Articles Of Confederation: Path To The Constitution

Ebert Nikolai Adame

Political Science

Research Paper I The Articles of Confederation, the Path to the Constitution After the Declaration of Independence, the Founding Fathers had to create a framework of government that would serve as the new enforceable law in the land. The Articles of Confederation, or formerly known as the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement made between the thirteen sovereign states that established the newly formed United States of America. The Articles served, and are regarded as the first "constitution". However, this first attempt at creating a system of government did not work as intended for it revealed many weaknesses. But why did the Articles
The states main concern to not be controlled delayed the acquiescence and compliance to the suggested Continental Congress mandate. The Articles of Confederation were written during the Second Continental congress taken place in Maryland and began the ratification in November 1977 Wikipedia. “The head of the committee, Johnson Dickinson, who did not participate in the signing of the Declaration of Independence, nevertheless adhering to the will of the majority, presented a report to the Continental Congress on July of 1976, just eight days after the Declaration of Independence was signed. Dickinson's initial proposal included a strong central government, with control over the western lands, equal representations for the states, and the power to levy taxes, etc.”(Barefootsworld.net) However, the previous and still latent experience with the British rule made the "United Colonies" cautious to confer an excess of power to the national government. The Continental Congress had been careful to deliberately give each state independence and sovereignty, meticulously defining and specifying the limited and deficient role of the central
Discord reigned between the states, thus delaying the acceptance and enforcement of the Articles. The founders were avid for the states approval and final ratification: "Permit us, then, earnestly to recommend these articles to the immediate and dispassionate attention of the legislatures of the respective states. Let them be candidly reviewed under a sense of the difficulty of combining in one system the various sentiments and interests of a continent divided into so many sovereign and independent communities, under a conviction of the absolute necessity of uniting all our councils and all our strength, to maintain and defend our common liberties...”(Journals of the Continental Congress). Disagreements resulted over boundary lines, trade between states, tariff regulations, etc. The small states, compared to the larger states were afraid of inequality in Congress representation. The larger states were preoccupied with paying unrestrained amounts of money to support the national government. The thirteen states were unable to come to an agreement regarding the western territories, prior to yielding power to the Congress to regulate the sale of these territories as long as profits were