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THE ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION
The Articles of Confederation was the first constitution of the United States of America. The
Articles of Confederation were first drafted by the Continental Congress in Philadelphia Pennsylvania in
1777. This first draft was prepared by a man named John Dickinson in 1776. The Articles were then
ratified in 1781. The cause for the changes to be made was due to state jealousies and widespread distrust
of the central authority. This jealousy then led to the emasculation of the document.
As adopted, the articles provided only for a "firm league of friendship" in which each of the 13
states expressly held "its sovereignty, freedom, and independence."
The People of each state were given equal privileges and rights, freedom of movement was guaranteed,
and procedures for the trials of accused criminals were outlined. The articles established a national
legislature called the Congress, consisting of two to seven delegates from each state; each state had one
vote, according to its size or population. No executive or judicial branches were provided for. Congress
was charged with responsibility for conducting foreign relations, declaring war or peace, maintaining an
army and navy, settling boundary disputes, establishing and maintaining a postal service, and various lesser
functions. Some of these responsibilities were shared with the states, and in one way or another Congress
was dependent upon the cooperation of the states for carrying out any of them.
Four visible weaknesses of the articles, apart from those of organization, made it impossible for
Congress to execute its constitutional duties. These were
analyzed in numbers 15-22 of The FEDERALIST, the political essays in which Alexander Hamilton,
James Madison, and John Jay argued the case for the U.S. CONSTITUTION of 1787. The first
weakness was that Congress could legislate only for states, not for individuals; because of this it could not
enforce legislation. Second, Congress had no power to tax. Instead, it was to assess its expenses and
divide those among the states on the basis of the value of land. States were then to tax their own citizens to
raise the money for these expenses and turn the proceeds over to Congress. They could not be forced to
do so, and in practice they rarely met their obligations. Third, Congress lacked the power to control
commerce--without its power to conduct foreign relations was not necessary, since most treaties except
those of peace were concerned mainly with trade.
The fourth weakness ensured the demise of the Confederation by making it too difficult to correct the first
three. Amendments could have corrected any of the weaknesses, but amendments required approval by
all 13 state legislatures. None of the several amendments that were proposed met that requirement.
On the days from September 11, 1786 to September 14, 1786, New Jersey, Delaware,
Pennsylvania, and Virginia had a meeting of there delegates at the Annapolis Convention. Too few states
were represented to carry out the original purpose of the meeting--to discuss the regulation of interstate
commerce--but there was a larger topic at question, specifically, the weakness of the Articles of
Confederation. Alexander Hamilton
successfully proposed that the states be invited to send delegates to Philadelphia to render the constitution
of the Federal Government adequate to the exigencies of the Union." As a
result, the Constitutional Convention was held in May 1787.
The Constitutional Convention, which wrote the Constitution of the United States, was held in
Philadelphia on May 25, 1787. It was called by the Continental Congress and several states in response to
the expected bankruptcy of Congress and a sense of
panic arising from an armed revolt--Shays's Rebellion--in New England. The convention's assigned job,
following proposals made at the Annapolis Convention the previous September, was to create
amendments to the Articles of Confederation. The
delegates, however, immediately started writing a new constitution.
Fifty-five delegates representing 12 states attended at least part of the sessions. Thirty-four of
them were lawyers; most of the others were planters or merchants. Although George Washington, who
presided, was 55, and John Dickinson was 54,
Benjamin Franklin 81, and Roger Shermen 66, most of the delegates were young men in their 20s and 30s.
Noticeable absent were the revolutionary leaders of the effort for independence in 1775-76, such as John
Adams, Patrick Henry, and Thomas Jefferson. The delegates' knowledge concerning government, both
ideal and practical, made the convention perhaps the most intelligent such gathering ever assembled.
On September 17 the Constitution was signed by 39 of the 42 delegates present. A period of national
argument followed, during which the case for support of the constitution was strongly presented in the
FEDERALIST essays of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison. The last of the 13 states to
ratify the Constitution was Rhode Island on May 29, 1790.
BIBLIOGRAPHY