1. Review Articles of Confederation

2. Articles of Confederation
Northwest Ordinance
Passed by confederation Congress
Created system for bringing new states into the union
Congress agreed to divide the Northwest Territory into several smaller territories each of which had a governor appointed by Congress. When the population of a territory reached 60,000, its settlers could draft their own constitution. The people could then ask Congress for permission to join the Union as a state.
Ordinance had a bill of rights
Required that public education be provided for citizens
No slavery

3. Why were the Articles of Confederation so weak?
Revolutionaries Disliked…
So Under the AoC…
Taxation without representation
The federal government could not tax
States didn’t have to follow federal laws
Large central governments that had absolute power
States had their own laws and didn’t have to follow other states’ laws
Having to follow British legislation
No executive branch or national court system
Lots of power in a king’s hands
The king changing laws at any time
Any amendment required all 13 states’ approval

4. Background to Shays’s Rebellion
Massachusetts has war debts
So they tax to earn money
Farmers who can’t pay taxes
Lose land
Debtor’s prison
Indentured Servitude
Why would the people who just finished fighting the American Revolution be upset by such taxes?
Massachusetts refused to print paper money and tried to pay its war debts by collecting taxes on land. The state’s economic policy hit farmers particularly hard. As landowners, they had to pay the new taxes. With little gold or silver and no paper money, farmers had trouble paying their debts. When they couldn’t pay they were forced by the gov. to sell their property, serve terms in prison, or sell themselves as indentured servants.

5. Shays’s Rebellion
Read pages of your textbook and answer the following 3 questions.

6. Constitutional Convention
To amend the weaknesses of the Articles of Confederation.

7. Differing Perspectives
Did all Americans think the Articles of Confederation were too weak?
Read the back of your note sheet and answer the following questions individually.
Be prepared to discuss your answers.