Embedded Files
+ State Constitutions
+ State Constitutions
Adopted by the Continental Congress on November 15, 1777, and ratified by the states in 1781, the Articles of Confederation created a weak central government—a “league of friendship”—that largely preserved state power (and independence).
Even before the War for Independence was over, states began writing their own state constitutions (plans for government). These constitutions were similar in many ways:
They all began with a statement of rights guided by the ideals in the Declaration of Independence: equality, freedom, and democracy.
Almost all of these first constitutions were far from being truly democratic, as voting rights were usually limited to white men who paid taxes or owned a certain amount of property.
Only New Jersey gave voting rights to women and African Americans, thousands of whom voted during the time of the Articles of Confederation.
Therefore, the Articles of Confederation in no way infringed upon the sovereignty of the original thirteen states. Each state held "its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this confederation expressly delegated to the United States, in Congress assembled." The Congress, the primary organ of the new national government, only had the power to declare war, appoint military officers, sign treaties, make alliances, appoint foreign ambassadors, and manage relations with Native Americans.
+ Land Ordinances
+ Land Ordinances
This engraving depicts settlers moving into newly-aquired western lands.
Land Ordinance of 1785
At the end of the Revolutionary War, the US defeated Britain and gained all the territory (land) east of the Mississippi from Britain (who has stolen it from Native Americans). Americans began moving into these new lands, but faced the pressing question: How would the land be distributed?
Many Americans didn't wait for an answer to this question-- they simply walked into the wilderness and settled on the land they wanted. They did not clearly mark the land to show what areas they claimed, so settlers often argued over land claims.
Under the Articles of Confederation, Congress set up the Land Ordinance of 1785, which set up an official system to sell and divide land among settlers through measuring and selling pieces of it. This allowed settlers to move west and claim land more efficiently.
Northwest Ordinance of 1787
On July 13, 1787, Congress enacts the Northwest Ordinance, structuring settlement of the Northwest Territory and creating a policy for the addition of new states to the nation. The members of Congress knew that if their new confederation were to survive intact, it had to resolve the states’ competing claims to western territory.
Building on the gains of the first land ordinance, the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 introduced a method for territories to become states, which allowed the new nation to grow.
It proposed that that each new territory would have an appointed governor and council. When the population reached 5,000, the residents could elect their own assembly, although the governor would retain absolute veto power. When 60,000 settlers resided in a territory, they could draft a constitution and petition for full statehood.
The ordinance provided for civil liberties and public education within the new territories, but did not allow slavery to exist within these new territories. Pro-slavery Southerners were willing to go along with this ordinance because they hoped that the new states would be populated by white settlers from the South. They believed that although these Southerners would have no enslaved workers of their own, they would not join the growing abolition (anti-slavery) movement growing in the Northern states.
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