From the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution

There were a variety of important reasons why the United States Constitution differed to such a remarkable degree from the Articles of Confederation. The extremely limited form of government characterized by the Articles of Confederation proved to be largely inefficient, and the result was the attempt within the Constitution to create a stronger and more centralized federal government while still remaining true to the principles of the American Revolution. There were also a number of changes within American society that spurred the shift in governing philosophy represented by the creation of the Constitution. This shift is one of the most important events in the political history of the United States, and it is therefore extremely important to accurately ascertain the reasons for this development. Careful examination of the issue reveals that, in many ways, the United States Constitution was a major change from the Articles of Confederation in that it needed to reflect the changing political, economic, and social needs of the nation.

To understand why the Constitution came about and appreciate its massive impact on the political landscape of the country it is first important to consider exactly why the Articles of Confederation failed. As James A. Henretta, Rebecca Edwards, and Robert O. Self state, “The Confederation had a major weakness: it lacked the authority to tax either the states or the people. By 1780, the central government was nearly bankrupt, and General Washington called urgently for a national tax system, warning Congress that otherwise ‘our cause is lost’.” The fact that the Articles of Confederation lacked the ability to impose taxes meant that it never had the financial stability to effectively govern the fledgling nation. Washington's concern that this chronic instability could cripple the new nation emphasizes the degree of importance of this issue. Later events would prove that the financial and structural weakness of the Articles of Confederation were dire flaws in need of serious and immediate resolution.

One of the events that solidified the dangerously weak nature of the federal government under the Articles of Confederation was Shay’s Rebellion. As Michael J.G. Cain and Keith L. Dougherty state, in regard to Shay’s Rebellion, it was quite clear “that states had sufficient resources to fund a national army but did not contribute these resources to the nation. With adequate revenues within the states, the flaws of the Articles of Confederation were clearly revealed. The Articles failed to prevent free-riding among states, contributed to the disharmony of the union, and ultimately prevented Congress from accomplishing its constitutional tasks.” These failures of the Articles of Confederation reflect a clear shift in the political needs of the nation. A new government that could strongly and efficiently raise revenues, accomplish tasks, and contribute to unity needed to be formulated if the United States was to have any hope of survival. It is quite clear that in many ways these political pressures helped formulate the structure of the Constitution that so many Americans take for granted.

The political instability marked by Shay’s Rebellion was in large part responsible for the drafting of the Constitution, which sought to directly address the changing political needs of the nation embodied by this event. As John R. Vile states, “Shay’s Rebellion served as the catalyst to convince most states that the time of action had come...all states except Rhode Island would heed the call to send delegates to Philadelphia to consider revisions to the Articles of Confederation.” The fact that in many ways the formulation of the Constitution was a direct response to the implications of Shay’s Rebellion makes it quite clear that the Constitution was largely an attempt to address the changing political needs of the nation. The inclusion of nearly every state and the timing of the convention underscores the relation between the shifting political atmosphere of the time period and the development of the most important document related to governance to emerge from the era. These political changes and concerns manifested themselves in the drafting of the Constitution in a number of ways.

The political environment and changes of the time period were the defining influences on the creation of the Constitution, which distinguished itself from the structure and character of the Articles of Confederation as a matter of necessity. As Max M. Edling states, “The Federalists, it was claimed, were concerned above all with checking the ‘excessive democracy’ that the Revolution had introduced in the state assemblies, threatening both the common good of the union and the rights of minorities.” The blowback against the paralyzingly democratic nature of the Articles of Confederation and the complete lack of centralized authority that resulted led to the creation of a much more power federal government with a defined executive branch in a direct response to the weak and chaotic nature of government at the time. The changing political needs of the nation resulted directly in the move towards a more powerful centralized government, while still protecting the revolutionary ideals of democracy and liberty established by the Revolutionary War. There were also a number of economic concerns that prompted the drafting of the constitution, in addition to the previously mentioned important political factors.

The economic motives that informed the drafting of the Constitution were extremely important and cannot go overlooked in any discussion of the shifts within American society that promoted this massive change. As Leo J. Wearing states, “The three principal economic factors which led to the calling of the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 are usually said to be the desire to put the central government on a sound financial basis, the need for national commercial regulations, especially against England and the conflicting state interests, and the necessity of protecting property rights from the

attacks of the debtor classes.” These economic factors were extremely important in the ratification of the Constitution and illustrate the importance of the changing economic needs of the nation to the ratification of the document. Without these economic pressures inherent to the structure of the Articles of Confederation it is doubtful that the Constitution would have been conceived, at least in the manner in which it was drafted. In addition to these economic concerns there were also a variety of social reasons for the establishment of the Constitution.

A number of social pressures left their indelible mark on the structure of the Constitution, particularly in the Bill of Rights, which directly addressed many of the most pressing societal concerns of the day. The American people had a number of concerns related to the social development of the country, which are summed up by stating that “recently freed from the despotic English monarchy, the American people wanted strong guarantees that the new government would not trample upon their newly won freedoms of speech, press and religion, nor upon their right to be free from warrantless searches and seizures.” The fact that the Constitution was forced to include the Bill of Rights and the wide variety of social concerns addressed therein points to the extreme importance of this issue to the development of the Constitution. The willingness to address the prevalent social concerns of the day is an important element of the success of the Constitution and reflects the major shift away from the Articles of Confederation as these civil concerns were acknowledged and safeguarded without weakening the efficacy of the new government. However, while the Constitution is widely regarded as a success in terms of the manner in which it addressed social issues, there was one area where it proved a decided failure.

The Constitution’s refusal to address slavery was both extremely reflective of the changing social needs of the nation as well as horrendously misguided. As Henretta, Edwards, and Self state, “To preserve national unity, the delegates devised other compromises on slavery-related issues...the delegates did not use the words ‘slavery’ or ‘slave’ in the Constitution, it spoke of citizens and ‘all other persons’.” This example illustrates the degree to which contemporary notions regarding social issues influenced the development of the Constitution, in contrast to the Articles of Confederation. Whereas the Articles were haphazardly created and structured, the extremely deliberate lack of reference to slavery in the Constitution is instructive of the degree to which the changing social landscape of the nation informed their creation. The unwillingness to take a strong abolitionist stance was the biggest failure of the Constitution, but one that reveals a great deal regarding the specifics of the time period and their influence on the document.

There were a number of ways in which the changing political, economic, and social landscape of the United States influenced the development of the Constitution and the ways in which it differed from the Articles of Confederation. The move towards a more centralized and powerful federal government with greater economic control largely characterized this shift. The development of the Constitution, despite certain failures and specific temporal influences, proved to be one of the most influential political events in world history, and is therefore worthy of intensive and detailed consideration.

References

American Civil Liberties Union. “The Bill of Rights: A Brief History. “Last modified March 4, 2003, accessed March 22, 2014, https://www.aclu.org/racial-justice_prisoners-rights_drug-law-reform_immigrants-rights/bill-rights-brief-history

Cain, Michael J.G. and Keith L. Dougherty. “Suppressing Shays' Rebellion: Collective Action and Constitutional Design under the Articles of Confederation.” Journal of Theoretical Politics 11, no. 2 (April 1999): 233-260.

Edling, Max M. A Revolution in Favor of Government: Origins of the U.S. Constitution and the Makings of the American State. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003).

Henretta, James A., Rebecca Edwards, and Robert O. Self. America: A Concise History, Volume One: To 1877. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2009.

Vile, John R. The Writing and Ratification of the Constitution: Practical Virtue in Action. Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2012.

Wearing, Leo J. “Economic Factors in the Drafting of the Federal Constitution.” Marquette Law Review 37, no. 2 (Fall 1953): 103-129.