The main purpose of this chapter is to determine the Founding Fathers’ motives for creating the Constitution by analyzing a secondary source by Woody Holton, and several primary sources. Frist, I will begin with the secondary source, “Unruly Americans and the Origins of the Constitution” by Woody Holton. Mr. Holton’s main purpose was to locate the motivation behind the Constitution in developments in the states (page 90). Mr. Holton addressed several grievances for possible motives of the Founding Fathers’. First, the excessive democracy that acerbated many Americans, the runaway inflation caused by the farmers who were allowed to satisfy their debt to creditors with property and good instead of hard currency, and the Revolutionary War that
1.Robertson states the founding fathers were politicians because they understood how to compromise, maintain political support even while conducting unpopular political activities, and balance conflicting demands. This is epitomized in James Madison because even when he did not achieve his whole goal, he still settled for “half a loaf rather than none.” His use of political strategy and willingness to compromise, shows that he and the rest of the founding fathers were not just political philosophers, scientists, or speculators, but politicians. 2.Robertson remarks some of the key reasons the founding fathers were successful in forming a new government is because during the time period they were framing the constitution there were volatile,
In the book, American Creation by Joseph J. Ellis, Ellis talks about the founding of America from the start of it to the finish. He argues that the founding of the United States was not a clash between democracy and aristocracy. He stated that none of the founding fathers even mentioned democracy as one of their goals. The main question was actually how they were going to create a successful nation state. Ellis mentioned, in his book, that the main clash was between the people who favored a full sovereign national government, which were the federalists, and the people who wanted to reserve the state rights over all of the domestic issues, which were the republicans.
In his essay ‘The founding fathers: a reform caucus in action', John P. Roche describes the Founding Fathers as practical politicians that were indeed acting on behalf the citizens they represented. Roche states the founding fathers kept in mind everyone's rights while making the Constitution. He explains how James Madison drafted the Virginia Plan. Roche describes it as a ‘Political Masterstroke'.
James Madison’s Federalist 10 was written amid criticisms that a republican form of government had never been successful on a large scale. Madison’s argument was that a well-constructed union could control factions. He argued that in order to control factions from their causes, we would need to either give up liberty or free thought. Since we cannot infringe upon these two natural rights, we must move on to controlling the effects. A republic, Madison argues, would be able to do this because the people choose the representatives, and they choose representatives who they feel best represent their opinions.
After a fiercely fought revolution, the newly independent American nation struggled to establish a concrete government amidst an influx of opposing ideologies. Loosely tied together by the Articles of Confederation, the thirteen sovereign states were far from united. As growing schisms in American society became apparent, an array of esteemed, prominent American men united in 1787 to form the basis of the United States government: the Constitution. Among the most eminent members of this convention were Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr, James Madison, and Thomas Jefferson. These men, held to an almost godly stature, defined the future of the nation; but were their intentions as honest as they seemed?
To combat this issue, and the others within the Articles, the Constitution was drafted to provide a layout for the country with a stronger government without invading the liberty of the people. The government under the Articles were subjected to the will majority in any conflict and Madison claimed that “there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual”. The liberties of the people and the authority of the government were drastically diminished when faced against a majority in a purely democratic country because of the full control that party gained to push their own agenda. James Madison’s argument on the Constitution’s ability to fight faction was, “Whilst all authority in it will be derived from and dependent on the society, the society itself will broken into so many parts… the minority, will be in little danger from interested combinations of the majority.” The government will still be able to possess authority over states and people, however, instead of just two contrasting parties where there has to be a majority, a republic forges multiple differentiating groups and ideas that makes factions less probable.
During Revolutionary America, two political parties came about: the Federalists and the Democratic-Republics. The Federalists believed in supported federal administration and were highly in favor of the Constitution, while the Democratic-Republicans favored the idea of extending the Revolution to everyday people. Their party names reflect their standpoints. The Election of 1796 was the first in American History for candidates running for office to belong to organized political parties.
After fighting for so long and hard to secure independence from the British rule, the young United States of America needed to come together to form a strong nation. Having literally sacrificed blood, sweat, and tears to free themselves from the tyrannical oppression of an over-powered central government, the people wanted to ensure that they would not be trading one for another. There needed to exist a means to effect a measure of equality and security for the newly founded country. The Constitution aimed to do just that.
In colonial America, the citizens did not know exactly what they wanted for their government. The colonists knew they didn’t want their lives to be like they had been in England. They were open to ideas; they did not know what would work and what wouldn’t. The colonists knew that trial and error was the best idea at the time. The democratic and undemocratic features of colonial America were very apparent in that democracy as it was a work in progress.
10 in an attempt to ratify the Constitution, the new form of government for the United States. In the Federalist Paper No. 10, Madison analyzed the way to deal with facts, made a comparison between a pure democracy and a republic, and made another comparison on whether a small government or a large government would be the best for America. He informed the people that there is not a way to completely get rid of factions, but there are ways to deal with them. One great way to deal with factions is by having a government that knows how to control and deal with their effects. Madison believes that a republic can do that job better than a democracy, because a democracy is a small society of people who can not admit there is a cure to factions.
The Federalist Papers v Democracy Were the Federalist papers anti-democratic? Were the founders against the conception of democracy as we now understand it, or was it an issue of definition assignment? What did the terms Republican, and democratic mean to the founders? Knowing what definitions certain words held during the founding era is essential to understanding the thought process of our forefathers. Another issue to consider is whether or not the Constitution itself is democratic.
Response: I, Democritus, state that there is motion in the world, due to the fact this is how one can account for the perception of different qualities. There are two realities we must account for: atoms and the void. The properties of the atoms are they are basic, indivisible units that do not come to be or pass away, do not change and are unified. Atoms are infinite in number, come in different shapes and postures, have existed for ever and are all uniform. The atoms are too small to be detected by the senses, but they make up everything in the world.
Even our founding fathers didn 't want a democracy, because they thought it would cause disarray and issues. The United States of America is not truly a democracy for those
