How Did The Articles Of Confederation Lead To The 1787 Constitution

The structure of The Articles of Confederation led to the 1787 Constitution by failing to decrease the nation’s debt, decide on rulings efficiently, and enforce acts adopted . Through situations such as Shay’s Rebellion and the obstruction of trade by the Spanish government on the Mississippi River, the federal government demonstrated its lack of authority and coherence. The original strategy for the new nation was to present the federal government with very little power and allow the states to run as they pleased to avoid oppression from a national body. This mindset led to Congress becoming unable to tax the states to help eradicate the debts accumulated during the Revolution. Each state had its own regulations for trade and denied the national government any money. Although pleasing to the individual states, unregulated trading and
lack of consistency quickly proved unhelpful for the withering economy. This absence of financial responsibility led to the Constitution’s Article 1 Section 8, where Congress can "lay and collect taxes, duties, imports, and excises."

In addition to monetary issues, the Articles of Confederation couldn’t organize the states into agreeing on basic rules.
While the states had an abundance of power, deadlocks occurred frequently in sessions of Congress because of the 9 out of 13 states needed to pass a law. Failing to create a solution, the United States suffered greatly when the Spanish stopped Southern trade on the Mississippi River. Greater in number, the Northern tradesmen were adapting and compromising while less southern states couldn’t avoid the halt in their commerce. The national government couldn’t help due to the nature of their ratification process. Each state had one vote, no matter the size, creating unnecessary tensions that were resolved when the 1787 Constitution established a House of Representative and a Senate. These two bodies allowed each state to be heard coinciding with the magnitude of population and also ignoring the size of each. In addition, the new Constitution created an Executive Branch to take away some of the dominance in the states and effectively pass laws through a system of checks and balances that benefitted America as a
whole.

Before the adding of the Executive Branch, enforcing laws and handling the military was difficult. When Shay’s Rebellion occurred due to Massachusetts's high taxes, a military force couldn’t be assembled to stop the increasing concern. Individual states had militias, but none of them were prepared to eradicate the threat. Major issues were brought to the attention of the public such as national weakness, and the enforcement of laws was proven necessary. By employing appointed officials and a commander of the military, the Executive Branch changed the once unimplemented rules into an upheld framework of the law. Foreign policies of trade were also improved when taken from the states, as they had been under the Articles of Confederation, and given to the new branch. To keep in the independent spirit the states blissfully acquired, the system of checks and balances ensured that each branch, new and old, wouldn’t take control of the country.

All in all, the lack of federal power in the Articles led to the Constitution’s creation to reconstruct the financially unstable economy after the Revolutionary War, create laws fairly for all states and efficiently process them through a balanced government, and enforce the just laws with a new branch that also kept the nation’s security applicable. These changes in the old government allowed for more to come as the country grew, and protected any tyranny from taking away the rights newly acquired. The Constitution continues to provide the framework for The United States, but wouldn’t be the same without the Articles of Confederation’s flaws and the situations derived from them.