How Did The Constitution Guard Against Tyranny Dbq

Jonah Shulman

Ms. Crohan

Civics 20

May 16, 2023

DBQ question - How did the Constitution guard against tyranny?

America has an important history when it comes to creating their government. America was fighting against Great Britain in the American revolution when they were trying to create their own government that was separate from Great Britain. At this time America was only 13 states in which they thought that they were independent small countries. The first government made in America was called the Articles of Confederation. This was a failure of a government because it was very weak and had a lot of problems. Some of the problems were having no set military, not being able to fight foreign attacks, no set leader, not being able to tax

This allowed federal and state governments to not have complete control over the people which limited government. Federalism is a type of compound government which is the division of power between the federal and state levels. The state government could do things like set up local governments, establish schools, regulate in-state business, etc. The federal government could do things like regulate trade, declare war, print money, provide an army and navy, etc. This compound government helped the American government and we still use it to this day. In Federalist Paper #51 James Madison explains more on what the compound government is and what it does. He says, “In the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is first divided between two distinct governments… Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people… the different governments will control each other, and at the same time… will be controlled by itself,”(Doc. A). Federalism guards against tyranny by ensuring the rights of the people and by providing a limited government that checks on each

While writing the constitution congress separated government into legislative, executive, and judicial branches in federal and state governments. According to Article 1 the legislative branch would create laws, the executive branch would enforce the laws, and the judicial branch would interpret laws. The goal of this was to ensure that the government of America did not have too much control over the people which is what Great Britain did to them in the revolutionary war. Including a system of checks and balances would ensure this to the people of America. In Federalist Paper #47 James Madison talks about how too much power would be bad. Madison writes, “the accumulation of powers… in the same hands, whether one , a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective may be pronounced the very definition of tyranny,”(Doc. B). James Madison is not saying that the separation of powers would cause tyranny, but that if they were all together in one government that that would be the definition of a tyrannical government. Document C explains how the 3 branches could check and balance each other to create a better government. In federalist paper #51 James Madison writes, “The constant aim is to divide and arrange the