After the colonies won independence from England, the Founding Fathers had the challenege of developing a form of government that would meet the wants and needs of the citizens. The Founding Fathers first attempt at this endavour was the Articles of the Confederation, however they soon discovered that a stronger federal government was necessary to lead the newly formed country. So in 1787, delegates from all the states, except Rhode Island, meet again to revise the Articles of the Confederation, however instead they ended up replacing the Articles of Confederation with the United States Constitution. Politics can be defined as “who gets what, when and how” according to Barbour and Wright; an implicit consequence of deciding how to distribute …show more content…
Constitution was deciding how much power the federal government should have versus how much power the state governments should have. The Federalist Party, consisting primarily of wealthy landowners and businessmen, argued for a strong central and supported the ratification of the new Constitution because it would offer them protection from the “common folks” and provide economic security (Tschudy 26Jan2018). The Anti-Federalists where opposed to the new Constitution fearing that it created too strong of a central government which only protected the elites and wanted (Tschudy 26Jan2018). In attempt to convince the Anti-Federalists to support the ratification of the Constitution, the Federalist wrote the Federalist Papers. In Federalist 51 written by James Madison, Madison argues that the separation of powers and checks and balance established under the Constitution will prevent tyranny and corruption despite the stronger central government because it lays a “separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government” (Madison). The arguments presented in the Federalist Papers and compromises, …show more content…
This issue existed between small and large states and between predominately slave states in the South versus the Northern states which had a much smaller slave population. Larrge states favored the Virginia Plan which said Congressional representation should be based on population, however small states favored the New Jersey Plan which would give equal congressional representation to all states (Barbour 57). Bigger states feared the New Jersey Plan would give to much power to small states, while small states feared that the Virginia Plan would give large states all the power. As a compromise, the Connecticut Compromise was proposed which established a bicameral Congressional system in which representation in the Senate is equal but representation in the House of Representatives is based on population (Barbour 60). Under this compromise both large and small states both large and small states were appeased as neither was the evident loser. However, with regard to representation between Northern and Southern states there is a much clearer winner and loser. Southern states argued that slaves should count as part of the population as it would greatly increase the representation, but those opposed expressed why “if they have no share in government, why is the number of members in the assembly, to be increase on their account?” (Brutus). The compromise created
The Anti-Federalist Party, led by Patrick Henry, objected to the constitution. They objected to it for a few basic reasons. Mostly the Anti-Federalists thought that the Constitution created too strong a central government. They felt that the Constitution did not create a Federal government, but a single national government. They were afraid that the power of the states would be lost and that the people would lose their individual rights because a few individuals would take over. They proposed a “Bill of Rights”, to make sure the citizens were protected by the law. They believed that no Bill of Rights would be equal to no check on our government for the people.
For weeks convention delegates have been argued over representation in congress, Large States want it based on population. Small states want each states to have the same number of votes. representative s shall be apportioned according to population. The number of shall not exceed one for every thirty thousand, but each state shall have at least one representatives. This piece of evidence relates to the argument because they said that big states has more power than small states that is why big states only need one representative.
Both groups came to agreement and agreed that there needed to be a stronger authority requiring an independent salary to function. They both also agreed that they needed to raise safeguards against the tyranny. The anti-Federalists would not agree to the new Constitution without the “Bill of Rights.” The Federalists ended up including the Bill of Rights into the Constitution. The Bill of Rights protects the freedoms of people. It reassured the anti-Federalists the government could not abuse their power by taking it out on the people. The Federalists included the Bill of Rights to get the anti-Federalists votes and support in the Constitution to actually get it
This party developed because of the ratification of the constitution process; one way the Federalists tried to persuade people that their views were right about a strong central government during the ratification process was through several articles, which became known as The Federalist Papers. The Federalists argued that the people needed a strong central government to keep order and protect the union (Doc 1). They believed that this form of government was needed because the Articles of Confederation was proof that the union needed a strong central government. They argued that the Articles of Confederation gave the central government too little power and as a result the Union, faced economic difficulties, foreign problems and state quarrels (Doc 3). They processed Checks and Balances, which was a system designed so that the central government would not get more powerful than the other would, and was intended to counter arguments being made by the Anti-federalists (Doc
The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers played a major role in US History. They dealt with many problems in politics. The papers were made after the Revolutionary war. People started to worry that the government would not last under the Articles of Confederation. Without having a backup plan just yet, some delegates met up and created the Constitution. The constitution had to be ratified before it became the rule of all the land. The Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers discuss whether the constitution should be approved or not. Some things Anti-Federalist and Federalists argued was a strong national government, a standing army, and whether or not the constitution should be ratified and why.
To begin with the unequal representation of the states in the Virginia Plan was of great concern and controversy while the New Jersey Plan retained equal representation of the states. Virginia proposed a bicameral legislature that included elections by the people and appointments by those elected. This system used both wealth and population as a determining factor in regards to the number of seats in both houses. New Jersey on the other hand proposed single house legislature that allow each state a single vote. Votes based on population would put small states at a disadvantage. The states that were more populated would be in control of the legislative branches, leaving small states without a voice. Concerns about who was to be counted in the population also ...
The founders’ disagreements about this issue based on their economic backgrounds and coming from states with different economy had influence the creation of the Three-Fifths Compromise which dealt with how to count slaves as a part of the population. According to "The Slavery Compromises,” the Southern state 's economy, such as South Carolina, depends on the labor of slaves working in their large plantations (University of Louisiana Lafayette 2016). Since the Southern states that depended on slavery naturally owned more slaves, many of the founders from these states wanted slaves to be counted as any other white people to gain more representatives and more voice in Congress. On the other hand, the Northern states’ economy does not heavily rely on slavery, and many of these states are “free” states which restrict slavery (University of Louisiana Lafayette 2016). Many of these Northern delegates such as Elbridge Gerry countered that “Blacks are properties” and should be counted as properties that can be taxed, but not as people when they don’t have the rights of citizens (Hart et al. 111). From this, we can infer that the Northern delegates fear that the South will get more voice, more representation due to more slaves, and they thought it was ironic how the
The Federalist, No. 10, by James Madison is a clear expression of views and policies for a new government. Madison was a strong supporter and member of the Federalists whose main beliefs favored the Constitution. They also believed that the Articles of Confederation needed to be rewritten so that a new central government would control the power of the states.
In one house, the Senate, every state is represented equally regardless of population. In the lower house, the House of Representatives each state receives one representative for a set number of people. This satisfied all of the states and helped resolve one of the greatest conflicts while writing the Constitution. Another conflict that arose was with the counting of slaves in the census used to set the number of representatives per state. This was resolved under the Three-Fifths Compromise which stated that every slave would be counted as 3/5 of a person, although these slaves were given no voice or rights.
The Three Fifths compromise states that a slave be counted as three-fifths of a person. Therefore, the population of the southern states equaled the population of the northern states. Now that the populations were balanced, the south and the north sent the same amount of representatives to the House of Representatives. Pro-slavery southerners felt as if the north still had an advantage, but it was actually the south that had the advantage in the Senate and the House of Representatives.... ...
When discussing the new science of politics laid out in the Federalist papers, it is imperative to understand that proponents of the Constitution had various reasons for writing these papers, not the least of which was convincing critics that a strong central government that would not oppress but actually protect individual freedoms as well as encouraging the state of New York to agree to ratify the Constitution.
While the Federalists believe in a strong, central government, the Anti-Federalists believe in the shared power of state and national governments to maintain the rights of all Americans .The Anti-Federalist favored a confederated government were the state and national governments could share power ,protect citizen’s freedom ,and independence. The Anti-Federalists found many problems in the Constitution. Many were concerned the central government take was all individual rights. Anti-Federalist primarily consisted of farmers and tradesmen and was less likely to be a part of the wealthy elite than were members of their rival the Federalist. Many Anti-federalists were local politicians who feared losing power should the Constitution be ratified and argued that senators that served for too long and represented excessively large territories would cause senators to forget what their responsibilities were for that state. They argued that the Constitution would give the country an entirely new and unknown form of government and saw no reason in throwing out the current government. Instead, they believed that the Federalists had over-stated the current problems of the country and wanted improved characterization of power allowable to the states. They also maintained that the Framers of the Constitution had met as a discriminatory group under an order of secrecy and had violated the stipulations of the Articles of Confederation in the hopes for the for ratification of the Constitution. The Anti-Federalist were sure that the Constitution would take away the rights of the American citizens and fought hard to stop the ratification on the
As James Madison said, “The different governments will each control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself.” What James Madison is trying to say is that the central and state governments have enough power that they don’t control everything. The central government has enough power to help some of the country’s major needs, and the state government has enough power to help the state’s needs because the state’s needs may be more specific. From this, you may conclude, that dividing powers between the central and state governments prevents tyranny. The first guard against tyranny was Federalism, which means a system of government in which power is divided between a federal government and state government.
Since the beginning of their new nation, the United States has had many differences between the Northern and Southern states. During the Constitutional Convention they disagreed on how to determine their representation in the house based on population; the Southerners wanted to count their slaves and the Northerners did not, which lead to the three-fifths compromise. Later in the Convention there were concessions given to the South, which left the Northerners feeling uneasy, such as: a guarantee that the slave trade would not be interfered with by Congress until 1808 and slave owners were given the right to recover refugee slaves from anywhere in the United States. While many Northern delegates were disappointed with the rights given to the South, they felt it was necessary for the good of the Nation. This was necessary to form a strong central government and union between the states.
Even before the Constitution was ratified, strong argument were made by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison in the Federalist Papers urging the inclusion of a federal form of government to replace the failed confederation. In Federalist Paper No. 9 Hamilton states, “This form of government is a convention by which several smaller states agree to become members of a large one, which they intend to form. It is s kind of assemblage of societies that constitutes a new one, capable of increasing, by means of new associations, until they arrive to such a degree of power as to be able to provide for the security of a united body” (Usinfo.state.gov). The people of the United States needed a central government that was capable of holding certain powers over the states.