AP United States History
Mr. M. Pecot
· Movements for equality
· Movement for separation of church and state
· Challenges to slavery
· The status of women: “republican motherhood”
· Continental Congress calls for states to draft constitutions in 1776
· Massachusetts and ratification
· Features of the state constitutions
· Character of state legislatures
· Availability of land aids “economic democracy”
· The effect of the Revolution on manufacturing
· Commercial drawbacks
· free trade
· looming economic troubles
· Problems with framing a new government
- Philosophy of natural rights
- Lack of colonial unity
- Hard times
· Reasons for optimism
· The Second Continental Congress & state sovereignty
· Creation of the Articles of Confederation
- the problem of western lands
- the importance of public lands
The Articles of Confederation: America’s First Constitution
· The character of the Articles of “Confusion”
· Weaknesses of Congress under the Articles
- powers to the states
- inability to regulate commerce
- taxation
- inability to act directly upon citizens
· Strengths of the Articles
- a landmark in government
- stepping stone toward the Constitution
· Land Ordinance of 1785
- Purpose
- Policy
· Northwest Ordinance of 1787
- Purpose/Goal
- Policy
- Significance
· Troubles in Foreign Relations
- England – trade, British forts
- Spain – Mississippi., Florida, etc.
- France – debts and trade issues
- North Africa - piracy & bribes
The Horrid Specter of Anarchy
· Quarrels between the states
· Shays’s Rebellion
- causes
- Daniel Shays & his rebellion
· Responses to Shays’s Rebellion
- Conservatives/wealthy/creditors: fear of “mobocracy”
- Liberals/poorer/debtors (see TJ’s quote p. 178)
· Commerce controversies and the Anapolis Convention
· The Constitutional Convention – 1787
- The delegates
- Key Figures: Washington, Franklin, Madison, Hamilton
- Conspicuous Absences: Jefferson, John Adams, Paine, Samuel Adams, John Hancock; Patrick Henry
· Characteristics of the delegates
· Goals of the delegates
· The decision to scrap the Articles
· The Virginia Plan v. the New Jersey Plan
· The Great Compromise
· The Executive
- powers of
- election of
· Sectional tensions:
- 3/5 Compromise
- 1807 slave trade compromise
· Sources of agreement among delegates
· safeguards against too much democracy:
- federal judges
- electoral college
- indirect election of senators
· democratic elements
The Clash of Federalists and AntiFederalists
· The Ratification Process
· The Antifederalists & Federalists
· Antifederalists arguments
· The importance of Massachusetts
· Ratification
· Virginia
· New York
- manhood suffrage
- The Federalist Papers
· North Carolina and Rhode Island
· A “minority” movement
The writing of the Constitution was, as Catherine Drinker Bowen has observed, a “Miracle at Philadelphia.” Yet, this “miracle” was based on historical experience. Trace the intellectual origins of the Constitution from British theory and practice through the philosophy and current events of the late 1780s.