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Discuss The Pros And Cons Of The Articles Of Confederation

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I am Jonathan Dayton, hailing from New Jersey, and I am a Federalist. I am here today at the Constitutional Convention to discuss the pros and cons of the our nation’s governing documents. I will be speaking in favor of a constitution rather than articles of confederation.
Speaking as a Federalist, I see some flaws in the Articles of the Confederation. One feature of the Articles of Confederation is that the power of voting would be in the hands of the people. Under the Articles, each state has one vote. So regardless of the population per state, be it 500,000 or 500, each still only has one vote. It also serves as an agreement among the states and is the first constitution of the United States of America, but it is incomplete. The concept of …show more content…

One positive thing about it would be that a document like this leads to political stability by removing the national government from some controversial issue areas, giving states power in some areas, and will allow our new government to achieve and maintain stability. This would be starkly different from the English government where the decisions that affect the people were made by either the king or the church, and the people had no say at all. Another pro would be that it ensures the separation of powers and prevents tyranny. Even if one person or group took control of all three branches of the federal government, federalism ensures that state governments would still function independently. Federalism, therefore, fulfills the need of a governmental structure that ensures liberty, which was the colonists’ goal in the first place. One negative thing about the constitution is that it is a large undertaking, and will require modifications as our nation progresses. It also will be difficult to come to an agreement on so many of these

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Articles of Confederation was the written document that established the functions of the national government of the United States after it declared independence from Great Britain.” The Articles were needed after the United States won war. There was no unity among the country. They used the Articles as their set of rules. There were many important people that had to do with the constitution.

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By the year 1786, the people realized that the foundation on which our country was built on, that being the Articles of Confederation, had some major flaws that needed to be modified. The Articles of Confederation hindered Congress from taxing the people, regulating domestic affairs, and even controlling the countries commerce. With these restrictions on the power of Congress, it made it very difficult for Congress to make money. Instead, they had to rely on generous contributions from the states,which most of the states didn't partake in. The United States had no money to pay the soldiers back who served in the Revolutionary War or to pay back the money from the foreign loans that was granted to them during the war, and this resulted in the United

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The constitutional convention was like a mouse trap. We are in a time where we consider our current condition to be unstable and unorganized as a country. We are fed lies about how astonishing our current government is, but in reality there are many aspects that are needed to be fixed. Many claim to have a vast knowledge on our broken system, yet they do less than the minimum in order to fix it. On the contrary, once the colonies got their Independence, there was one person who did see the mistakes that were in the Articles of Confederation.

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When we made the Articles of Confederation, we did not see all of the problems that would come with it. This New Constitution could change all of that, with this we could finally give the government the power to collect taxes, and the power to create an army. These are just two of the many things that we could do with this New Constitution. There were many weaknesses that the Articles of Confederation had that made it so that when something needed to be done, we had to have a vote that 8 of the states had to agree to.

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The document essentially split the nation into two camps. On one hand, there was a group who welcomed the document, seeing it as necessary for progress. On the other hand, there was a camp which opposed the document, arguing that it represented an unwelcome change. The fact that it ushered a new form of governance where authority would be shared between the federal government and state authorities is one of the factors that made the constitution a controversial document (U.S National Archives and Records Administration, n.d). There are those who felt that the constitution took away authority from the state governments and therefore robbed them of their autonomy.

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The United States Constitution was written in seventeen eighty seven to address governmental weaknesses that existed in the Articles of the Confederation, the first articles written during the Revolutionary War to establish regulations for a unified government. The Constitution not only established law, it incorporated basic rights for citizens and dictated to what extent the government could rule. Albeit an improvement to the Articles of the Confederation, according to “The Great Debate”, in order for the Constitution to go into effect, “ratification from nine states” was required. Gaining full support of nine states for ratification was not an easy feat; the changes to the Articles created a divide amongst delegates, the two sides were

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Finally, the Small State-Large State Compromise is a framer of the constitution that helps guard against tyranny. “Representatives shall be appointed according to the population.” “The Senate of the the United States shall be composed to two senators from each state.” (Constitution of the United States of America, 1787) (Doc D) Each state had equal representation, yet the larger states had the representation the amount of people living in the state.

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The Articles of the Confederation was the first government constitution that the United States used, and, although there were strength like the Northwest Ordinance of 1787, there were major weaknesses of the Articles of the Confederation like the following: requiring 9 out of the 13 colonial votes from the representatives from different states to pass a law; having no executive and judicial branch; and the federal government being unable to impose tax revenue onto the states. Such flaws would eventually lead to the Constitution and the repeal of the articles, for the Constitution was a measure to fix the problems of the articles with a stronger government that allowed them to impose taxes and and implement new laws for a more effective government.

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Hello, and thank you for allowing me to speak to you today as an anti federalist. I will be speaking about why the constitution, in its current form, should not be ratified. I would like to start today with a quote from one of our papers “When a building is to be erected which is intended to stand for ages, the foundation should be firmly laid.” As anti federalists we believe that the way our constitution, the foundation of our nation, is being constructed is incorrect, and primarily only beneficiary for the aristocrats. Over time we have obtained information and experienced first hand how fragile our foundation really is.

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This system would limit state voting power and turn rely on an electoral college to make decisions regarding presidential elections, and a cabinet of representatives, as seen at the continental congress, to make come up with the verdict on national dilemmas, primarily decisions concerning taxation and the judicial system. Therein lies the problem. As an anti-federalist I would be largely concerned with local issues and supporting the people and economy of my respective state, as opposed to national trade and productivity. This issue will arise again on the topic of republicanism as a focus of anti-federalists. In opposition to any ratifications, I would have hoped to see power lie within state governments with an overarching national government that regulate trade and the national economy, but not so much state level affairs.

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“I have a different constitution. I have a different brain; I have a different heart; I got tiger blood, man” quote from Charlie Sheen. Everyone has their own opinion on everything, even on as many things as what truly makes us American. So, to begin the debate of the Constitution was rather cloying or dreadful to many. You were either a Federal or a Anti-Federal (against or with the Constitution).

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Calvin Coolidge, the 30th president of the United States, one said “every American can turn for solace and consolation to the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United States with the assurance and confidence that those two great charters of freedom and justice remain firm and unshaken”. That reverence for our Nation’s long standing constitution still stands strong because of the hard work of the 55 delegates that argued for their beliefs in creating a new government at the Philadelphia Convention (Wilson et al. 27). The framers of the Constitution fervently contested what form the government of our nation should take and the impact of their debates are displayed throughout the framework of the document. The main concerns

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Right now a debate is occurring about whether not we should ratify the Constitution. This is an important moment in our country's history because this is the moment where we could unify and become a government or we could disapprove of the Constitution and have troubles between the country. The Articles of Confederation were not very credible because it gave the states too much power; which were too weak. The debts were not getting payed and the country was in great trouble. The Constitution would let the power will lie with the wealthy men, and not give the power to the states to raise money to pay off debt; the country will still remain in debt if we ratify the Constitution.

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The new constitution, a document granting the framework for a new democratic government, replacing the Articles of the Confederation. This new document gained approval from some of the citizens, but also raised questions and concerns from others. There was a constant back and forth between the two groups on whether or not the constitution should be ratified. This editorial provides historical background on the issue and expresses my opinion on which side I would’ve chosen.

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