The US Constitution In The 18th Century

During the early years of our nation, there was struggle to finding a government that worked for the people. In the late 18th century philosophers began to strongly criticize the governments that were being dominated by monarchy and imperialism. The new beliefs in democracy, freedom for individuals of society, and the importance of human interactions led to the makings of the Constitution. Even though the ideas coming from everyone was far from an agreement, they were certain on their admiration of direct democracy and the restraints on that democracy. Their challenge in creating a government, was to strike a balance between liberty and order. Many documents built the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Declaration of Rights. For example, Second Treatise of Civil Government, The Spirit of Laws, Social Contract, The Virginia Declaration of Rights, and Common Sense.

“While the authors of the United States Constitution are frequently portrayed as noble and idealistic statesmen who drafted a document based upon their conception of good government, reality is that the constitution reflects the politics of the drafting and ratification process. Unfortunately, the result is a document that is designed to produce an ineffective government, rather than a government that can respond to issues in a timely fashion.” In support of this conclusion, the issues of slavery, The 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, and the civil rights struggle keenly demonstrate the ways in which our constitution hinders the expediency and effectiveness of America’s government. The constitution’s provisions towards voting eligibility and

A constitution is a written document that sets forth the fundamental rules by which a society is governed. Throughout the course of history the United States has lived under two Constitutions since the British-American colonies declared their independence from Great Britain in 1776. First in line was the Articles of Confederation (1789-1789) followed by the Constitution of United States of America (1789-present). The Articles of Confederation was the first formal written Constitution of America that specified how the national government was to operate. Unfortunately, the Articles did not last long. Under the words of the Article’s power was limited; Congress could make decisions, but had no power to enforce them. Also the articles stated

The US Constitution states “We The People of the United states in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, ensure domestic Tranquility, provide for more common defense, promote the General Welfare, and secure the blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” The main purpose of the U.S Constitution is to establish the basic rights of all American Citizens. This follows that every United States Citizens have equal rights. Belonging to a minority group because of culture, religion or race does not assert that one is unconstitutional. In times of war, evacuation of minority groups only in NOT constitutional; however, evacuation of ALL United

Rules would be the new topic of discussion at the end of the American Revolution amongst the newly formed Free states that won their independence from Britain. One huge question loomed over the Free states, how could they conduct a civilized way of living without another ruler such as the king of Britain here in America? There needed to be some sort of system that would generate a control to create a unified country. States were acting and conducting business as if each state was its own country and this left the America vulnerable on many fronts. Some of the main issues that surfaced were; How to divide powers between local and national governments? Which laws should be made, and by whom and who would enforce them? I will address some of the differences between the Constitution and The Articles of Confederation.

During the Revolutionary War, colonists believed that they needed a sense of unified government, so this led to the creation of the Articles of Confederation, the first written constitution of the United States (history.com). Although the Articles of Confederation had its strengths, such as allowing the central government to create treaties and maintain military, it had many weaknesses, such as preventing the central government to levy taxes and regulate trade. It also could not be changed unless there was a unanimous decision and it lacked a stable currency. Since the creation of the Articles of Confederation had many issues and weaknesses, the Continental Congress rewrote the Articles into what is now known as the U.S Constitution. The Constitution established a national government, guaranteed basic rights for the colonists and revised almost everything that was wrong in the original Articles, such as the sovereignty that resided primarily in the states and the lack of power from the national government. The Constitution was later ratified by all 13 states in May 1790, with the support of the Federalist Party. [A] Federalists believed in the commitment to a strong national government and in the practice of a separation of powers. However, Anti-Federalists had the opposite view which was the opposition of a strong national government, the support for small landowners, and the representation of rights of the people. Anti-Federalists believed that a strong national government

Until the ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment, the Constitution of the United States had retained a certain character which properly belonged to the fundamental form of law of the Republic at the time of its creation. The matters with which it dealt were simply three types. State sovereignty, through the division of powers between the Federal and the State governments, the inalienable rights of the American citizens and the structure of the Federal government itself. These were areas that it was felt by the framers to be of the utmost importance and should be safeguarded from the uncertainty of the majority whim of the time. They believed that there should be no room for doubt in regards to the limits of Federal

When the colonists first arrived to the New World there were very few obligations and rules that the British government had set for them and they were on their own to live their life in the way they saw fit. Throughout the years, England realized how much of an asset the New World was to their economy. Due to the American colonies great advantages to their economy and their everyday lives, Great Britain became greedy and decided that only they should be able to exploit from the colonies. This greed prompted the Crown to implement new taxes and regulations in order to obtain a larger profit. After many attempts to work with Great Britain and being dismissed, the colonist declared independence from England. This caused the Revolutionary War and in 1783 the colonists were finally free from Great Britain. The colonists drew from the positive and negative experiences from the Crown's rule when writing their own country's government. The crown's supreme rule over all aspects of the colonists life compelled the colonists to incorporate a limited government into the Constitution. Because of the lack of representation that the colonists possessed during during colonial times, when making the constitution they secured the idea of popular sovereignty as an effort to make sure that all citizens could have an opinion in their ruling. Separation of power was implemented into the Constitution for the purpose of denying one person excessive power. Checks and balances fall under

The creation of the US constitution was prompted my many different things going on. What established America’s national government and fundamental laws is the U.S constitution. It also guarantees basic rights for its citizens. The U.S constitution was signed on September 17, 1787 in Philadelphia, Pa. The first document before the U.S constitution was the Articles of Confederation, with that the government wasn’t very strong and the states didn’t act like they do today. In 1787, at the 1787 convention, delegates made a decision to make a stronger federal government that consisted of the executive, legislative, and the judicial branches. That wasn’t it either, it also had a system of checks and balances because they did not want one branch to be able to overpower another branch. The ten amendments of the Bill of Rights guarantees protections for people like religion and freedom of speech. In total, there are twenty-seven constitutional amendments.

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 created many problems to the new government, after the Revolutionary War. It contained a weak national government and a strong state government. After the Revolutionary War, many colonists still feared Parliament and the monarchy they were once ruled by. Therefore, they created the Articles of Confederation with a weak national government and gave all the power to the states. But, many individuals did not favor the Articles of Confederation because it gave the states equal representations, no matter how big the state, and did not give the national government the ability to tax. Therefore, the ratifying of the Constitution took place. In this new Constitution, Framers wanted to create a new nation. With a separation of powers, and a new system of checks and balances between each branch. The new Constitution, expelled all of the problems within the Articles of Confederation. But, it did not include the secure liberties that the colonists had fought for. Therefore, the Bill of Rights was proposed in order to secure our blessings of liberty and to ensure that the colonists will never chant, “no taxation without representation,” ever again.

During the Revolutionary war, America was under a government called the Articles of Confederation. Fearing a tyrannical ruler, the Articles gave states more power than the National Government. However, it became apparent that the Articles were not functioning properly, as the economy and wealth of America plummeted. At one point, a mob of Massachusetts farmers rebelling into what would be called Shays rebellion. Our current government, the Constitution, was the solution to the chaos created by the Articles. The Constitution was a necessary change for the success of the United states, because it addressed taxes, law enforcement, and court systems.

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 plan to divide the government into three branches was proposed by James Madison, at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. He modeled the division from who he referred to as ‘the Perfect Governor,’ as he read Isaiah 33:22; “For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; He will save us.” http://www.eadshome.com/QuotesoftheFounders.htm

When the government first achieved independence from England there were thirteen individual governments. They had an agreement called the Articles of Confederation that specified how each would interact with the others and manage the states. Despite the ratification by every state the agreement soon became problematic. What ensued was the meeting of state delegates, known as the Constitutional Convention, who planned to revise the problems. As a result the U.S. Constitution was fashioned to take its place. The idea was to ultimately federalize the States. That means each State remains an individual government but also agrees to be part of a Union. Thus created a federal government that would handle those things that are best controlled by a central government, which acts on behalf of the many States. An example would be the Navy and Army. The Federal Government has the right to raise and maintain a full time standing military. The Federal government is not limited to just the enumerated powers granted to Congress. It was also arranged that the national government would have powers not specifically stated in the Constitution, called implied powers. Although popular