“Our peculiar security is in the possession of a written Constitution. Let us not make it a blank paper by construction.” - Thomas Jefferson, 1803 The American Constitution framed one of the most novel and incredible political structures the world has ever seen. Ironically, the greatest strength of the American national government was in its ability to limit its own power; the Constitution was framed for the purpose of maximizing the freedoms of individual people while restraining national power. The Constitution achieved these end by unify its extremely diverse states into one body, with a central government that governed cooperatively with state and local authorities. Through extremely precise and nuanced sets of legal directives, the Constitution outlines in no uncertain terms exactly what powers and responsibilities the federal government would have and how it was to interact with powers of state government and state law. This relationship and understanding within American politics is known as Federalism. And while federalism provided the growing federal government with real powers even over and against state powers, over time and into our modern era, federal power has been greatly. This has mainly been brought about throughout the evolving interpretation of certain constitutional provisions. Constitutional interpretation is contingent on at least 3 factors: who is president, who is in the government, and what prevailing mores of the people are. Most exemplary of changes in the meaning Federalism in our days are the Commerce Clause or the Supremacy Clause, which have been used to dramatically expand the scope of federal power. The Commerce Clause provided congress with “the power to regulate commerce between foreign Nation... ... middle of paper ... ... in order to unity the 13 colonies into one body. A united country, which allowed for social, political and commercial activities to occur, unhindered and unimpeded by a careless or biased legal system. But over time, the Constitution and the Supreme Court commissioned to keep and expound it began to use the clauses and provisions of the document to fight out partisan political issues and made the Constitution a political tool for different ends. Those ends were not always bad, often they were quite good. But the legitimate place for such functions was within the other two branches of government in which elected representatives were expected made such political decisions. Federal power was expanded tremendously but not without pushback from within and without. The meaning of Federalism still remains up for grabs in the ever-changing world of American politics.
In the early years of the eighteenth Century, the young United States of America were slowly adapting to the union and the way the country was governed. And just like the country, the governmental powers were starting to develop. Since the creation of the Constitution and due to the Connecticut Compromise, there is the Executive, the Legislative and the Judicial Power. But the existence of those powers was not always that naturally. In these crucial times, the Judicial Power had problems controlling the other powers. It was a challenge for the Supreme Court to exercise the powers granted by the new Constitution. Federal Government was not generally appreciated and its formation also caused many disagreements and debates.
The establishment of the U.S. Constitution was an action taken in order to supply federal control over the young United States of America without replicating the mistakes and flaws present within the Articles of Confederation. The idea of the Constitution was to better unify the states, something the Articles of Confederation were completely unable to do. Even during the infancy of the Constitution, its creators were divided into two major political parties: the federalists, who supported large and strong federal government, and the Anti-Federalists who supported reserving state’s rights and limiting the grasp of the federal government. Upon the establishment and the passing of the U.S. constitution, these two parties used personal party-based
The Independent Journal published the first Federalist essay in 1787, closely following the Constitutional Convention. This was one of 85 essays that were all soon published in support of the Constitution. The essays were all published under the alias name “Publius.” All essays were compiled into a single volume titled The Federalist Papers. The Federalist Papers is considered a significant illustration of American political philosophy under the Articles of Confederation, which were adopted by the Continental Congress. The Articles set up the first legislative system that unified the thirteen states that battled in the American Revolution. A major theme that was discussed in the essays centers around the idea that the United States could not continue to endure under the Articles of Confederation and the weaknesses that accompany it. The Articles gave states the authority to create their own laws, however they were unsuccessful in creating a strong government. The essay suggested that immediate action be taken to prevent the impending anarchy that would ensue under these Articles.
The United States constitution set a foundation for the structure of our government today. The founding fathers went through trial and error, and many compromises in order give order and structure to both the government and to the people. The first initial constitution called the Article of Confederation made the central government weak and gave individual states too much power. In the Article of Confederation, there was only one branch and were not able to collect taxes. The government was only able to receive donations. However, each individual states printed their own currency, and too much money which caused an economic turmoil or inflation. In addition, each individual states had their own army in which caused the mentality of being a union of individual state, instead of union of a country. The national government on the other
The general gist was to create non-tyrannical state, more importantly to declare the independence and to separate both politically and economically from British monarchy. The Declaration of Independence consisted of three pieces of Jefferson’s view on the need of separation from British monarchy. At the same time, colonists were benefitted from the British government by a treaty, however it did not provide any political authority over nation, soon the colonies had united to abolish British control, and they had less interest to allow them to meddle in their internal matters. The determination to create the constitution was to establish powerful government and sustain the democracy by avoid forming tyranny. The Constitution enabled the opportunity to form the federal government which based on the taxation with regard to create their own defense army as well as created judiciary and foreign relations (Ryan, 2012). It was crucial that the government avoid tyrannize over the states and the people. The Constitution formed the system in which there was a double sovereign, which allows citizen can access to the same authority in two different states. Madison argues that an extensive republic is the best security against factionalism, because it makes factions against each other without damaging as a whole, and making them exhaust each other during the conflict. The Federalists was dedicated to convince their opponents that fragile government cannot protect from foreign invasion and revolt. Clearly, it was huge contribution and collaboration of well-educated men and their hard work and passion made the United States
The Colonies were excited about having won their independence in 1783 with the signing of the Treaty of Paris, but they still had to be able to create their own system of government which they thought would create a strong government which would not have an overpowering central government as they thought Great Britain had had. With this was the creation of the Articles of Confederation. These articles were meant to create strong local and state governments while not granting any power to the central government with the idea that it could not have any power over the states. The states were allowed to conduct their own diplomacy, or war, from nation to nation or even from state to state. States were allowed to create their own currency and put heavy import taxes on goods from other states. The federal government had no independent executive, nor could it levy taxes on any part of the states. It could not create or maintain a militia; this duty was left to the states. All decisions had to be ratified by all thirteen colonies. In thought, this was a great idea because only the most popular decisions would be ratified and stronger states could not hurt the smaller states through majority rule. In practice it did not work very well because it could be thwarted by a single stubborn state.
During the construction of the new Constitution, many of the most prominent and experienced political members of America’s society provided a framework on the future of the new country; they had in mind, because of the failures of the Articles of Confederation, a new kind of government where the national or Federal government would be the sovereign power, not the states. Because of the increased power of the national government over the individual states, many Americans feared it would hinder their ability to exercise their individual freedoms. Assuring the people, both Alexander Hamilton and James Madison insisted the new government under the constitution was “an expression of freedom, not its enemy,” declaring “the Constitution made political tyranny almost impossible.” (Foner, pg. 227) The checks and balances introduced under the new and more powerful national government would not allow the tyranny caused by a king under the Parliament system in Britain. They insisted that in order achieve a greater amount of freedom, a national government was needed to avoid the civil unrest during the system under the Articles of Confederation. Claiming that the new national government would be a “perfect balance between liberty and power,” it would avoid the disruption that liberty [civil unrest] and power [king’s abuse of power in England] caused. The “lackluster leadership” of the critics of the new constitution claimed that a large land area such as America could not work for such a diverse nation.
Jay, later named as first chief justice of the Supreme Court, wrote five of the
The American Revolution stirred political unity and motivated the need for change in the nation. Because many Americans fought for a more balanced government in the Revolutionary War, they initially created a weak national government that hampered the country's growth and expansion. In the Letter from Abigail Adams to Thomas Jefferson, Mrs. Adams complained about the inadequacy of power that the American government had to regulate domestic affairs. The Articles of Confederation was created to be weak because many had feared a similar governing experience that they had just eliminated with Britain. The alliance of states united the 13 local governments but lacked power to deal with important issues or to regulate diplomatic affairs. Congress did not have the power to tax, regulate trade, or draft people for war. This put the American citizens at stake because States had the power to refuse requests for taxes and troops (Document G). The weakened national government could not do anything about uprisings or small-scale protests because it did not have the power to put together an army. The deficiencies of the confederation government inspired the drafting of the American Constitution. The document itself embodied the principle of a national government prepared to deal with the nation's problems. In James Madison's Federalist Paper, he persuades the American public to adopt the Constitution so that the government can protect humans from their nature and keep them out of conflicts.
When the United States of America came about, the colonies adopt the Articles of Confederation. These articles function for a while but the federal government has little power. In fear of revolts and riots, the government decides to revise the articles. However, since the articles give too much authority to the states, the editors start over and create the Constitution. The Articles of Confederation provide a starting place for America’s government.
The Federalist papers were written by James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and John Jay. The purpose of these papers was to persuade American’s to disregard the Articles of Confederation and to replace it with the Constitution. In Federalist papers 10, 51, and 78 are crucial ideas discussed such as liberty, factions, separation of powers, and the electoral system and pluralism.
Federalism plays an integral part in the growth and development of the United States of America and is a key factor in determining the basis of power in this country. Clearly, the term federalism can be understood in many different ways pertaining to each person's view, but it can be more broadly defined in terms of the separation between the state and federal government. Thomas E. Patterson defines federalism as, “the division of sovereignty, or ultimate governing authority, between a national government and regional (that is, state) governments. Each directly governs the people and derives its authority from them” (Patterson 74). He then goes on to give a more basic definition with, “American Federalism is basically a system of divided powers” (Patterson 74). But federalism is more than just a word with a definition. It is hard wired into the constitution because the framers knew how important this division of power would be for the development of America and to ensure power would ultimately reside with the people.
After winning the Revolutionary War and sovereign control of their home country from the British, Americans now had to deal with a new authoritative issue: who was to rule at home? In the wake of this massive authoritative usurpation, there were two primary views of how the new American government should function. Whereas part of the nation believed that a strong, central government would be the most beneficial for the preservation of the Union, others saw a Confederation of sovereign state governments as an option more supportive of the liberties American’s fought so hard for in the Revolution. Those in favor of a central government, the Federalists, thought this form of government was necessary to ensure national stability, unity and influence concerning foreign perception. Contrastingly, Anti-Federalists saw this stronger form of government as potentially oppressive and eerily similar to the authority’s tendencies of the British government they had just fought to remove. However, through the final ratification of the Constitution, new laws favoring state’s rights and the election at the turn of the century, one can say that the Anti-Federalist view of America prevails despite making some concessions in an effort to preserve the Union.
American federalism has changed drastically since its genesis. In 1776 the thirteen colonies adopted the Articles of Confederation in order to coordinate their efforts in the war for independence. The Articles of Confederation bound the states together in two main aspects; foreign and military affairs. The Articles of Confederation worked well while all the states had a common cause. However, as soon as the war ended and interests began to change, it became obvious that the Articles were not enough. This brings on the creation of Federalism (Reinventing American Federalism).
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.