1. From Confederation to Constitution

2. My Questions
What were three problems with the Articles of Confederation?
Why was Shay’s Rebellion an important moment in American History?
How did the Constitution address two of the problems under the Articles of Confederation?
Name two provisions (parts) of the Constitution that are influenced by the Enlightenment and explain how they are influenced.

3. The Articles of Confederation
Most Americans do not realize that the first U.S. government was much different from the one we know today under the U.S. Constitution.
Instead of the Constitution, the Articles of Confederation laid out the framework for how the federal government would work.
However, for many reasons, the Articles of Confederation was very flawed.
Eventually, because of these problems, the Articles of Confederation were scrapped and the Constitution took its place.

4. The “Bad” of the Articles
No President
No National Court System
No ability to tax
No army
No national money
Complex interstate commerce
Food For Thought: What problems would result?

5. The “Ugly” of the Articles
Shay’s Rebellion: The “spark” that lit the Articles of Confederation on fire.
Daniel Shays was a former Revolutionary soldier and farmer from Western Massachusetts.
Many western farmers—because they were subsistence farmers—often did not have money to buy goods sold by the merchants living in the east.
Therefore when farmers bought goods, they bought them on credit—or a promise that they would pay up later.

6. Show Me the Money!
Eventually, the merchants demanded to be paid in hard currency, or coins, instead of paper money.
With hard currency being scarce among the farmers, many of them fell into debt. Many lost their land and were put in prison.
Shays led a large army of furious farmers to rebel against the local and state government.

7. Samuel Adams

8. Ending the Rebellion
The Massachusetts government first looked to the Feds for help, but they did not have an army at all!
Consequently local militias had to be formed to put down the rebellion that included 4,000 angry farmers.
After a year of fighting and mayhem, the rebellion was stopped, two farmers were hanged, and hundreds more were pardoned—including Shays.

9. A Timely Rebellion
Leading politicians used Shay’s Rebellion as a prime example of why the United States needed a stronger federal government.
Therefore a convention was called to fix the Articles of Confederation.
However, politician secretly planned to get rid of the Articles and replace them with a new Constitution.
Franklin, Washington, Madison, and Hamilton supported its creation.

10. The Constitution
Overall, the Constitution would eventually strengthen the United States’ federal government.
Because of the Constitution, separate executive and judicial branches were created.
The legislature was less restricted in its ability to pass laws, raise armies, and levy taxes.
The Constitution also outlined how federalism would be implemented to balance political power between the states and the national government.

11. Enlightenment in the Constitution
The Constitution, like the Declaration of Independence, was heavily influenced by Enlightenment thoughts.
The Preamble, which is the introductory statement of the Constitution, is a prime example of social contract.
The Preamble begins with the famous phrase “We the People” because the “Founding Fathers” wanted it to be known that the American people—not the government leaders—held supreme power. The American people held the power—through voting—to choose America’s destiny.

12. Separation of Powers: An Enlightenment Idea
Montesquieu was a French Enlightenment thinker who first proposed the idea of the “balance of powers” within a government.
By balancing the power in government, a person or group cannot gain too much power.
Probably the most important thing that the Constitution does is it outlines the separation of powers between the Executive, Judicial, and Legislative branches. These powers can be found in Articles I, II, & III.