Before the Constitution, there was the Articles of Confederation. The Articles of Confederation was a weak plan for the country. The central government wasn’t allowed to tax the people, which caused them to be in serious debt. Majority of the power went to the states, causing the central government to be useless. So the framers met up in Philadelphia of 1787 to revise the Articles. When revising the Articles, the framers realized that they needed a whole new document. Resulting to the Constitution. Meetings were top secret. They shut the doors and windows so no one would listen in. They were afraid rebellions would start revolting against the new document.The first section of the Constitution is called the Preamble. The Preamble introduces …show more content…
One of the biggest debates was deciding the structure of the government. There were two different plans; the Virginia Plan and the New Jersey Plan. The Virginia Plan was written by James MAdison but the ideas came from Edmund Randolph. The structure of the government was going to have three branches—judicial, executive, and legislative—and the House of Representatives. The larger states favored this plan more because the seats in the House of Representatives was based on population. While the New Jersey Plan was not. The Jersey Plan was written by William Paterson. The structure of the government was one house of Congress. Many small states favored this plan more because the votes were equal for all states. To put an end to the debate, Roger Sherman wrote the Great Compromise. The structure was two houses of Congress—House of Representatives and the Upper House. In the House of Representatives, the seats were based off of population and the Upper House was all equal votes. It also had the three branches of government. The compromise pleased both sides of the debate, but it lead to …show more content…
The branches of government have a system called Checks and Balances. Checks and Balances is used to ensure that one branch isn’t getting more power than the others. The judicial branch is made up of the Supreme Court and other federal courts. They can declare laws and executive actions unconstitutional and interpret laws. The Executive branch is made up of 15 members; the President, Vice President, and the Cabinet. Some examples of powers are serving as Commander in Chief of Armed Forces, proposes laws, and can veto laws. The last branch is legislative. The Legislative branch is made up of Congress, Representatives, and Senators. Some powers are overriding the President’s veto, declare war, prints and coins money, and approves treaties. These three branches all make sure that they are following the rules of the
The three branches that the constitution have made include the legislative, the executive and the judicial branch. The Legislative branch, also known as the House of Representatives, has certain powers over the other branches, the Executive is known as the President will also have powers over the other branches, and the same goes for the judiciary which is known as the Supreme Court. By creating these three branches of government, the representatives will also build a check and balance system which is included in the
The United Sates has operated under two constitutions. The Articles of Confederation was effective in 1781, and The Constitution which replaced the Articles in 1788. These two documents have much in common, but they differ more than they do resemble each other. The primary difference was the Articles of Confederation was an agreement establishing the United States of America as a confederation of sovereign states. Otherwise, the US Constitution is the supreme law of the United States of America, also a constitution embodying the relationship of the federal government with the states of America and the citizens of the US.
The Constitution changed the face of the United States government. However, the United States government was not always run by the Constitution. The Articles of Confederation came before it, but ultimately was decided to be unfit for the needs of the republic due to the lack of power to the central government and the weak bond it formed for the Union. The Constitution transformed the federal system of the United States into the balanced system we use today. The Articles of Confederation and the Constitution were very different documents, especially under the topic of state sovereignty.
The Articles of Confederation, created and ratified in 1781 during the Revolutionary War, was the first basis for the United States of America’s central government. This was a shaky set of laws, yet it evolved into The Constitution of the United States of America. Though The Constitution was created from the Articles of Confederation, there were many differences. Three of these are differences in powers, in purposes, and in effects.
There was the legislative branch which makes the laws and it was made up of congress. Congress was made up the senate and house of representatives. The last branch is known as the executive branch which carries out the laws and is made of the president, vice president and the cabinet. The cabinet is picked by the president and that person is the leader of the U.S. The country needed a leader because the states were becoming countries.
But the legislative branch decides who goes into the judicial branch, can override the veto, and impeach the president. The judicial branch can say the presidents acts are unconstitutional, but the president (part of executive branch) nominates judges who are in the judicial branch. Lastly, the judicial branch can make laws unconstitutional. Checks and balances protects against tyranny because they gave each of the 3 branches of government several ways of having power over the other 2
he Articles of Confederation were not a sufficient set of principles for the fledgling United States to rely upon. The main discussion point of the Articles of Confederation was how much power a new government should have, which was something that many disagreed on. The sole branch of government was the legislative branch, which made compelling states to follow laws difficult, if not impossible. Additionally, there were tensions between larger and smaller states over the value of their one vote in Congress, which had not been addressed yet by the Articles of Confederation. As such, the United States Constitution was a profoundly radical departure from the previous resolution of the Articles of Confederation for a multitude of causes.
Name: Jeshuwin Prabakaran Before the Constitution was approved and known as the structure of our government, we had the Articles of Confederation. The Articles of Confederation was a broken system, with no central government to collect taxes or enforce law we were burying ourselves in massive debt while States taxed each other. There was no National Court System or Supreme Court which made serious cases harder to deal with often having a less just outcome. These are the few of the multiple flaws and reasons it was necessary to replace the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution.
There were two plans proposed to the convention. The Virginia plan planned to establish three branches of government, two separate houses of Congress, and allowed the federal government to veto local state laws. This plan was opposed by smaller states because they would have little influence in decisions made by Congress. However this was appealing the larger states because they would be more influential and their opinion would be valued more than smaller states. The New Jersey Plan planned to have a one house Congress, and establish executive and judicial branches of government.
After deciding to write a new constitution, the delegates could not decide what new form the government should take. One of the options was the Virginia Plan created by Edmund Randolph and James Madison. The plan included a strong government with three branches (the legislative branch, The judicial branch, and the executive branch). In the Virginia Plan, the legislator would consist of two houses and seats would be awarded on the basis of the population. Due to the fact that the seats are awarded based on population, larger states would have more representatives than smaller states.
Therefore, The Great Compromise was created. This stated that the government be split into two separate houses making it a bicameral government system. The Senate would have 2 delegates from each state, no matter the population, meet and these senators would represent their entire state. The House of Representatives would be based on population, and each representative would represent his or her congressional district rather than the entire state. This would be accepted by the government and Congress would be formed.
Some of the conflicts in the construction of the constitution are the two different plans. The Virginia Plan, formulated by James Madison who advocated the Constitution, set out a three-branch government which composed of a “chamber legislature, a powerful executive, and a judiciary” which was to operate directly on people, not on the state (Roark 208). In this plan, the executive and judiciary could jointly veto the actions of Congress to prevent it from having too much power. An alternative plan was the New Jersey Plan that retained the confederation’s single-house congress with one vote per state. Other conflict that stemmed from the formation of the Constitution was the development of two different groups; the Federalists, those who supported the Constitution and the Antifederalists, those who did not support the Constitution.
Articles of Confederation vs. U.S. Constitution The Articles of the Confederation and the U.S. Constitution are two articles that where written and accepted by the United States as a foundation for their new government. They are both very important documents that have similarities and differences. Some of the main things the Articles of Confederation and the U.S. Constitution have in common is that they addressed the needs of its constituencies.
The Executive branch executes laws and is the president. The Judicial branch judges laws and is the Supreme Court. The Legislative branch creates laws and is the House of Representatives and Senate. James Madison said in Federalist Paper #47 Document B, “the accumulation of all powers...in the same hands...may be justly pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” This helps protect from tyranny because the Separation of Powers prevents all power from being in the same hands.
The Constitution is better than the Articles of Confederation because the Articles of Confederation had many weaknesses. The Articles did not give Congress the power to place tariffs on foreign goods, hurting American businesses that could not compete with cheaper British goods. The U.S. government had no chief executive so there was no one to enforce the laws that were passed. The new Constitution addressed many of the problems created by the Articles by creating a federal system of government with a much more powerful national government. The Constitution made a stronger Federal government that could unite the States, taking many of the powers held by the States: the right to tax, the right to raise armies, the right to regulate trade and