Constitutional Congress At the Constitutional Congress of 1787, The Delegates frequently used compromise to resolve controversial issues such as, Representation in the Government, Slavery in the new country, and Also the Morality of the Slave Trade. If it wasn’t for the ability of the Founders of our country to compromise, Who knows that the United States of America would have existed at all. The constitution that they wrote over two hundred years ago, still is the basis of our government today, with only few changes. The creators were smart enough to allow room for change and growth, they knew that the document would have to change for future problems, and changes. They were aware that with time the government and the people under that government would have new demands and be faced with many new situations. One thing that the states reached a compromise on at the Constitutional Congress was the Problems concerning, Representation from each state. The larger states wanted the representation to be determined on the state population, The smaller states wanted each state to have an equal amount of representatives. The solution they derived became known as the Great Compromise, They decided that they would have two houses of representatives, one based on the population of the state and the other with an equal; amount of representatives from each sate, therefore each of the two groups got what they wanted. This was also an effective way to divide the powers of the government. Another compromise made between the states was concerning Slavery. The North wanted The Slaves in the south to be accounted for so that they could be counted as people and be taxed. The South wanted the Slaves also to be counted but only for the population count, They knew if they had a higher population then they could have more representatives in the congress, and thus have more power. They Reached a compromise known as the Three/Fifths plan, This plan indicated that three/fifths of the slave population would be accounted for both taxation and towards the population of the state. This way both were happy. Lastly an Agreement was reached between the States on the Slave trade, The north wanted the Slave Trade to be abolished, and for the central government to Regulate commerce. The South needed the slaves for their plantations and they were afraid if the government regulated commerce then they would be taxed on their exports.
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Show MoreAfter America was recognized as an independent country from England, the new republic went through almost twenty years worth of trial and error to find a government that would satisfy the needs of the citizens, the states, and the central national government. The most memorable, and influential, action of this time would have to be the Connecticut Compromise, proposed Roger Sherman, following the proposal of the Large and Small State plans at the Constitutional Convention of 1787. This Compromise directly affected the amount of representation from each state, and created the government system we are familiar with today.
The Missouri Compromise had an interesting political action, It depicted the norths disagreement towards slavery was more of a political issue rather than a moral argument. In the early 19th century , the north was populated with abolitionists and radicals, those who believes in abolition. Their main aim was not to stop slavery because it was inhumane, but the fact that white people were becoming unemployed and the south were becoming more powerful.
At the convention, the founders were debating about how many representatives in the Congress should each state allowed to have. For example, James Madison, who came from Virginia, one of the larger states, suggested that representation should be proportional to the state’s population (Hart et al. 109-110). Coming from a state with larger population had influenced Madison’s proposal, for he reasoned that since Virginia has a large population of people, so more representatives are needed to represent more people. However, the states with a smaller population disagreed with this proposal and came up with a proposal that would counter Madison’s proposal. Paterson, who came from New Jersey, one of those states with smaller population, proposed a plan in which equal number of people should be elected from each state for representation in the Congress (Hart et al. 109-110). It was evident to see how coming from a smaller state had affected Paterson’s proposal, for he feared
The north made a compromise which was a wrong decision and was the start to something worse that was what to come. Also the corruption of the government in the north caused the reconstruction to fall apart. (Background Essay paragraph 1) “1876 was an exciting year for America” “So it is great irony of history that the election of 1876 officially crushed the american dream.” The Compromise of 1877 was a compromise that gave both sides what they assumed they wanted. (Background Essay, Paragraph 4) The Compromise was introduced because of the presidential election. The north wanted there president and the south wanted theirs. The Republican candidate Rutherford B. Hayes against the Democratic Candidate Samuel J. Tilden. So the north wanted to make a compromise and they wanted to give the north and the south what they wanted. The north got their president and the south got the union troops out of the south. (Background Essay Paragraph 5) When Hayes took union troops from the south he was ending the
Throughout the 1800’s many compromises were created with the intent of pulling two nations together to from a more perfect government. The North and the South have different views that created many conflicts between the two parties. Congress continued to address controversial matters with compromises that only benefitted one side or the other and not both. These compromises affected the North and the South; however they started to drastically worsen because both sides had economic, social, and political differences.
The North and South in the years 1800 to 1860 were divided into two different territory which showed their different morale and lifestyle. Both factions conflicting ideas towards the issues affecting the nation. The compromise was made impossible by 1860 due to disagreement over states' rights, intense growth in sectionalism and dispute over the morals of slavery. During the time, the north underwent major social, industrial, and economic changes known as the Antebellum Period. The industrial economy took place in the North while the cotton kingdom took place in the South. The southern states wanted to expand slavery to other countries, while the northern states wanted to limit slavery to the South. In the Election of 1860 when Lincoln was elected, he believed slavery was wrong and made efforts to hold the Union together, Attempts such as the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and the Great Compromise of 1850 to bring reconciliation the North and South were made which led the Tariff/Nullification Controversy. In the early 1800s, the South and North faction made attempts to compromise but f...
The Connecticut Compromise resolved this issue by forming the two houses that we have today. 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.
Since the beginning of their new nation, the United States 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.
Therefore, in 1787, two delegates by the names of Roger Sherman and James Wilson introduced the Three Fifths compromise in the Philadelphia Convention. 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 Rep...
The people of the North and South each believed fiercely in their cause, one for a free people the other for life servitude. Neither group, based on the documents presented were willing to budge regarding their beliefs. They North wanted to abolish slavery completely and the South could not understand why they had to give up their way of life because the concept was so ingrained in them as a people. The two completely different ideals could not co-exist peacefully and therefore the eventual climax of this issue, the war, was an inevitable
There were three major compromises made at the Constitutional Convention. They were The Connecticut Compromise, The Three-Fifths Compromise, and The Slave Trade Compromise. The Connecticut Compromise resolved one of the largest disputes between the large states and the smaller states. The larger states believed they should have representation based on how much land they owned, whereas the smaller states believed they should have equal representation for all regardless of the size of land or the population. The decision that pleased all was the creation of the House of Representatives, which was based on the proportionate size of the population and the Senate which had equal representation for all, two members per colony. After the Connecticut
As previously mentioned, slavery was at the root of most tensions that arose between the North and the South, and the annexation of new land created much conflict concerning the status of slavery. Missouri Compromise dictated that the lands of the Louisiana Purchase north of the 36¢ª30¡¯ parallel were to be free of slavery. Democratic senator Douglas, introduced a bill in early 1854 which proposed the division of the Nebraska Territory into two units, Kansas and Nebraska, and the application of his idea of ¡°popular sovereignty¡± which would allow the territorial vote to decide the area¡¯s status concerning slavery. This proposal would, in effect, repeal the Missouri Compromise, which greatly angered abolitionists and Northerners. Douglas and Southern supporters won a congressional debate and shortly after, the bill was signed. With the passage of this bill, many conflicts arose. Much personal turmoil erupted in the territories with almost immediate tragic results in ¡°Bleeding Kansas.¡± Also, the bill resulted in a complete realignment of the major political parties: The Democrats lost influence in the North and were to become the regional proslavery party of the South, the Whig Party, which had opposed the Kansas-Nebraska Act, died in the South and was weakened in the North, and a new Republican Party ...
Before we had the Constitution of the United States, we had the Articles of Confederation. However, like every important document in our country’s history, there are always issues that must be fixed in order to have a well-running government. Compromises are agreements or settlements that two or more parties reach. Our present Constitution would not be what it is today without key compromises.
When discussing the makeup of Congress, one must first look to the intent of the framers around creating a bicameral legislature. This would take me to the first section of our class regarding the debates the founding fathers had about equal representation of the states in the Congress.
No matter the problem, compromise usually finds itself solving it. In American history, the Connecticut Compromise is an example of how compromise kept the country from falling into more conflict and confusion that they were already trapped in at the time. There were two plans for the layout of the legislative branch, the New Jersey and Virginia Plans. One favored smaller states by giving each state equal voted and the other favored big states by basing voted on population. At the Constitutional Convention, Roger Sherman proposed the Connecticut Compromise which incorporated both plans by creating a bicameral Congress with one chamber giving two votes to each state and the other basing on population. While the plan did seem to favor the bigger states, the members of the Convention seemed to agree to it and Congress has been using this format to this day. Without it, who knows how bills would be made into laws today or if we would even have a legislative branch. It was thanks to a compromise that America has what it has