The Stregnths and Weaknesses of the Articles of confederation

Articles of Confederation

The years 1781 to 1789, the years known as the "Critical period" were the reign of the Articles of Confederation... were those years a highlight in American history, or a Time that is best to be forgotten? The argument can go either way it really depends on how you look at it. The question is; were the Articles an effective system of government? Well, while something might not be effective it can still be very necessary, and important, to the future the way it is ran (government), In this essay both the weaknesses and the strengths of the Articles of Confederation will be given, you can make up your mind about the effectiveness of it. The way I feel is... The Articles of Confederation, while not entirely successful, were indeed a necessary stepping-stone to today's federalist government.

Many people tend to think that the reign of the Articles of Confederation were a complete waste of almost ten years and to some extent, they are right. The confederation style of government has many weaknesses. The Articles of Confederation gave sovereign power to each of states to rule themselves that isn't always a bad thing but take into effect the states history, they couldn't agree on anything. It was hard for them to become unified while they were fighting for their independence in the American Revolution. After the states won their independence they had to set up a government, and of course they didn't want it to be anything like the British so the central government was severely lacking in power, among other things. Under the Articles of Confederation The Congress had no power to levy taxes or tariffs; that makes for a ruthless shortage of money the only way it could gain funds was ask the states for money most of those requests were ignored or only partially met. Speaking of money, the congress did have the right to print its own currency, but so did the states. "One ground of discontent in the army" was the slowness of congress to pay their bonuses and bay pays. (Document C). Other weaknesses are: no central court that could settle disputes between people from different states, no power to build an army, no power to make and pass laws, and no power to regulate commerce foreign or local. That may seem like a lot of weaknesses, and those probably the only ones that there are. When you have different sides in a dispute there is always the other side. In this case, where the previous were the weaknesses of the Articles, they indeed have their own strengths, and they will be noted now.

Yes, the Articles had many flaws, enough that one might think there wouldn't be any room for strengths or that they were seemingly nothing but bad news, but they do have an up-side. The Articles while not entirely successful in the way they ruled the country, did get the Americans their very most sought-after obsession, independence and liberty. It was able to pull the states together enough to win a war against the bigger, stronger, and better trained British. After winning the war the leaders, under the Articles, negotiated and signed the beneficial treaty of Paris of 1783. The unity that was gained between the states during the wartime was slowly beginning to dissipate and the articles held them together by name, the United States of America, even if they weren't actually fully unified. The people also managed to pass the Land Ordinance 1785 and the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. After the war many of the states wanted the western land and only a few had it, so of course contention was present. The states that were left out of the western land siege wouldn't accept the leadership of the articles until the disputation was resolved. Under the Land Ordinance all the western land had to be ceded to the government and then divided up equally into townships. The townships were then divided into 36 sections, of 1 square mile each, then they were sold to people and the income from one of the sections of every township went towards education. The Northwest Ordinance said that the land was to be divided into 3-5 territories that when they had 60,000 people could become a state. You might ask why those were important well... The land Ordinance set the guidelines for buying the land in the west and it pushed for a more educated nation. The Northwest Ordinance was a democratic approach to the management to the new territories.

All in all, the Articles of Confederation did have it's pro's and con's but what doesn't. It really wasn't that most effective or successful way of governing our new nation but it did get us independence, it did help in getting us the thing that we needed in the treaty of Paris, and it did help us with the issue of western land. Sure, it had no real power, and it did have to be replaced with Federalism. Think not of it as effective or failing but in this light, if it didn't do so well back in the beginning it wouldn't be the same country we all live in today. The time period that known as the Critical period was indeed critical and the Articles of Confederations were a necessary step forward to the government we have and the country we love.