, people, including federalists and antifederalists, felt more safe when the Bill of Rights were added and ratified into the Constitution because there was no way of bending or changing the Bill of Rights. A strong part of the Constitution was that it promised that it could never become a monarchy or government where one individual ruled everyone. This was possible by checks and

The articles of confederation were first put into place in 1777 as a temporary constitution preparing for if the colonists won the revolution against Britain. The colonists did win the war and used the Articles of confederation as their constitution for 10 years even though it was only meant to be temporary. The Articles of Confederation were effective in controlling foreign relations with other countries. However the articles of confederation were ineffective in improving the country's economy and in controlling western borders in a reasonable way. Therefore we had no stable way of improving our economy or efficient way for the federal government to control the western settlement of the colonists and the indians they angered.

Shortly after the Declaration of Independence was written and signed America had only one problem at the time that did not involve England. America had no form of government to fill the hole that was made when the separated from Parliament. This led to America creating the first republic ever seen in the whole world. Why did the not just follow in the footsteps of the Europeans country and have a monarchy? Because they did not want the new fund nation to collapse within itself like what was happening at the time and also to try and fix problems that were obvious with Parliament. This lead them to the Articles of Confederation. This document had 13 articles which gave the young America its government. The Articles of Confederation promoted state

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

According to ushistoryscene.com, the Articles placed all of the power in the hands of each state, rather than placing it in the hands of the national government. Article IV states, “Full faith and credit shall be given in each of these States to the records, acts, and judicial proceedings of the courts and magistrates of every other State.” This means that there was absolutely no independent judicial system for the national government and made each state responsible for their own judiciary branch. Because of this, states could repeal any action taken by the national government that they did not agree with. Also, because there was no national court system, complaints could not be filed against the national

The Article of Confederation, was put in place and structured for the safety of the American people, who had just returned from fighting for independence, to not be anxious Americans who did not want one sole person to have total power. The Articles were written before the war was won, in 1777, and was put into law following it, being ratified in 1781, conforming with the issues resolved in the Treaty of Paris. The American people also did not want to give the government too much power because they feared that if given such power, the government would abuse it. While the Articles of Confederation provided the American people with what they need having just finished their war for independence with Great Britain, it did not provide the new country

The Articles of Confederation was the United State’s first constitution, it was written in an effort to unite the states after the American Revolution and served as a blueprint for the modern constitution. In order for the Articles to become official, they had to be approved by all thirteen colonies. Although Congress sent the Articles of Confederation to the states around the end of 1777 to become ratified, they were not officially adopted until March 1, 1781. Under these Articles, the states remained sovereign and independent, with Congress serving as the last resort on appeal of disputes. The American people feared a strong national government and as a result of this, the Articles of Confederation were specifically designed to be weak in the sense that each state maintains its own sovereignty and all rights to govern themselves, with the except of the rights exclusively granted to Congress. Since the Articles lacked many necessary components to keep a nation properly structured, they were eventually revised into the constitution we recognize today. Although, the Articles of Confederation seemed as though it only contained weaknesses, within the document, many strengths and accomplishments were made. Overall, the Articles of Confederation were proven to be both efficient and non-efficient during the time period they were in effect.

At first the Articles had to deal with three unrelated issues. First, they had to assume responsibility of covering the war debts. Next, the Articles had to see to making peace with the Indians. Finally, they had to guide the citizens in dealing with the western settlement. The Articles seemed to be a fair form of government with equal rights and powers and no executive legislature, however, it was very weak causing a modest form of upper power to slowly be invented.