Why did the Framers of the United States ultimately decide to give more power to the Federal Government rather than the state governments?
There were many problems and weaknesses with the Articles of Confederation. Some of the weaknesses was that congress did not have the power to tax, couldn’t regulate trade between the states or foreign countries. They had no National court system, the articles could not be amended without the commitment of all 13 colonies. Despite all the problems and weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation there were some good things about it or “strengths”, like it created the first official government of the United States, and the state had no authority to tax or regulate state-to-state trade.
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The first government in the U.S. was called the Articles of Confederation. It was the first set of laws after the states became independent. The laws in the Confederation were very weak, and they all contracted each other. It also had a weak central/national government because the states didn’t want to give it too much power like the monarchy with the British. Some weaknesses in the first government were that each state no matter how big or small had only one vote, each state could coin its own money, making it hard to move, and lastly, they could not have a military so it would be hard to fight armed rebellions or militias.
Shays Rebellion served as the final nail in the coffin for the Articles of Confederation. Although the Articles of Confederation was America's first national document, it came with many weaknesses. One of the major weaknesses was that the federal government was too weak and therefore could not enforce laws. The Continental Congress borrowed money to fight in both the Revolutionary War and the French and Indian War therefore were in debt.
This is evident in document A, where it shows you a Venn diagram of which powers are given to the states and which powers are given to the federal government. For one thing, this shows how “a double security arises to the rights of the people”, which means that when the power is distributed between the states and the federal government, neither is able to gain absolute power over the country. Federalism also comes in handy by specifying what the states get to control and what the national government gets to control, which is meant to prevent conflict between the two powers. For example, the task of declaring war is meant for the national government only. If that wasn’t specified, there would likely be a lot of cases where states declared war, and the national government had to clean up the mess.
The Articles of Confederation failed because the articles offered no solutions. Many of these issues did not propose innovation and were primarily conservative providing each state with its own autonomy with minimal influence by the federal government (Schultz, n.d.). This led to multiple disagreements between each state, with each state viewing its own power as a priority over the unity of the Confederation. This created multiple weaknesses within the articles, which includes the following (Articles of Confederation, 2018). Each state, regardless of its size, only had one vote in Congress.
Federalism Compare state sovereignty under the Articles of Confederation and under the Constitution. States were sovereign under the Articles of the Confederation although they shared no power under the constitution. It is the states that were supreme under the Articles of Confederation that led to the creation of a government that had a weaker national government. The executive arm of the government was not independent, and there were no federal courts since the state courts enacted all the laws (Brest, p.58). Also, neither did the Congress have the taxing power nor did it have the power to control interstate or foreign commerce.
Not everything is done correct the first time around. Surprisingly, this is also true for America’s national government. The Articles of Confederation was the constitution of the United States for the first few years of its existence, however, it had many flaws that jeopardized said existence. These flaws included but are not limited to the fact that the national government didn't have the power to tax the states, it couldn't enforce its own laws, but rather only create them, no national currency, however each state had its own currency, a national army could be put in place, and the same goes for a national court. The voting process for each state was also an issue since each state only received one vote which was not fair to
As it applies to the Articles of Confederation there were many weaknesses in the way it went about governing the United States. For one, the loose federation of the states was too weak to act as a foundation to be considered or act as a central government. In addition the state legislatures had too much power and in turn had the ability to influence economic issues of all kinds. This strong legislature is the same one that allowed for mob ruling and actions by debtors. The Articles of confederation were also weak because the required congress to have all 13 colonies in agreement when a new tax was to be passed.
How did the failure of the State of Franklin demonstrates the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation? First of all the, the congress was divided into 13 states and each state had one vote in congress. Congress handled many problems, like how to make the western lands made by the united states i the treaty of paris. Congress failed to solve problems between states due to taxes and boundaries. Most of the citizens felt like the government was too weak.
While with the Articles of Confederation, it was the states that held majority of the power and jurisdiction of the United States; these powers were being granted to the new National Government. The individual state governments would though maintain some of the authoritarian power that was granted in the Articles of Confederation. This was a major concern of our founding fathers, they did not want a national government that would become so powerful, that its’ citizenry would become its subjects such as that they revolted against, England. So of this fear was born the separation of powers between the different branches of the national government. Both houses of the legislature would have to agree on a cause for a law to be enacted, and once approved it would be sent to the newly created executive branch for that elected official to sign into law.
To the population, war is when you are told what to fight for, and a revolution is when you decide for yourself. On April 19, 1775 was the day that America had decided for itself that we needed to be independent, the start of the American Revolution. The American revolution was over in about eight years. After the war Americans had decided to turn its focus inward and decide on what government they wanted and what America as a country would become. That is how the articles of confederation came to be on March 1, 1781 and of course like everything it had it’s pros, cons and results.
The Articles of Confederation was written when the United States was a fairly new country, and from the people wanting to create a different government from the king of England. Although this document respected individual rights, it was too loose of a document that could drive the country to success. After revising what they had created, the founding father of the us the created the us constitution. It was more strict, but still valued peoples rights.
The framers were concerned that the current federal government under the Articles of Confederation did not possess enough power in order to preserve the union; therefore, the constitution must provide the federal government with enough power to serve its duty while still preserving power in the state governments. In Federalist Paper No. 1, Hamilton is urging that under the new constitution the “utility of the union” created by a stronger federal government will help to ensure the vitality of the states as it offers protection of liberty (Hamilton et al. 30). Madison argued in Federalist Paper No. 10 that in a larger government the impacts of factions will be lessened because the people will defeat “sinister views by regular vote” (Hamilton et al. 75). He also states in Federalist Paper No. 39 that the ratifying of the constitution creates a government that is “neither wholly national nor wholly federal” (Hamilton et al. 242). The idea of these three Federalist Papers that were written by the framers of the constitution is that the federal government has to have a higher share of power than was present in the Articles of Confederation in order to strengthen the union.
The Confederation gave the state governments power. Another political reason can be how the British didn’t want to be involved in their colonies' government. The Confederation was made because of the fear of American expansion, and then taking over Canada. Many examples can prove this like of how the Red River settlement (Manitoba) was pressured into creation due to the strong presence of the USA. This was mainly due to trade and the railway problems.
Federalism is one of the main topics in both the Constitution and the articles of Confederation. In the Articles of Confederation they decided that the states would have more power than the federal government. In the articles it mentions that, “Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right…” Which means that the states will be more superior and have more impact on the people than the federal government. While for the Constitution it is not only the states and the federal government that has power but it’s the people that have some too.
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.