American Government Founding First Government of the United States & Constitutional Convention
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Overview
America’s Founding Fathers—Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, James Madison, and the like—created a republican system of government that was, for its time, truly unique. This government reflected the political philosophies of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment. Perhaps more important, the American system of government embodied the conceptions of liberty, equality, and freedom from tyranny held by ordinary Americans.
Both the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution reflect these ideals. The Declaration of Independence cut off all of the colonies’ political ties with Great Britain, established the United States as a new nation, and expressed America’s political philosophy. The Constitution created a stable federal system of government in which the individual states and a strong national government share political power. The process in which the Constitution was written and later ratified further reflects American ideals and values.
The First Government of the United States
Americans had significant experience with self-government before the writing of the Constitution in 1787, and this experience shaped the political views of the framers who wrote the Constitution and factored into the formation of the first government. A constitution is a set of rules that determines how power will be used legitimately in a state. Contrary to popular belief, few governments have been created by written constitutions.
The Colonies
Europeans settlers had been living in America for more than 250 years by the time independence from England was declared. Although the colonists were subjects of the British crown, the colonies functioned more or less independently and thus had extensive experience in self-government. Many towns held meetings to discuss public business, for example, and residents had some input into their colonies’ governments.
The colonists rebelled, in part, because they felt that the British were increasingly taking away their powers of self-government. Prior to the 1750s, the colonists paid few taxes to Britain. But when the British Parliament passed a number of taxes on the colonists, the colonists decried the measures as taxation without representation. In the 1760s, for example, the Stamp Act and the Sugar Act enraged many colonists because the acts levied taxes on certain commodities but gave the colonists no say in how the money would be spent.
Angered by the taxes, representatives from the colonies gathered at the First Continental Congress in 1774 and called for a total boycott of British goods. When the British sent troops to enforce the new taxes, many colonists began to agitate for independence. War between the British and the American colonists broke out in 1775.
The table on the next page lists the major events during the early years of the United States.
| Date | Event |
| 1607 | First permanent British colony at Jamestown, Virginia |
| 1620 | Pilgrims land in Massachusetts |
| 1620–1732 | Founding of the thirteen colonies; colonists govern themselves and develop idea of limited government |
| 1641 | Massachusetts Body of Liberties passed; it protects rights of individuals |
| 1764 | Sugar Act taxes sugar |
| 1765 | Stamp Act taxes a variety of goods |
| 1770 | Boston Massacre |
| 1773 | Boston Tea Party |
| 1775 | Revolutionary War begins |
| 1776 | Second Continental Congress convenes; Declaration of Independence is written |
| 1781 | Ratification of the Articles of Confederation |
| 1783 | Treaty of Paris ends the Revolutionary War |
| 1786 | Shays’ Rebellion begins in western Massachusetts |
| 1786 | Annapolis Convention calls on Congress to convene a meeting to fix the Articles |
| 1787 | Constitutional Convention |
| 1787–1789 | Battle to ratify the Constitution |
| 1789 | Constitution ratified; the new United States government takes |
Declaring Independence
The first attempt at national government arose during the Revolutionary War (1775–1783). State governments sent representatives to the Second Continental Congress in 1776 to organize American efforts immediately before and during the Revolutionary War. Instead of merely demanding better treatment as British subjects, the congress decided to fight for full independence.
The Declaration of Independence
Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence in 1776 to formally break away from Great Britain and to justify the Revolutionary War. According to the Declaration, “all men are created equal” and certain rights and liberties cannot be denied to people. Among those rights is self-government: The people must consent to the government for it to be legitimate. Because the British government had repeatedly abused the rights of the colonists and ignored their wishes, the colonists were no longer obligated to obey the government.
Jefferson’s Wise Words
The second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence contains perhaps the most famous words in American history: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” An inalienable right is a right that all people in the world have that no one can take away. Jefferson’s argument lays the foundation for American thinking about civil rights and liberties: Any infringement on our rights is an affront to natural law.
The Articles of Confederation
The Second Continental Congress also wrote a constitution to create a new national government. The Continental Congress approved the Articles of Confederation, which took effect in 1781 during the war. The national government under the Articles of Confederation consisted of a single legislative body called Congress in which each state received one vote. All congressional decisions required a unanimous vote. The government under the Articles did not have a judicial system (national courts) or an executive (such as a president). As a result, each state had a significant degree of sovereignty and autonomy. The national government under the Articles remained in effect until 1789.
The Constitutional Convention
Delegates from eleven of the thirteen colonies gathered in Philadelphia in May 1787 to revise the Articles. Instead, however, delegates at the Constitutional Convention (sometimes called the Philadelphia Convention) quickly decided to scrap the Articles and write a document that created an entirely new, stronger national government.
The Cincinnati
As the delegates gathered to change the government, a group of disgruntled veteran officers also met in Philadelphia. Calling themselves “the Cincinnati” (after a public-minded Roman hero), the veterans hoped that George Washington would join them and take control of the government. Washington’s refusal to attend the meeting, let alone lead a rebellion, was an important moment: Washington carried a lot of influence, so his support legitimized the Constitutional Convention and delegitimized splinter groups such as the Cincinnati.
The Framers of the Constitution
The group that met during the Constitutional Convention included some of the most prominent men of the revolutionary and post-revolutionary era. George Washington attended the convention (and was elected its president), along with Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and Roger Sherman, among others. The framers of the Constitution were wealthier and better educated than the average American. Nearly all of them had experience in state and national governments, and many of them had fought in the revolution.
Although the Constitutional Convention included many luminaries, several famous figures from the revolutionary era did not attend. Patrick Henry and Samuel Adams, for example, were not there, and both expressed serious reservations about the final document. Thomas Jefferson was also absent because he was serving as the American ambassador to France at the time.
The Aims of the Framers
The framers met in Philadelphia to create a stronger national government that would better protect and enhance liberty by preventing tyranny. Shays’ Rebellion and the states’ inability to cooperate with one another had also demonstrated the weaknesses inherent in the Articles of Confederation, and many worried that Britain would take advantage of American weaknesses. At the same time, however, the framers did not want to abolish the state governments. At this time, most Americans felt more loyalty toward their state governments than to Congress, and strong local government made sense for the operation of a large nation such as the United States.
Issues and Compromises
The delegates to the convention disagreed with one another on three main issues: representation in Congress, slavery, and presidential elections. Failure to reach agreement on any of these issues would likely have led to dissolution of the already tenuous union of the states. Slave states, for example, were not willing to accept a constitution that banned slavery, whereas small states would not accept a document that gave excessive power to large states. Three compromises, summarized in the following table, resolved these disagreements.
| Issue | Compromise |
| Representation in the national legislature | Great Compromise |
| Slavery | Three-Fifths Compromise |
| Presidential elections | Electoral College |
Representation and the Great Compromise
Delegates debated extensively about how the people and the states would be represented in the national legislature. Most delegates favored one of two representation schemes:
- The Virginia Plan: Favored representation based on population. Delegates from the large states supported this plan because it would give them a great deal of power. Representatives from small states, however, rejected the plan because they would have fewer seats than the larger states and consequently less power.
- The New Jersey Plan: Proposed giving each state equal representation in the legislature. Delegates from smaller states supported the New Jersey Plan because they believed that all states should have equal power, regardless of population.
Supremacy Clause
The New Jersey Plan also advocated the supremacy doctrine, the idea that national law has priority over state law. This doctrine was later included in the Constitution in the supremacy clause (Article VI), which states that the Constitution and the laws Congress passes have more weight than state and local laws.
