Zinn And Arnove: A Comparative Analysis

On the day that the United States of America declared to become independent, people of the United States began to have a completely different life which started from the new government structure that been established. Due to the change of political situation after America's declaration of independence, revision of law took the priority to better serve the nation. Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove both were writers, editors, and social activists that were best known for their anti-war movement. They had published a book together called Voices of a People's History of the United States, which mainly discussed the process on how the people who had been treated unequally to fight for their rights and how much their lives had changed since then( Howard Zinn, Anthony Arnove, 2004). The creation of the United States Constitution was the first step to establishing American Democracy which proposed during the Constitutional Convention. The debate that brought up primarily was the number of representatives that each state should have. This debate led to the publishment of the Virginia Plan and the New Jersey Plan, two different plans that favored in a different
number of representatives that each state has. The author of the New Jersey Plan, William Paterson, a New Jersey delegate and one of the signers of the U.S.
Constitution. Paterson delivered the New Jersey Plan with his concern of the voices of smaller states would be drawn out of larger states if the Virginia Plan been approved (Abraham Messler, 1954). His plan was particularly in response to the Virginia Plan, which in favor of proportional representation and a bicameral legislature( Leonard Williams Levy, 2000). The New Jersey Plan supported each state has one vote regardless of their population and the unicameral legislature. The with the final decision had come after their intense debate, that was the rejection of the New Jersey Plan, and the main reason was because it was too concentrated on gain more power to small states rather than the
whole. Though the New Jersey Plan was rejected, it did help to create the US Democracy by provided the ideas to help maintain the justice in legislative structure. The significance of the New Jersey Plan was it led to the establishment of the Connecticut Compromise with the combination of the Virginia Plan. The Connecticut Compromise supported the bicameral legislature, that is, the congress would consist of two houses with a different number of representatives (Catherine Drinker Bowen,1986). The House of Representatives would have proportional representation, which was the idea from the Virginia Plan; the Senate would have 2 representatives for each state regardless of their population, which was the idea adopted by the New Jersey Plan. Later on, the three federalists, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay wrote a series of articles regarding the details of the Constitution and its provisions, which was the Federalist Papers. From the article 55 to 66, the Federalist Papers was mainly focused on more details of election methods and restrictions onto the conclusion that draw from the Connecticut Compromise, with the legislative structure of the House of Representative and the Senate(Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, 1788).
The New Jersey Plan along with the Virginia Plan made out the Connecticut Compromise, which had perfected the US Constitution with justice and rights to people. Thus, the New Jersey Plan was one of the significant factors that helped to create a fair legislative structure to the United States Constitution, which maintained a great balance between the big states and small states and provided the democracy to the United States of America.