The Articles of Confederation and the U.S Constitution

Governing our nation under the Articles of Confederation was difficult. The Confederation was born under very extreme circumstances. It was a time when corruption from the monarchs had just ended and the people were looking for a different form of government. While there were many weaknesses in the Articles of Confederation, many believed that by creating a Constitution it would solve many of the nations problems. Fortunately, the Constitution solved many problems, but created some big flaws that still remain today.

One of the weaknesses in the Articles of the Confederation was that most of the governmental power was held by the states. It created a weak national government. The states were afraid that congress, due to its limited power, was unable to control the states. The government under the Articles of Confederation was a legislative branch and had no executive or judicial branches. Under the constitution, Mr. John Jay, of the Federalist Papers #3, believed that once a national government was established it would be wiser than the states. The solution was achieved by more power being held by the national government. Each state must be under the authority of the national government and each state has control of local government. These examples can be seen today in the local government and police department.

Another weakness in the Articles of Confederation is it only had one branch of government. It was called the legislative branch. There were no other branches of government. In order for the legislative branch to take action on any government matter it required the approval of all of the states. In order to fix the problem in the constitution they added 2 more branches of government. These are called executive and judicial branches. The legislative branch is responsible for writing laws, confirming presidential appointments, approving treaties, granting money and declaring war. The executive branch proposes laws, administers