Articles of Confederation vs Constitution (US History)
The Articles of Confederation and The Constitution In 1783, when the Treaty of Paris was signed, America officially broke away from Britain and became an independent nation. Without British rule, we needed a new form of government. The Articles of Confederation were America’s first form of government, but it was a very weak system and it started to fail rapidly. There were many individual problems with the Articles of Confederation that caused it to become a failure. One of the biggest problems America had under this form of government was that all 13 states acted as their own independent nations, instead of being one united country. Each state printed its own money, and that form of currency could only be used in that state. In this time period, there were many financial problems. Merchants stopped accepted money from outside their own state. The paper money that Americans used was not backed by gold or silver, which caused inflation. A lot of money had now become worthless.
Because we had just broken away from Britain, we did not want a strong overbearing government. The American government did not have the power to tax, so it could not pay for some of the things it desperately needed to. We still owed debts to other foreign countries such as France, Holland, and Spain from the Revolutionary War. We couldn’t pay our own soldiers or pay off our debt.
There were also many international and domestic problems involved with the Articles of Confederation. The United States lacked the military power to be able to defend itself against Britain and Spain. The British still occupied their forts near the Great Lakes area, and congress found it very difficult to negotiate territory with Spain. Under the new form of government, we had no judicial system or executive branch, but we did have a legislative branch. Our congress was unicameral, meaning it had one house, which was the senate. Because the states were acting as individual countries, they seldom agreed with
Because we had just broken away from Britain, we did not want a strong overbearing government. The American government did not have the power to tax, so it could not pay for some of the things it desperately needed to. We still owed debts to other foreign countries such as France, Holland, and Spain from the Revolutionary War. We couldn’t pay our own soldiers or pay off our debt.
There were also many international and domestic problems involved with the Articles of Confederation. The United States lacked the military power to be able to defend itself against Britain and Spain. The British still occupied their forts near the Great Lakes area, and congress found it very difficult to negotiate territory with Spain. Under the new form of government, we had no judicial system or executive branch, but we did have a legislative branch. Our congress was unicameral, meaning it had one house, which was the senate. Because the states were acting as individual countries, they seldom agreed with