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* Political Thought * Colonial Government * Revolution * Constitution * Birth of Party Politics * War of 1812 * James Monroe: "Era of Good Feeling" and Monroe Doctrine * Jacksonian Democracy * Regional Conflict and Compromise * 1860 Election of Abraham Lincoln * Civil War 1861-62 * Civil War 1863-65 * Reconstruction and Impeachment of President Johnson * Gilded Age and Progressive Era * 1912 Election of Woodrow Wilson * 1916 Election and World War I * Women's Suffrage * Depression and 1932 Election of Franklin D. Roosevelt * Prelude to World War II * Pearl Harbor and Mobilization * World War II: European Theater * World War II: Pacific Theater * Atomic Bomb and End of World War II * 1948 Truman-Dewey Election * 1960 Kennedy-Nixon Election * 1964 Johnson-Goldwater Election * Civil Rights Movement * Vietnam: Evolution of the American Role * Vietnam: Kennedy Administration and Intervention * Vietnam: Johnson Administration and Escalation * Vietnam: Nixon, Ford and Fall of South Vietnam * 1968 Humphrey-Nixon Election * Watergate Scandal and Resignation of President Nixon * 1976 Carter-Ford Election * 1980 & 1984 Reagan Elections * Clinton Impeachment * 2000 Bush-Gore Election * War in Iraq * 2008 Obama-McCain Election * 2012 Obama-Romney Election 'We the People' US Constitution Mug by HistoryPolitics Create unique personalized coffee cups at Zazzle |
ConstitutionWe the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union... Constitution of the United States Whilst the last members were signing it Doctr. FRANKLIN looking towards the Presidents Chair, at the back of which a rising sun happened to be painted, observed to a few members near him, that Painters had found it difficult to distinguish in their art a rising from a setting sun. I have said he, often and often in the course of the Session, and the vicisitudes of my hopes and fears as to its issue, looked at that behind the President without being able to tell whether it was rising or setting: But now at length I have the happiness to know that it is a rising and not a setting Sun. Notes of James Madison at the signing of the Constitution at the Constitutional Convention on September 17, 1787 Avalon Project, Yale Law School Shays' Rebellion and Movement for Reform In 1786, Massachusetts farmers attacked courthouses to protest foreclosures on their properties, and in January of the next year attempted to seize weapons stored in an armory. The civil and economic unrest known as Shays' Rebellion provided further support to those who had been calling for a stronger national government than that which had been formed under the Articles of Confederation adopted in 1781. The Articles guaranteed the independence of the states and did not provide for a federal chief executive or judicial system, giving the Continental Congress little authority to deal with emergencies such as the armed revolt led by Shays or the underlying problems provoking the revolt, including skyrocketing inflation, the lack of a recognized national currency or system to manage trade between the states or foreign countries. Even prior to the Massachusetts uprising, a meeting in 1785 initially convened in Alexandria, Virginia, and then continued at the Mount Vernon estate of George Washington, discussed possible steps to strengthen the national government. In the Virginia assembly, a proposal offered by James Madison and John Tyler that the Continental Congress be given power to regulate commerce throughout the Confederation led to another meeting, the Annapolis Convention convened in Maryland where representatives from several states discussed commercial problems. When the delegates at this meeting began to address governmental reform issues that they believed went beyond the authority given them by their respective legislatures, Madison and Alexander Hamilton, a young lawyer from New York who had served as an aide to Washington in the Revolution, drafted a report summarizing the discussions in Annapolis and calling upon Congress to summon delegates of all of the states to meet for the purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation. The report was widely viewed as an interference with the authority of the Congress, but the Congress put aside the challenge to its jurisdiction to approve a formal call to the states for a convention to meet in Philadelphia. The Convention The Convention convened in the State House (now Independence Hall) in Philadelphia on May 14, 1787, but did not formally meet for business until May 25, when a quorum of delegates from seven states had arrived. Washington was elected unanimously as president of the Convention. When a resolution introduced by William Paterson of New Jersey simply to revise the Articles to give Congress more power to raise revenues and regulate commerce failed to gain a majority, the larger states moved to abandon attempts to amend the Articles in favor of the drafting of an entirely new document. The delegates debated the articles of the new Constitution through the summer and into September. Although their sessions were closed, a record of the positions advanced and the votes taken on each resolution is available through the extensive notes taken by some in attendance, principally James Madison, who is generally credited as having the most significant role in the drafting of the final document. Chief issues debated during the sessions included how much power to allow the central government, how many representatives in Congress to allow each state, and how these representatives should be elected--directly by the people or indirectly by the state legislatures. The Virginia Plan advanced by the larger states proposed to base representation on population; the contrasting New Jersey Plan called for a legislature of equal representation for each state regardless of its number of people. The ultimate compromise--creation of a Senate with two members from each state elected by the individual state legislatures and a House of Representatives with its composition apportioned by size of population and elected directly by the people--bridged the differences between the interests of the larger and smaller states. The document signed on September 17 was then submitted to the Congress, which in turn on September 28, 1787 approved a resolution directing that it be provided to each of the state legislatures to vote on its ratification. Ratification After the Philadelphia Convention adjourned, several of the delegates returned to their respective states to urge support for the document's ratification. The Federalist Papers, a series of 85 essays published anonymously under the pen name "Publius," between October 1787 and May 1788, primarily appearing in two New York state newspapers of the time, The New York Packet and The Independent Journal, were the most prominent effort of those seeking approval of the new charter. They were written to urge citizens of New York to support ratification of the proposed Constitution, and while their authorship remains uncertain to this day, they are thought by most historians to have been the work primarily of Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and James Madison. On June 21, 1788, with the ratification by New Hampshire, the nine states required to approve the Constitution pursuant to its Article VII had acted, making it effective. Resources * Constitution of the United States >> National Archives * A More Perfect Union: The Creation of the U.S. Constitution >> National Archives * The Founders' Constitution >> University of Chicago Press * Creating the United States Constitution >> Library of Congress * James Madison, Notes on the Debates in the Federal Convention >> Avalon Project, Yale Law School * The Federalist Papers >> Library of Congress * Articles of Confederation >> Library of Congress National Constitution Center Education * Teaching Six Big Ideas in the Constitution: Lesson Plans >> National Archives * Teaching the Constitution >> PBS Learning Media * The Constitution: Drafting a More Perfect Union: Lesson Plan >> Library of Congress * The Constitutional Convention of 1787: Lesson Plans >> National Endowment for the Humanities * The Constitution, the Articles, and Federalism (video) |
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