History 1301 12 Problems after the Revolution

2014 History 1301-12

Articles of Confederation• Wary of strong central governments after

their interactions with Britain, delegates at the Second Continental Congress made certain that the new national congress created under the Articles of Confederation would have very little authority over state legislatures. Instead, drafters hoped that the congress would act as a collective substitute for a monarch, or a multiperson executive.

The Articles stipulated that the Congress could do the following:

• Negotiate treaties, declare war, and make peace • Coin money • Issue loans • Maintain an army and a navy • Operate a postal service • Negotiate treaties with Native Americans • Resolve disputes among the states • Govern western territories for the benefit of all

states

Continental Dollars and Depression

• The new Congress immediately set to printing paper currency in order to pay for the Revolutionary War. The money became the standard currency in the United States during the war, but when hard times hit and inflation skyrocketed, these Continental dollars became “not worth a Continental.” Many Americans, especially farmers, faced hardship as the economy slid into depression. Congress requested that states increase taxes to help pay for a new national currency, but most states refused and printed their own paper money instead. This, too, quickly succumbed to inflation, and by the end of the war Americans had fistfuls of a variety of worthless money.

This much was very clear

• The individual states reserved all powers not specifically granted to congress.

• The new national government had no taxing authority.

The issue of Taxes

• Representative governments in the states would levy their own taxes and then use a percentage of the duties collected to pay their share of national expenditures.

• Did this work? Not hardly. Many states refused to pay…can you imagine that?

Governing Western Lands

• The Land Ordinance of 1785, which helped the government survey western lands. The law created townships, each six miles square, that were divided into thirty-six square-mile sections and auctioned to the highest bidder so that any American could settle in the West.

• The Northwest Ordinance of 1787, which stipulated that a western territory could apply for full statehood as soon as it had the same number of people as the least populous of the original thirteen states. The ordinance made certain that new states would receive equal footing with older states and that all citizens of the territories would have the same rights as the citizens of the states.

Effects of Actions

• England had attempted to restrict westward expansion to appease the Indians, the new central government sought ways to promote settlements in the American West via land laws and Indian policies.

• Both ordinances were popular because they opened land to settlers and the possibility of profits for speculators.

FTM

• Income from land sales promised to help reduce the national debt.

• Slaves in the area could stay, but no new ones.

• Made area attractive to white farmers who feared cheap labor.

• Southerners did not complain because there was still a lot of land.

Faulty Assumptions

• During the postwar years the Confederation acted as if the Indians of the interior were “conquered” peoples, allies of England who had lost the war and thus came under U.S. control.

• Land treaties were imposed. Ft. Stanwix Treaty in 1784 ceded Iroquois Land.Indian tribes dwindled, 2 years later repudiated.

Indian Raids Started

• Devastating Indian raids now greeted new settlers. Speculation fell, but land still was needed.

European presence

• Congress also failed to resolve problems because of Spain in Florida and Gulf Coast and areas of Mississippi.

• Spanish agents were urging residents to break away.

• Washington warned that they might. “The Touch of a feather would turn them away.”

National Debt

• Congress was unable to effectively deal with the $35 Million War Debt. Much owed to French and Dutch Bankers. Congress had to borrow additional money to just pay the interest.

• Owed Soldiers.• By 1780, with the outcome of the war still very

much undecided, the central government had run out of money and was essentially BANKRUPT! As a result the paper money it issued was basically worthless.

Robert Morris-1781

• Robert Morris appointed as Supt. of Finance. He forged a solution to this dire dilemma. Morris expanded existing government power and secured special privileges for the BANK OF NORTH AMERICA in an attempt to stabilize the value of the paper money issued by the Congress. He went beyond authorized powers but stemmed runaway inflation.

Morris

• Urged states to stop issuing paper money and persuaded Congress to demand that the states pay their requisitions in gold and silver coin. (specie)

• Took steps to make Federal Bonds more attractive to investors.

• In 1781, Congress requested $8 million from the States. 2 1/2 years later they got less than $1.5. States would not come through. By 1784 Morris resigned.

Would the Great Experiment Survive?

• We won the war, but Britain, France and Spain stood circled like Vultures harboring imperial ambitions. They had not gone far.

• Britain was still in Canada.

• Spain in Mississippi and South.

• France had proven to be a very untrustworthy friend.

• Times were tough.

Farmers upset

• Frustration with the economic depression boiled over in 1786. Farmers throughout the colonies were suffering intensely after the revolution, mainly due to the worthless Continentals they were forced to use as money. Most of the state legislatures refused to provide any assistance to these impoverished farmers and, in some cases, even raised taxes. Unable to find any relief, and still intoxicated from their success in the Revolution, many farmers grabbed their muskets once again and marched on the various state capitals to demand new governments.  

Shay’s Rebellion

• The most notorious of these small uprising was Shays’s Rebellion. Led by the Revolutionary war hero Daniel Shays, protesters attacked Massachusetts’s courthouses to prevent local judges from foreclosing on farms. The state legislature ultimately used militia troops to crush the uprising. Still, Shays’s Rebellion awakened legislators in Massachusetts and throughout the states to the inadequacies of the existing political system.

Daniel Shays in Massachusetts

• “the spector of debtors jail… hovered close by.”

• 1787 Shays led 1200 men, mostly debtors and veterans toward the federal arsenal.

• Defenders fired killing four.

• Shays and others later forgiven.

Go with the French, butIt gets complicated

• Franklin, Jay, and others are pressing for colonial demands for recognition.

• We can’t trust the French or the British.• The negotiations for a final settlement

were complicated by considerations involving France, Spain, and the Netherlands.

• The American and British peace commissioners, however, reached a secret preliminary agreement in November, 1782. Their final agreement, the Treaty of Paris, was signed September 3, 1783.

Tough Times, Buy American

• Not everyone suffered equally. Artisans and clothing manufacturers did well.

• Government contracts still paid.

• Times were tough, like now.

Congress had to Act

• But what to do, my my, what to do?

Two Party System

• The passing of time had created people who saw the need for a strong national or federal government. These were soon called the Federalists.

• Those who feared and opposed a strong national government wanted power to be vested in the states. They were called Anti-Federalists.

Enter the Federalists who Wanted:

• A strong government. Danger rose from “excessive liberty” that was a threat.

• “We have probably had too good an opinion of human nature. Experience has taught us that men will not adopt and carry into execution the measures best calculated for their own good, without the intervention of a coercive power.” G.W.

What America Needs:

• A Strong Government, ably administered. (we know what we don’t want.)

• A new national government capable of extending Am. Trade spurring the economy and protecting the National Interest.

What National Interest?

• Barbary Coast-We could not protect our merchant vessels.

• 1785: USA pays $60,000 as tribute to Algiers, in order to free two ships and the crew, and would continue to pay $1 million per year.

What National Interest?

• Areas around the Mississippi were controlled by Spain. The “Spanish Conspiracy” involved getting a small group of western adventurers to consider leaving the union and making a separate treaty with Spain.

Indian Claims

• Cherokee, Creek, Choctaw and Chickasaw claims in what is now Mississippi and Alabama and the contiguous fringes of Tennessee and Georgia.

• Spain made treaties and provided subsidies of munitions and firewater.

7 British Fortified Posts

• Great Britain had held successfully during the Revolution seven fortified posts south of the river and lake boundary between the U.S. and Canada including Lake Champlain, St. Lawrence, Lake Ontario, Detroit and others.

• Peace treaty with Great Britain, April 9, 1784, called for her to leave “with all convenient speed.”

• Secret Order issued by Great Britain the night before directed the Governor-General of Canada not to evacuate the posts until further instructions.

British kept them 12 more years

• Forbade navigation of the Great Lakes by American merchant ships.

• British customs officer at Oswego, N.Y., shut off American goods from that post and the lakes.

• Continued activities among Indian tribes far within the territory of the United States.

How could they do this?

• Under what pretext could they do this?• 1-Machiavelli• 2-Pre war debts were confiscated into

treasuries of various states who really did not want to return them.

• Congress could ask, but had no authority to make them.

• John Jay felt the retention of the posts was not unjustified given the circumstances.

Gee, there’s a lot of stuff…

• Posts, debts, Loyalists, evacuated slaves, trade, boundaries-none of these issues need have existed had the United States been a power capable of resolutely defending its rights against all comers.

• Lacking union with France, a nation only in name, with no army, no navy, no executive, no national courts, no control over national commerce was powerless.

What Federalist dreamed:

• Federalists shared a vision of an expanding the commercial republic, its people spreading across the rich lands of the interior, its merchant ships connecting America with the markets of Europe and beyond. This vision, so rich in promise, seemed clearly at risk! (cue the music)

Who were the Federalists?

• Men who had experience in the Continental Army and Congress and had a national vision.

• George Washington-(kind of)

• James Madison

• Alexander Hamilton

• John Jay

George Washington

• After the war G.W. found himself in an “acute” financial situation. While still an outstanding farmer, he had western land where Indians threatened settlement.

Washington

• After the Revolutionary War ended, Washington simply wanted to go home.

• He had served his country well and even if never became “President” he would have been well remembered by historians for being able to keep the Continental Army in tact during war with the British.

Alexander HamiltonAn aide to Washington during the Revolution.

He became acutely aware of the economic and political troubles that were hindering the American army's ability to wage war, and was especially critical of the Continental Congress's inefficiency in managing the military.

He Knew firsthand the shortcomings of the government

Alexander Hamilton

• Only a "talented few" -- understood to mean men drawn from the wealthy and aristocratic strata of society -- had the wisdom and dispassionate foresight to implement the measures necessary for the public good.

• The great majority of people, in Hamilton's eyes, operated primarily out of self-interest and could not be trusted to think or act judiciously in matters of state power.

• Proposed elected President serve for life.• He had an elite-est side to him, perhaps an ego?

Alexander Hamilton

• The second major distinguishing feature of Hamilton's political philosophy was its emphasis on energetic government.

• He believed that the government should be proactive in economic and military affairs, have the power the supersede lower governments (as at the state level), and be able to exercise authority directly on the people.

• Only an energetic government would be able to provide the stability and order necessary to secure the blessings of liberty for the people, especially over such a large geographical area as the United States.

John Jay

• Although he did not initially favor separation from Britain, he was nonetheless among the American commissioners who negotiated the peace with Great Britain that secured independence for the former colonies.

John Jay

• He was Secretary for Foreign Affairs under the Articles of Confederation, a contributor to the Federalist, the first Chief Justice of the United States, negotiator of the 1794 "Jay Treaty" with Great Britain, and a two-term Governor of the State of New York. 

• Often represented us in Europe. He returned once to find he’d been appointed Secretary for Foreign Affairs and later he returned to find he had been elected Governor of New York.

James Madison• He participated in the

framing of the Virginia Constitution in 1776, served in the Continental Congress, and was a leader in Va.

• Madison made a major contribution to the ratification of the Constitution by writing, with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, the Federalist essays. In later years, when he was referred to as the "Father of the Constitution," Madison protested that the document was not "the off-spring of a single brain," but "the work of many heads and many hands."

Forming a More Perfect Union

• With Congress’s permission, and spurred by Hamilton, delegates met in Annapolis, Maryland, in 1786, but 4 states were not represented. With too many no shows they agreed to meet again in Philadelphia in 1787 to discuss revising the Articles of Confederation. Shays rebellion help spur attendance in Philly.

• Why would they want Congress’s permission?

• More than a revision was going on.

Constitutional Convention• The fifty-five men who gathered at the Constitutional

Convention in Philadelphia came from the upper echelons of society. Most had attended college and had become wealthy planters, lawyers, and merchants but generally understood that they served all classes of Americans. On the other hand, the delegates did want the new government to protect individuals’ rights to acquire and hold wealth.

• Most all of the attendees had not been heavily involved in the revolution: Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Samuel Adams, and Patrick Henry were all absent. Nevertheless, most did have experience writing their own state constitutions.

• Delegates unanimously selected George Washington to chair the convention.

A who’s who of founding fathers

• Robert Morris, perhaps the richest man in America.

• Thomas Jefferson was in Paris, but Madison had corresponded with him. Madison was the best prepared.

• Benjamin Franklin, older, but still able to inspire.

• George Washington, whose attendance may have made it happen.

Where?

• Independence Hall where the Declaration of Independence had been signed a little more than a decade earlier.

• These were heady times, exciting times. Things were about to really change.

Virginia Plan Introduced

• Debate focused first on the Va. Plan which outlined a potentially powerful national government, a bicameral Congress, and a President who would be named by Congress. It also included a National Judiciary and a Council of Revision to review the Constitutionality of Federal laws.

The Virginia Plan

• Designed and presented by Madison, with the advice of Jefferson, it called for the creation of a bicameral national legislature, or a new Congress with an upper and lower house, in which the number of representatives per state would be apportioned based on that state’s population. Many of the more populous states supported this “large state plan” because it would give them more power.

Virginia Plan

• In addition it recommended the creation of a "national executive" to be chosen by Congress for a single limited term. It proposed that the powers of the executive include all of those powers "vested in Congress by the Confederation." The executive would also have the power to "negative" or veto bills, which could still become laws if re-passed by Congress.

New Jersey Plan

• Introduced because Virginia Plan seemed to favor big states, proposed keeping Articles of Confederation as basic structure of government and adding powers to tax and regulate foreign and interstate commerce.

New Jersey Plan

• A "federal executive" to be chosen by Congress, consisting of more than one person. As in the Virginia Plan, the executives would serve only a single term in office.

• Unlike the Virginia Plan, the executives would not have a veto power, and would be impeachable by Congress on the request of a majority of state governors.

Virginia Plan as basis

• After three days of heated debate, by a vote of 7-3 the Virginia Plan was adopted as the basis for moving forward.

• A much stronger national government was coming, but how strong would it be.

100 Years later….

• This guy would come along, a young engineer named Willis Carrier. But in the summer of 1787 it was hot in Philly. What did Willis invent?

Hamiliton’s Exit

• Nobody likes rejection. Hamilton had proposed a “Supreme Executive,” a President elected for life and a federal government so strong that the states were merely administrative. His idea was rejected, he felt rejected and left for a while.

• Luther Martin of Maryland was an ardent Anti-Federalist who opposed anything that threatened state sovereignty or smacked of aristocracy. He left too. Other Anti-Federalists were Patrick Henry, John Hancock and Sam Adams. Weaker National/Stronger States.

Issues debated for 4 months

• Conflicting interests of large and small states

• Balance of power-national and state governments.

• Strong Executive, but not too strong.

• Slavery? Slave trade? –Passions on both sides North and South.

The Great Compromise

• Compromise struck by Franklin, Roger Sherman of Connecticut and others.

• 3/5 Compromise for House of Reps. Northern delegates did not want slaves counted at all.

• States would have equal votes in Senate.

• Electoral College-see your notes

Checks and Balances

• A) spotters at a gymnastic meet.

• B) Accountant helpers.

• C) Circus Performers

• D) East European Scales

• E) Powers that the three branches of government have over each other in order to keep any one branch from gaining too much power.

Other points

• Judicial Review-Supreme Court may review and decide if a law is constitutional or not. Power is implied.

• Elastic Clause has gotten very elastic.• Ratification-Needed 9 states to come into

effect. • Senators elected indirectly by State

Legislators. 1913 Changed to direct election by the people.

Slave Trade

• Slave trade would not formally end for another 20 years. Slavery and slave trade were not mentioned, but the meaning of the wording used was clear lawyer-eze setting a high standard for political double talk to come…not prohibiting the “Migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit.”

And more

• They also added convoluted language that provided federal sanction for the capture and return of runaway slaves.

• At the time it seemed a small price for unity and harmony, but would later haunt northern colonies as the fugitive slave clause.

National Government

• Levy and collect taxes

• Regulate commerce with foreign nations and between the states.

• Devise uniform rules for naturalization.

• Administer national patents and copyrights

• General Welfare and make all laws necessary became elastic clauses.

Whew, that’s finally over!

• After all the business was concluded, 3 of the 42 remaining delegates refused to sign the document. The other 39,however, affixed their names and forwarded it to the Confederation Congress along with the request that it be sent on to the states for approval.

• On Sept. 17, the Grand Convention adjourned. • When nine agreed, it was a deal. If the others

agreed, they could join. • The next battle would be ratification.

Effective selling is not arguing but giving more information.

• The treatment of government power. Federalists argued that power was not the enemy of liberty but its guarantor.

• Factions have developed. Federalists argued that political divisions were the inevitable accompaniment of human liberty.

• “Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, element without which it instantly expires.” To suppress faction would bring the destruction of liberty itself

The Federalists Papers

• The Federalist Papers were written and published during the years 1787 and 1788 in several New York State newspapers to persuade New York voters to ratify the proposed constitution.

• In total, the Federalist Papers consist of 85 essays outlining how this new government would operate and why this type of government was the best choice for the United States of America.

The Federalists Papers

• All of the essays were signed "PUBLIUS" and the actual authors of some are under dispute, but the general consensus is that Alexander Hamilton wrote 52. James Madison wrote 28 and John Jay contributed the remaining five.

• Publius, whose name is translated Friend of the people, was a Roman counsul who lived in 500 B.C.E. The Federalist Papers remain today as an excellent reference for anyone who wants to understand the U.S. Constitution.

General Introduction

• AFTER an unequivocal experience of the inefficiency of the subsisting federal government, you are called upon to deliberate on a new Constitution for the United States of America.

Results

• Where Federalists knew they had a majority, they pressed quickly for a vote.

• In states like New York they delayed and educated.

• It took less than a year to secure approval by the necessary nine states. Federalists leaders had to agree to a set of amendments outlining a federal bill of rights. (Adams and Hancock joined now.)

Federalist/Anti Federalist Areas

Results

• Virginia and New Hampshire ratified by ten votes, New York passed by three and Rhode Island by only two.

• How did the Federalists prevail?

The “Living”Constitution• Political philosophers around the world have

hailed the Constitution as one of the most important documents in world history.

• It established the first stable democratic government and inspired the creation of similar constitutions around the world.

• Past historians have waxed lyrical about the Founding Fathers’ incredible foresight when writing the Constitution.

Or… a bundle of compromises ?

• Many contemporary historians, however, tend to see the Constitution more as a bundle of compromises rather than a document they knew would change the world. Either way, the Constitution established a much stronger federal government and has since become the oldest living written constitution in the world. 

Importance of a vote

• Only 39 signed it originally.

• It passed by slim margins.

• How could so few have had such a mighty impact on so many?

GEORGE NOT JAMES MASON

THIS GUY NOT THIS GUY

GEORGE MASON

• Mason had earlier written the Va. Declaration of Rights that strongly influenced Thomas Jefferson in writing the first part of the Declaration of Independence. He left the convention bitterly disappointed, however, and became one of the Constitution's most vocal opponents. "It has no declaration of rights," he was to state. Ultimately, George Mason's views prevailed. When James Madison drafted the amendments to the Constitution that were to become the Bill of Rights, he drew heavily upon the ideas put forth in the Virginia Declaration of Rights.

Bill of Rights

• During the debates on the adoption of the Constitution, its opponents repeatedly charged that the Constitution as drafted would open the way to tyranny by the central government. Fresh in their minds was the memory of the British violation of civil rights before and during the Revolution. They demanded a "bill of rights" that would spell out the immunities of individual citizens. Several state conventions in their formal ratification of the Constitution asked for such amendments; others ratified the Constitution with the understanding that the amendments would be offered.

Bill of Rights

• Rights for U.S. Citizens.

• Limitations on the national government.

Bill of Rights

• On September 25, 1789, the First Congress of the United States therefore proposed to the state legislatures 12 amendments to the Constitution that met arguments most frequently advanced against it. The first two proposed amendments, which concerned the number of constituents for each Representative and the compensation of Congressmen, were not ratified. Articles 3 to 12, however, ratified by three-fourths of the state legislatures, constitute the first 10 amendments of the Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights.

BILL OF RIGHTS

• 1. Freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, freedom of petition.

• 2. Right to Bear Arms.• 3. Freedom from quartering soldiers.• 4. Protection from unreasonable search

and seizure.• 5. Right to indictment, protection from self

incrimination.

Bill of Rights

• 6. Right to trial by jury in criminal cases.

• 7. Right to trial by jury in civil cases.

• 8. Protection from cruel and unusual punishment.

• 9. Any rights we left out.

• 10. States Rights Amendment. Any rights not specifically awarded to the federal government shall be reserved to the states

What to back it with?

• Franklin pointed out that gold and silver are of no permanent value and so paper monies linked to or backed by gold and silver, as with bank paper money in Europe, are of no permanent value.

• Land is a more certain and steady asset with which to back paper money. Most importantly, land cannot be exported from the provinces as gold and silver can.

Land Banks and Stability

• A properly run land bank will never loan more paper money than the landed security available to back it, and so the value of paper money, through this limit on its quantity, will never fall below that of land.

• Franklin also favored private banks backed by gold and silver.

James Madison

• Madison helped write the Federalist papers with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay. In later years, when he was referred to as the "Father of the Constitution," Madison protested that the document was not "the off-spring of a single brain," but "the work of many heads and many hands."

Alexander Hamilton

• Fought alongside George Washington.

• A cabinet member under Washington

• Later would go head to head with Jefferson.