WEBVTT 00:00.900 --> 00:04.190 Prof: So today I've titled the lecture for today 00:04.185 --> 00:07.585 "Confederation," but in a sense I'm going to be 00:07.591 --> 00:10.391 talking about something larger than that, 00:10.390 --> 00:12.540 and by the end of the lecture I'll be talking about the 00:12.536 --> 00:13.646 Articles of Confederation. 00:13.650 --> 00:16.540 I'll talk a little bit more about them on Thursday. 00:16.540 --> 00:21.670 But as I mentioned last Thursday, last Thursday's 00:21.665 --> 00:24.375 lecture, today's lecture and actually 00:24.377 --> 00:28.287 some of the few that are left -- that are still to come--are all 00:28.290 --> 00:32.150 in one way or another dealing with big questions that were 00:32.153 --> 00:36.493 left looming after the fighting of the Revolution had passed. 00:36.490 --> 00:39.500 And we dealt with one of them on Thursday and that was the 00:39.500 --> 00:42.300 question of what would happen to American society, 00:42.300 --> 00:44.800 and I looked at that in a very specific way but I was touching 00:44.801 --> 00:46.601 on that broader question, which is: okay, 00:46.600 --> 00:49.010 so we've had a Revolution; what does that do? 00:49.010 --> 00:52.890 And we sort of explored some things it did or didn't do. 00:52.890 --> 00:56.360 Today I'm going to discuss a different big question left over 00:56.364 --> 00:59.554 after the fighting and actually going on even during the 00:59.549 --> 01:02.339 fighting, and that is the question of 01:02.343 --> 01:05.433 what would happen to American governance; 01:05.430 --> 01:08.890 how would independence from Great Britain actually affect 01:08.893 --> 01:12.233 the way that the states individually functioned and the 01:12.233 --> 01:14.773 way that they were governed together? 01:14.769 --> 01:18.999 And it's not--obviously it's not just a question of little 01:19.004 --> 01:21.684 political technicalities because, 01:21.680 --> 01:25.540 as people at the time really knew, aside from the obvious 01:25.542 --> 01:29.132 task of winning the war and gaining independence, 01:29.129 --> 01:31.849 it was really political change. 01:31.849 --> 01:36.229 It was the shaping of new state governments and the creation of 01:36.230 --> 01:40.470 some kind of a new national or American government that would 01:40.470 --> 01:44.780 most shape the real outcome of the Revolution as a whole. 01:44.780 --> 01:47.050 As Jefferson put it right in the middle of the Revolution, 01:47.050 --> 01:50.620 "In truth a new government is the whole object of the 01:50.617 --> 01:52.367 present controversy." 01:52.370 --> 01:54.720 See, I love finding quotes from Founders in which I think to 01:54.720 --> 01:57.110 myself I need a Founder to say that politics is important. 01:57.110 --> 01:59.650 Oh, there's Thomas Jefferson now. 01:59.650 --> 02:01.360 [laughs] A new government "is the 02:01.364 --> 02:03.314 whole object of the present controversy; 02:03.310 --> 02:06.600 for should a bad government be instituted for us in the future 02:06.602 --> 02:09.632 it had been as well to have accepted at first the bad one 02:09.626 --> 02:12.596 offered to us from beyond the water without the risk and 02:12.596 --> 02:14.266 expence of contest." 02:14.270 --> 02:17.620 So basically, as people at the time well 02:17.622 --> 02:19.922 knew, it was in the creation of 02:19.918 --> 02:23.708 governments in the states and one for all of the states that 02:23.712 --> 02:26.932 the Revolution ultimately would be lost or won. 02:26.930 --> 02:29.640 We're going to hear this -- people talking about the 1780s, 02:29.641 --> 02:32.261 when they're a little alarmed at what is happening in the 02:32.262 --> 02:32.732 1780s. 02:32.729 --> 02:34.029 They're going to repeat that sentiment, 02:34.030 --> 02:36.250 like: 'uh oh, we thought we won and now we're 02:36.254 --> 02:38.944 going to lose because everything's going to fall apart 02:38.937 --> 02:40.907 because of problems of government.' 02:40.910 --> 02:44.790 So on a really immediate level, Americans knew that if they 02:44.793 --> 02:47.473 wanted to win the war in a broader sense, 02:47.471 --> 02:50.351 they had to have effective governments. 02:50.348 --> 02:54.008 And obviously also in the longer term, they needed 02:54.013 --> 02:57.303 effective governments to survive, to prosper, 02:57.301 --> 02:59.771 to last more than five years. 02:59.770 --> 03:03.380 It's fascinating when you look at letters between these people 03:03.376 --> 03:06.446 in the first couple years under the Constitution, 03:06.449 --> 03:08.469 and they're really not convinced it's going to last 03:08.469 --> 03:10.449 more than a few years: nifty little experiment; 03:10.449 --> 03:12.179 maybe it's not going to work. 03:12.180 --> 03:16.070 So people understood government is the key. 03:16.068 --> 03:20.148 So when the colonies declared independence in 1776 and these 03:20.147 --> 03:24.557 former colonies became states, they needed to create new state 03:24.555 --> 03:28.805 governments that would basically write the royal government out 03:28.805 --> 03:30.925 of their form of governance. 03:30.930 --> 03:34.240 And they--each state now needed to come up with a new way to 03:34.238 --> 03:36.758 govern itself, or some decision about how they 03:36.760 --> 03:38.780 were going to govern themselves. 03:38.780 --> 03:43.350 So from roughly 1776 through the 1780s, 03:43.348 --> 03:46.998 the individual states, and as we'll see in a little 03:46.998 --> 03:49.218 bit, the Continental Congress, 03:49.218 --> 03:52.638 grappled with trying to figure out the best mode of 03:52.638 --> 03:56.538 establishing new governments according to prevailing hopes 03:56.535 --> 03:57.625 and ideals. 03:57.628 --> 04:01.798 And this whole period was really a remarkable period of 04:01.798 --> 04:03.958 political experimentation. 04:03.960 --> 04:07.220 As Benjamin Franklin said, "We are, 04:07.218 --> 04:10.168 I think, in the right Road of the spirit of Improvement, 04:10.169 --> 04:12.889 for we are making Experiments." 04:12.889 --> 04:14.439 Right? There's a man of science. 04:14.438 --> 04:17.588 Basically, in this whole period, not just the Revolution 04:17.588 --> 04:20.048 but a little before and certainly after, 04:20.050 --> 04:23.510 fueled by the optimism of the Revolution and fueled by the 04:23.512 --> 04:25.762 whole spirit of the Enlightenment, 04:25.759 --> 04:29.089 this was an age of experiments in government. 04:29.089 --> 04:33.869 And--I always find when I try to get across what it felt like 04:33.874 --> 04:36.724 at that time, how people thought about 04:36.720 --> 04:39.720 politics at that time, I'm always sort of trying to 04:39.716 --> 04:42.376 figure out some great metaphor, something that I can say, 04:42.379 --> 04:44.259 and I always come back to the same comparison, 04:44.259 --> 04:46.909 which somehow, at least in the last five or 04:46.908 --> 04:50.048 six years, has always been true. 04:50.050 --> 04:52.370 And that is, in a sense to get a feeling for 04:52.365 --> 04:55.805 what it felt like to think about politics and experience politics 04:55.810 --> 04:59.660 in the late eighteenth century, think about how we now 04:59.661 --> 05:03.051 experience and think about technology. 05:03.050 --> 05:06.100 Okay, because basically they could announce tomorrow that 05:06.103 --> 05:09.383 Apple was secretly coming up with a device that allows you to 05:09.377 --> 05:11.447 see inside every home in America, 05:11.449 --> 05:13.999 and we would go, 'Oh, interesting,' but we would 05:13.995 --> 05:15.725 accept that maybe that exists. 05:15.730 --> 05:18.940 There's--On our part there's a sort of expectation that new 05:18.937 --> 05:22.087 technological innovations are popping up all the time, 05:22.089 --> 05:26.279 and they might have us doing or thinking things that we never 05:26.281 --> 05:27.191 did before. 05:27.189 --> 05:28.439 We're communicating in new ways. 05:28.439 --> 05:31.729 Technology I think for us is this realm where anything can 05:31.730 --> 05:35.370 happen and things are happening all the time and we're adjusting 05:35.367 --> 05:37.847 and we're excited and we're interested. 05:37.850 --> 05:41.110 And that's where a lot of the innovation is now with people 05:41.108 --> 05:44.938 sort of trying to pour-- every app-maker in America -- 05:44.940 --> 05:49.680 people creating and innovating and devising and creating. 05:49.680 --> 05:53.370 And that kind of spirit -- transport that back to the late 05:53.370 --> 05:54.730 eighteenth century. 05:54.730 --> 05:57.810 That's the way that people were feeling about government. 05:57.810 --> 06:00.420 That was the period in which government was doing all of 06:00.418 --> 06:01.128 those things. 06:01.129 --> 06:02.059 There were innovations. 06:02.060 --> 06:04.590 There were--It was experimental. 06:04.588 --> 06:06.578 People didn't know what was going to happen. 06:06.579 --> 06:09.679 They were challenging rules of government and sort of seeing 06:09.678 --> 06:10.728 what would happen. 06:10.730 --> 06:14.020 It was--Particularly for people who were interested in politics, 06:14.019 --> 06:17.099 it was a fascinating sort of wonderful time because all of 06:17.098 --> 06:20.068 these weird things were happening and they were big, 06:20.069 --> 06:24.059 literally constitutional things on a really big level. 06:24.060 --> 06:28.140 And you can hear this kind of excitement in a statement that 06:28.144 --> 06:32.374 John Adams wrote in 1776 in a pamphlet that I'll be discussing 06:32.367 --> 06:35.847 in a few minutes, and it's titled Thoughts on 06:35.853 --> 06:39.653 Government, and Adams wrote: "You and I, 06:39.649 --> 06:42.119 my dear Friend, have been sent into life at a 06:42.115 --> 06:45.585 time when the greatest lawgivers of antiquity would have wished 06:45.589 --> 06:48.519 to have lived.-- How few of the human race have 06:48.521 --> 06:52.271 ever enjoyed an opportunity of making an election of government 06:52.266 --> 06:52.626 ... 06:52.629 --> 06:55.489 for themselves or their children." 06:55.490 --> 06:59.410 People knew that what they were doing at that time was a big 06:59.411 --> 07:03.001 deal, and they knew it could effect enormous change. 07:03.000 --> 07:04.800 So what I'm going to be talking about today, 07:04.800 --> 07:07.420 in that spirit, are these experiments in 07:07.420 --> 07:09.620 government -- people experimenting in 07:09.622 --> 07:11.892 government -- and I'm going to talk about 07:11.887 --> 07:14.277 these kinds of experiments on two levels. 07:14.278 --> 07:17.628 First, I'll talk about state constitution-making and how 07:17.625 --> 07:21.515 people were trying to figure out what to do on a state level, 07:21.519 --> 07:24.629 and then I'll discuss the process of joining all of these 07:24.625 --> 07:27.725 states together into some kind of a confederation or, 07:27.730 --> 07:31.380 as the Articles of Confederation themselves put it, 07:31.379 --> 07:33.369 a "league of friendship." 07:33.370 --> 07:36.190 That's how the government defined itself -- the Articles 07:36.185 --> 07:37.615 -- a league of friendship. 07:37.620 --> 07:39.460 But I want to start with state constitutions -- 07:39.459 --> 07:42.159 and the fact is, although to us we think 07:42.161 --> 07:45.421 "constitution" is sort of the big, 07:45.420 --> 07:47.050 looming thing that's important in that period, 07:47.050 --> 07:50.200 to people at the time, certainly in the middle of the 07:50.201 --> 07:52.821 Revolution, it was really in the drafting 07:52.817 --> 07:56.717 of state constitutions that they really thought the future of the 07:56.718 --> 07:59.338 American people was going to be decided. 07:59.339 --> 08:05.239 Even before the formal Declaration of Independence in 08:05.235 --> 08:08.435 July of 1776, already people in the colonies 08:08.440 --> 08:11.360 had been giving some thought to the fact that they were going to 08:11.363 --> 08:13.913 need new state constitutions because already things were 08:13.913 --> 08:15.853 unstable, sources of authority--royal 08:15.851 --> 08:18.411 sources of authority-- were not necessarily in place, 08:18.413 --> 08:21.123 but it was unclear what was in place instead of them. 08:21.120 --> 08:24.670 So people already saw the need for some kind of new legitimate 08:24.668 --> 08:27.168 source of authority and they began thinking: 08:27.170 --> 08:29.090 'okay, well, if we do end up being 08:29.086 --> 08:32.066 independent we need some kind of a new government so we'd better 08:32.067 --> 08:34.667 start talking about it now because sooner or later, 08:34.668 --> 08:37.068 probably sooner, we're going to actually have to 08:37.067 --> 08:38.237 implement something.' 08:38.240 --> 08:42.880 So as early as the beginning of 1776, states began considering 08:42.875 --> 08:47.505 what they should do about the unsettled state of governance in 08:47.510 --> 08:49.260 their own colonies. 08:49.259 --> 08:52.439 And some colonies actually wrote to the Continental 08:52.441 --> 08:55.881 Congress asking for advice on what they should do about 08:55.876 --> 08:57.846 governance in their colony. 08:57.850 --> 09:01.280 And there were some people in the Continental Congress that 09:01.284 --> 09:04.074 suggested: 'well, you guys should take some kind 09:04.068 --> 09:06.588 of an interim measure; things aren't sorted out yet 09:06.590 --> 09:08.480 with England' we don't know what's going to happen -- 09:08.480 --> 09:11.960 sort of do something to tide you over until we figure out 09:11.962 --> 09:13.272 what's coming next. 09:13.269 --> 09:16.589 But there were others who were more radical in their politics 09:16.594 --> 09:19.704 in the Continental Congress who thought that the colonies 09:19.697 --> 09:23.297 actually should really establish new political institutions, 09:23.299 --> 09:25.219 basically new constitutions. 09:25.220 --> 09:29.660 More conservative Congressmen argued that adopting new forms 09:29.658 --> 09:34.098 of government would be as good as declaring independence. 09:34.100 --> 09:37.320 Even if independence hadn't been declared, 09:37.320 --> 09:39.680 if the colonies start creating their own constitutions, 09:39.678 --> 09:42.448 these conservatives are arguing, that's just as good as 09:42.445 --> 09:45.255 saying you're independent and it's going to make sort of 09:45.260 --> 09:48.590 reconciling with England even harder if you begin to do that. 09:48.590 --> 09:52.880 Even so, in May of 1776, the Continental Congress 09:52.884 --> 09:58.614 adopted a resolution saying that colonial assemblies should adopt 09:58.610 --> 10:00.400 new governments. 10:00.399 --> 10:04.619 And just as the conservatives in Congress argued, 10:04.620 --> 10:07.210 certainly to John Adams and many others, 10:07.210 --> 10:12.680 that resolution was what really was the instrument of American 10:12.682 --> 10:14.032 independence. 10:14.028 --> 10:16.328 That's--To Adams, he saw that resolution as a 10:16.333 --> 10:19.533 really key turning point when the Continental Congress said to 10:19.528 --> 10:23.398 the colonies becoming states, 'I think it's time that you 10:23.395 --> 10:26.405 should devise your own constitutions.' 10:26.408 --> 10:29.448 Now it's important to note, the Continental Congress wasn't 10:29.452 --> 10:30.452 in the lead here. 10:30.450 --> 10:33.720 What happened is that colonies were asking them what to do and 10:33.715 --> 10:36.975 Congress sort of responded and figured out what it thought and 10:36.980 --> 10:38.640 then made a recommendation. 10:38.639 --> 10:41.479 So states were thinking about government before the 10:41.480 --> 10:44.720 Continental Congress necessarily did anything about it. 10:44.720 --> 10:50.230 The first new constitution had already been drafted in New 10:50.226 --> 10:54.936 Hampshire in January of 1776, making it the first written 10:54.941 --> 10:58.001 constitution drawn up by one of the colonies without 10:58.004 --> 11:01.614 consultation with or approval of the Crown or Parliament. 11:01.610 --> 11:06.310 So the states are all occupied with constitution-making, 11:06.306 --> 11:09.206 and that continued through 1777. 11:09.210 --> 11:12.080 Now at first, people in the Congress were 11:12.081 --> 11:16.531 undecided about whether maybe it would be smart to recommend to 11:16.533 --> 11:19.913 all of the colonies one model constitution; 11:19.908 --> 11:22.738 maybe they should come up with one model, and sort of send it 11:22.739 --> 11:25.189 out and say, 'Here's what we think the best kind of a 11:25.191 --> 11:26.371 government would be.' 11:26.370 --> 11:29.050 But after a brief debate, the idea went nowhere, 11:29.052 --> 11:31.282 and that's basically for two reasons. 11:31.278 --> 11:32.908 I think one of them is really obvious, 11:32.908 --> 11:35.908 which is what is the likelihood that everybody in that Congress 11:35.912 --> 11:38.822 was going to agree on what a model constitution ought to look 11:38.817 --> 11:40.317 like for all of the states? 11:40.320 --> 11:41.940 Okay, not. 11:41.940 --> 11:45.390 On a purely pragmatic level, that would be very hard to do. 11:45.389 --> 11:47.409 But second and more important than that, 11:47.408 --> 11:51.478 the Congress ultimately felt that people in each colony or 11:51.482 --> 11:55.632 each state should really be adopting and devising their own 11:55.628 --> 11:59.628 governments that really suited their own character, 11:59.629 --> 12:03.249 their own habits, their own specific needs -- 12:03.250 --> 12:04.110 local conditions. 12:04.110 --> 12:07.650 So really, it was the colonies themselves who were best suited. 12:07.649 --> 12:10.869 It wasn't a smart idea to the Congress ultimately for them to 12:10.870 --> 12:14.200 be imposing a model anything, since part of the purpose of 12:14.202 --> 12:17.772 the Revolution was for people to devise governments that suited 12:17.774 --> 12:18.644 them better. 12:18.639 --> 12:22.279 And in making this suggestion, that each colony should be free 12:22.278 --> 12:25.558 to create a constitution that reflected their particular 12:25.557 --> 12:28.657 values and habits, the Congress was pretty much 12:28.658 --> 12:32.118 acting in accordance with a prevailing belief at the time 12:32.115 --> 12:34.905 that there was, or certainly that there should 12:34.914 --> 12:37.954 be, an intimate connection between the values of a people 12:37.948 --> 12:39.698 -- between the habits of a people 12:39.697 --> 12:42.547 on the one hand and between their instruments of government 12:42.554 --> 12:44.284 and systems of law on the other. 12:44.279 --> 12:45.409 It's a general assumption. 12:45.409 --> 12:46.909 One shapes the other. 12:46.909 --> 12:48.809 One should shape the other. 12:48.808 --> 12:51.268 And that's part of the assumption that the Continental 12:51.274 --> 12:52.394 Congress is acting on. 12:52.389 --> 12:56.569 But just because Congress didn't design a model 12:56.567 --> 12:59.907 constitution, it doesn't mean that individual 12:59.909 --> 13:03.629 Continental congressmen didn't begin thinking about what ought 13:03.630 --> 13:06.620 to be happening in their own states back home. 13:06.620 --> 13:08.700 And in fact, so many Continental congressmen 13:08.700 --> 13:11.790 became so obsessed with the idea of state constitution-making for 13:11.794 --> 13:14.504 their own states that some people feared that some of the 13:14.504 --> 13:17.314 basic demands of the Revolution were falling by the wayside 13:17.309 --> 13:20.569 because everyone was saying, 'Oh, well, back home they're 13:20.572 --> 13:21.942 making up a constitution. 13:21.940 --> 13:24.610 That's amazing and I have some ideas about that. 13:24.610 --> 13:26.680 Maybe I should even go back there. 13:26.678 --> 13:26.868 Okay. 13:26.874 --> 13:29.254 Maybe not, but I'll send them some ideas about what they ought 13:29.246 --> 13:29.866 to be doing.' 13:29.870 --> 13:32.320 So these delegates in the Continental Congress are 13:32.320 --> 13:34.920 extremely interested, for really obvious reasons, 13:34.921 --> 13:37.621 in what's being devised back in their home colony, 13:37.620 --> 13:39.740 their home state. 13:39.740 --> 13:43.460 One result of this obsession with constitution-making was 13:43.457 --> 13:46.577 this pamphlet I mentioned a few moments ago, 13:46.580 --> 13:48.990 which ends up being an important and influential 13:48.990 --> 13:51.960 pamphlet written by John Adams that's titled Thoughts on 13:51.964 --> 13:55.594 Government. Now Adams had long been really 13:55.591 --> 13:58.891 interested in constitutional issues, 13:58.889 --> 14:01.679 and he actually had something of a reputation for being 14:01.678 --> 14:04.468 someone who was pretty knowledgeable on the subject. 14:04.470 --> 14:08.600 So when these states began talking about new constitutions 14:08.599 --> 14:13.379 beginning at the very, very end of 1775 going through 14:13.384 --> 14:16.204 1776, several men from different 14:16.196 --> 14:19.856 states came to him to ask his advice: 'Hey, 14:19.860 --> 14:22.590 you're the guy who knows a lot about constitutions. 14:22.590 --> 14:25.740 What do you think we ought to be doing, Mr. Adams?' 14:25.740 --> 14:29.100 So Adams -- so many people asked him, that he wrote up what 14:29.101 --> 14:32.811 he called a sketch of what a new constitution might look like. 14:32.808 --> 14:34.918 And he gave the sketch out to a few people. 14:34.918 --> 14:36.938 'Well, you want to know what I think a new constitution ought 14:36.942 --> 14:37.452 to look like? 14:37.450 --> 14:40.170 Here you go, my best idea.' 14:40.168 --> 14:41.678 Well, obviously, if everyone's casting about 14:41.677 --> 14:44.237 like: 'I don't know what to do, what should I say' -- and one 14:44.236 --> 14:46.936 guy pipes up and says, 'I think this is a pretty good 14:46.937 --> 14:50.177 idea,' not surprisingly other people went to Adams and said, 14:50.178 --> 14:51.798 'Hey, I'd like a copy of that sketch too. 14:51.798 --> 14:55.228 I'd like to see what your model constitution looks like.' 14:55.230 --> 14:58.830 So by April of 1776, Adams had turned this sketch 14:58.826 --> 15:00.396 into this pamphlet. 15:00.399 --> 15:02.599 The full title of his pamphlet is one of these great 15:02.599 --> 15:05.049 eighteenth-century titles, Thoughts on Government 15:05.053 --> 15:07.943 Applicable to the Present State of the American Colonies in a 15:07.943 --> 15:09.923 Letter From a Gentleman to his Friend. 15:09.918 --> 15:11.928 We can call it Thoughts on Government. 15:11.928 --> 15:14.688 [laughs] Now besides the obvious 15:14.688 --> 15:18.468 practical use the pamphlet, and I'm going to come back to 15:18.474 --> 15:20.284 some of the things he recommends in a minute, 15:20.278 --> 15:23.918 Adams also intended it to be a response to the concluding 15:23.917 --> 15:27.547 section of Thomas Paine's Common Sense published a 15:27.554 --> 15:29.054 few months earlier. 15:29.048 --> 15:30.978 And you'll remember the wonderful opinion that John 15:30.976 --> 15:32.476 Adams registered on Common Sense, 15:32.480 --> 15:34.210 quote, "A poor ignorant, 15:34.210 --> 15:36.690 Malicious, short-sighted, Crapulous Mass." 15:36.690 --> 15:38.900 [laughs] Thank you, John Adams. 15:38.899 --> 15:44.119 So Adams basically thought that that final section of Common 15:44.124 --> 15:48.004 Sense was irresponsible and impractical; 15:48.000 --> 15:51.920 it was giving ideas about forming a new government that 15:51.918 --> 15:53.368 didn't make sense. 15:53.370 --> 15:55.600 And if you remember, Paine had said that there 15:55.601 --> 15:58.591 should be a unicameral -- a one-house legislature for 15:58.586 --> 16:01.846 each of the colonies, and that would be--all of those 16:01.850 --> 16:05.210 would be subordinate to a unicameral legislature like the 16:05.210 --> 16:06.650 Continental Congress. 16:06.649 --> 16:10.499 No level of government would have an independent executive. 16:10.500 --> 16:12.610 So basically as Adams is thinking about it, 16:12.610 --> 16:15.630 Paine is just tossing off separation of powers and the 16:15.626 --> 16:18.736 balance of powers and saying, Eh, we don't need to think 16:18.743 --> 16:19.343 about that. 16:19.340 --> 16:21.330 We should be thinking about the people.' 16:21.330 --> 16:21.540 Right? 16:21.535 --> 16:23.525 'We should be thinking about making a government responsive 16:23.528 --> 16:24.798 to people,' which is a nice idea, 16:24.798 --> 16:28.458 but Adams thought, in reality there's no way that 16:28.456 --> 16:30.206 that's going to work. 16:30.210 --> 16:33.490 Adams and others, though they valued what Paine 16:33.485 --> 16:36.255 had to say obviously about independence, 16:36.261 --> 16:39.041 did not appreciate that whole plan. 16:39.038 --> 16:41.858 And in Thoughts on Government, Adams 16:41.860 --> 16:45.370 argued that whatever the states did with these new governments 16:45.370 --> 16:48.540 they should at least preserve the best of Anglo-American 16:48.537 --> 16:51.597 traditions of government, and particularly, 16:51.596 --> 16:53.166 separation of powers. 16:53.168 --> 16:57.548 Adams really did not like the idea of having a one-house 16:57.547 --> 17:00.887 assembly and having no executive at all. 17:00.889 --> 17:05.019 He argued that there was no way that that could work well; 17:05.019 --> 17:07.239 a one-house legislature would never be effective; 17:07.240 --> 17:09.000 it could never do anything executive; 17:09.000 --> 17:11.370 it could never do anything judicial. 17:11.368 --> 17:14.308 As he put it, a one-house legislature could 17:14.308 --> 17:17.628 not act as an executive power, quote, "for want of two 17:17.634 --> 17:21.074 essential properties, secrecy and despatch." 17:21.068 --> 17:21.368 Okay. 17:21.367 --> 17:23.457 That's what executives need to be; 17:23.460 --> 17:26.270 no congress will ever manage those two things. 17:26.269 --> 17:29.019 He also said that a one-house legislature couldn't be a 17:29.019 --> 17:31.669 judicial power because it was "too numerous, 17:31.670 --> 17:35.890 too slow, and too little skilled in the laws." 17:35.890 --> 17:39.880 And just as bad to Adams, a unicameral legislature was 17:39.883 --> 17:42.373 just unstable in and of itself. 17:42.368 --> 17:44.818 As he put it, it was "liable to all the 17:44.818 --> 17:47.608 vices, follies, and frailties of an individual; 17:47.608 --> 17:50.818 subject to fits of humor, starts of passion, 17:50.818 --> 17:53.558 flights of enthusiasm, partialities, 17:53.558 --> 17:55.688 or prejudice, and consequently productive of 17:55.690 --> 17:57.820 hasty results and absurd judgments." 17:57.818 --> 18:00.278 I think that sounds like a quote from a guy who's really 18:00.281 --> 18:01.671 tired of being in congresses. 18:01.670 --> 18:03.690 He was like: 'I know what congresses do. 18:03.690 --> 18:07.020 [laughs] This unicameral legislature, 18:07.019 --> 18:08.129 bad idea.' 18:08.130 --> 18:12.950 He really preferred a bicameral legislature, both houses of 18:12.951 --> 18:15.531 which would elect a governor. 18:15.528 --> 18:18.508 The governor would have a veto over legislation, 18:18.507 --> 18:22.057 and could appoint judges and some other officers with the 18:22.055 --> 18:24.015 consent of the upper house. 18:24.019 --> 18:27.879 Judges would have tenure for life during good behavior. 18:27.880 --> 18:31.870 And all officials apart from judges would be elected annually 18:31.871 --> 18:35.731 to prevent an aristocratic ruling class from rising up, 18:35.730 --> 18:39.130 and to keep politicians humble because they'd have to go home 18:39.134 --> 18:42.734 every year and get reelected, and to Adams that would 18:42.729 --> 18:45.669 successfully keep politicians humble. 18:45.670 --> 18:49.330 Rotation in office would be something that would keep the 18:49.330 --> 18:51.620 right spirit of government going. 18:51.618 --> 18:54.608 Now it's hard to say how much direct influence Thoughts on 18:54.612 --> 18:55.662 Government had. 18:55.660 --> 18:56.410 It's always very hard. 18:56.410 --> 18:57.680 You always want to say, 'Wow. 18:57.680 --> 19:00.770 These five states were extremely influenced.' 19:00.769 --> 19:03.609 It's hard to say that, but the fact is that most of 19:03.614 --> 19:07.034 the state constitutions ended up being in hailing distance of 19:07.028 --> 19:10.158 what Adams suggested in that pamphlet and he did receive 19:10.156 --> 19:13.226 letters from a number of friends saying: 'well, 19:13.230 --> 19:14.260 actually that was helpful. 19:14.259 --> 19:15.759 Thank you very much, John Adams. 19:15.759 --> 19:17.569 That was actually very helpful.' 19:17.568 --> 19:19.738 So we have this little moment in which John Adams must have 19:19.736 --> 19:21.526 been smiling because he's getting recognition. 19:21.529 --> 19:22.539 Right? 'Yay.' 19:22.538 --> 19:25.298 He's like: 'I wrote a good pamphlet and they're saying 19:25.296 --> 19:25.916 thank you. 19:25.920 --> 19:28.630 Yay.' Poor John Adams. 19:28.630 --> 19:29.210 Okay. 19:29.212 --> 19:34.352 So, all this talking about new governments. 19:34.348 --> 19:37.498 The fact is, as I suggested when Adams says 19:37.496 --> 19:41.836 we should be preserving the best features of Anglo-American 19:41.840 --> 19:44.700 governance, these state constitutions 19:44.704 --> 19:48.644 generally did preserve some basic features of Anglo-American 19:48.636 --> 19:49.566 governance. 19:49.568 --> 19:52.808 So take for example a bicameral legislature, obviously 19:52.814 --> 19:56.614 resembling Parliament's House of Commons and House of Lords. 19:56.608 --> 20:00.068 Obviously, America did not have Lords and Commons in quite the 20:00.069 --> 20:01.999 same way, but the idea remained. 20:02.000 --> 20:06.020 You had two houses and you had different sets of people in the 20:06.018 --> 20:07.928 two, although it was not entirely 20:07.931 --> 20:10.421 clear what that meant in the American example, 20:10.420 --> 20:12.310 and this was actually a source of confusion. 20:12.308 --> 20:13.618 When the Constitution first starts, 20:13.618 --> 20:16.488 with this new bicameral legislature, 20:16.490 --> 20:20.090 people aren't sure if the Senate is kind of like a House 20:20.093 --> 20:22.483 of Lords, meaning that the people in the 20:22.477 --> 20:25.457 Senate were sort of higher up than the representatives. 20:25.460 --> 20:26.860 Should they have special privileges? 20:26.858 --> 20:30.418 Should there be--Should they get a higher salary? 20:30.420 --> 20:33.140 Are they "special people" in comparison to 20:33.140 --> 20:33.780 the House? 20:33.779 --> 20:36.359 Should we really be making that kind of difference between the 20:36.356 --> 20:37.326 House and the Senate? 20:37.328 --> 20:39.598 And you can see this throughout this period. 20:39.598 --> 20:41.738 You can see it in somewhat ridiculous ways, 20:41.736 --> 20:44.326 but you can see how people were so focused on it. 20:44.328 --> 20:47.848 And one example of this is from 1790 -- 20:47.848 --> 20:51.378 so one year of government -- and the Senate wrote some kind 20:51.378 --> 20:53.918 of a bill, and they included I suppose 20:53.916 --> 20:56.696 names of people who had drafted the bill, 20:56.700 --> 20:59.580 and before the names of the people they put "the 20:59.578 --> 21:01.788 honorable," like "the honorable 21:01.794 --> 21:04.074 messieurs," and they sent this to the 21:04.065 --> 21:04.725 House. 21:04.730 --> 21:06.220 The House got this bill. 21:06.220 --> 21:08.640 They didn't even look at the content of the bill. 21:08.640 --> 21:10.150 They just looked at the bill. 21:10.150 --> 21:11.960 'Why are the Senators calling themselves "the 21:11.962 --> 21:12.632 honorable?" 21:12.630 --> 21:14.270 We don't like that. 21:14.269 --> 21:15.999 What's it suggesting about who they are? 21:16.000 --> 21:17.500 Do they think they're better than us? 21:17.500 --> 21:18.940 No, they're not better than us.' 21:18.940 --> 21:21.280 So the House--before it votes on the content of the 21:21.275 --> 21:23.185 bill--votes to cut those two words out. 21:23.190 --> 21:23.450 Right? 21:23.453 --> 21:26.143 That's not going to be on the document, none of this honorable 21:26.143 --> 21:26.543 stuff. 21:26.538 --> 21:29.388 Then they pass it, and it goes back to the Senate, 21:29.390 --> 21:32.310 and the Senate passes another amendment in which they take 21:32.307 --> 21:35.167 their names off the document because they don't want them 21:35.173 --> 21:37.223 printed without "the honorable" 21:37.221 --> 21:38.401 attached to them. 21:38.400 --> 21:38.680 Okay. 21:38.675 --> 21:41.045 A seemingly little, trivial, petty thing, 21:41.048 --> 21:45.308 but that clearly two parts of the legislature were focused on, 21:45.308 --> 21:47.228 and there was even a letter from Madison-- 21:47.230 --> 21:48.440 and I can't remember who he was writing to-- 21:48.440 --> 21:51.430 and he says, 'This seems trivial. 21:51.430 --> 21:53.620 [laughs] It really isn't because it's 21:53.615 --> 21:56.585 getting down to these kind of basic questions, 21:56.588 --> 21:58.828 of exactly what is the House and what is the Senate, 21:58.828 --> 22:01.408 and what's their relationship to the House of Lords, 22:01.410 --> 22:02.840 the House of Commons.' 22:02.838 --> 22:06.568 So a bicameral legislature is one tradition that Americans 22:06.574 --> 22:10.514 held on to, generally speaking, and I'm going to come back to 22:10.506 --> 22:11.616 an exception. 22:11.618 --> 22:16.118 A second traditional assumption that was represented in the new 22:16.123 --> 22:19.753 state constitutions concerned the need for property 22:19.753 --> 22:24.043 requirements for voting and for holding elected office. 22:24.038 --> 22:27.208 And the reasoning there being, men who owned property were 22:27.211 --> 22:29.651 independent men, so they could vote for 22:29.650 --> 22:33.160 themselves as they thought rather than being dependent on 22:33.163 --> 22:36.613 someone else and thus maybe having to vote in a way that 22:36.613 --> 22:39.063 somebody else wanted them to vote. 22:39.058 --> 22:41.028 And likewise it was thought that if you had literally 22:41.030 --> 22:42.510 financial investment in a community, 22:42.509 --> 22:45.509 you were the people best qualified to affect that 22:45.506 --> 22:47.376 community through elections. 22:47.380 --> 22:51.990 So though the Revolution would inspire many states to reduce 22:51.992 --> 22:56.062 the level of the property requirement for voting, 22:56.058 --> 22:59.518 the fact is that those kinds of restrictions remained in place. 22:59.519 --> 23:02.479 And on average, in the new state constitutions, 23:02.480 --> 23:06.170 roughly there was an increase of fifteen percent in the number 23:06.172 --> 23:09.082 of adult white males voting -- which in a sense, 23:09.083 --> 23:11.033 compared I suppose with England, 23:11.028 --> 23:14.548 maybe seems a little bit--somewhat substantial, 23:14.549 --> 23:16.809 if not revolutionary in scope. 23:16.808 --> 23:18.648 So that was held on to, as well, as something that 23:18.646 --> 23:19.806 people felt comfortable with. 23:19.808 --> 23:24.268 It was a precedent, a tradition that made sense to 23:24.271 --> 23:24.911 them. 23:24.910 --> 23:29.440 Now there were other ways in which these constitutions-- 23:29.440 --> 23:31.860 these state constitutions--rather than 23:31.862 --> 23:35.322 reflecting traditions, Anglo-American traditions, 23:35.321 --> 23:38.971 instead more obviously reflected the immediate impact 23:38.967 --> 23:40.437 of the Revolution. 23:40.440 --> 23:43.510 And the first and most obvious example of that is the simple 23:43.506 --> 23:45.686 fact that they're writing constitutions. 23:45.690 --> 23:46.080 Right? 23:46.084 --> 23:49.644 Americans were revealing their recognition of what they 23:49.635 --> 23:53.115 believed to be the instability and lack of security in 23:53.122 --> 23:55.032 unwritten constitutions. 23:55.029 --> 23:57.359 As they looked at Great Britain, they thought, 23:57.355 --> 23:59.315 we don't like that system very much. 23:59.319 --> 24:00.499 We want everything in writing. 24:00.500 --> 24:02.360 We want it all on paper. 24:02.358 --> 24:06.058 Americans wanted to fix the principles of their new 24:06.060 --> 24:10.360 governments in writing in a form that was distinct from and 24:10.355 --> 24:13.015 superior to mere legal statutes. 24:13.019 --> 24:17.319 You can also see the immediate impact of the Revolution in the 24:17.319 --> 24:21.549 three main ideas that were at the core of most of these state 24:21.549 --> 24:26.309 constitutions, three sort of basic ideas. 24:26.308 --> 24:29.708 Number one, most of these constitutions were premised on 24:29.707 --> 24:33.287 the idea that they had to be grounded on natural rights. 24:33.288 --> 24:36.838 And you can really see this belief reflected in the 24:36.843 --> 24:40.683 declarations of rights that were appended to most state 24:40.680 --> 24:41.960 constitutions. 24:41.960 --> 24:46.680 And again, there is a lot that's traditional in these 24:46.680 --> 24:50.050 reclarations of rights, because a lot of the rights 24:50.050 --> 24:52.300 that are being declared in these declarations are traditional 24:52.298 --> 24:54.978 English rights, but they're being put in--on 24:54.980 --> 24:59.070 paper in these documents and then attached to these sort of 24:59.066 --> 25:02.726 constitutional statements creating whatever these new 25:02.727 --> 25:04.767 states were going to be. 25:04.769 --> 25:09.809 Most of these declarations of rights specified things like the 25:09.806 --> 25:11.866 right of trial by jury. 25:11.868 --> 25:12.088 Right? 25:12.093 --> 25:13.473 They thought back to the Revolution. 25:13.470 --> 25:15.830 They remembered those Vice Admiralty courts, 25:15.826 --> 25:17.686 not popular, so now they were like: 25:17.689 --> 25:20.209 'okay, we want the right of trial by jury; 25:20.210 --> 25:22.320 we want the right not to be deprived of life, 25:22.323 --> 25:25.203 liberty and property through the protection of due process of 25:25.204 --> 25:26.634 law; freedom of speech, 25:26.630 --> 25:29.030 freedom of the press, and in some states like 25:29.030 --> 25:32.130 Virginia, freedom of religion -- again, rights that are familiar 25:32.126 --> 25:34.126 to us, rights that they're putting 25:34.126 --> 25:37.736 down on paper and attaching to constitutions at this moment in 25:37.736 --> 25:38.206 time. 25:38.210 --> 25:43.450 So declarations of rights were shared by constitutions, 25:43.450 --> 25:45.930 this sort of idea that there are these natural rights that 25:45.932 --> 25:47.852 need to be written down and memorialized, 25:47.848 --> 25:50.658 one of the things that all of these state constitutions 25:50.662 --> 25:51.602 generally share. 25:51.598 --> 25:56.218 The other two main ideas that were at the core of these 25:56.215 --> 25:58.605 constitutions are related. 25:58.608 --> 26:02.708 So these--the last two ideas are: most constitutions declared 26:02.710 --> 26:05.650 that representation is based on consent, 26:05.650 --> 26:07.830 again, obviously coming right out of the Revolution; 26:07.828 --> 26:11.978 consent is important in the process of representation. 26:11.980 --> 26:15.230 And then the third and last basic idea related to that is -- 26:15.234 --> 26:18.664 and maybe it's the most central one of all -- sovereignty rests 26:18.655 --> 26:21.945 with the people; the people are sovereign. 26:21.950 --> 26:25.360 As the Virginia Constitution declared, 26:25.358 --> 26:28.458 and a lot of the other states in one way or another rephrased 26:28.460 --> 26:30.340 it, but said something like it: 26:30.343 --> 26:34.593 "all power is vested in, and consequently derived from, 26:34.585 --> 26:37.695 the people; that the magistrates are their 26:37.698 --> 26:41.258 trustees and servants, and at all times amenable to 26:41.261 --> 26:42.261 them." 26:42.259 --> 26:45.769 The main question about this was, as John Adams put it at the 26:45.772 --> 26:49.582 time, "to what extent shall we carry this principle?" 26:49.579 --> 26:50.519 Like, 'nice idea. 26:50.519 --> 26:52.399 What does that exactly mean? 26:52.400 --> 26:55.240 How is it going to actually boil down into what people are 26:55.241 --> 26:56.091 actually doing? 26:56.088 --> 26:59.418 How beholden should the government be to the people?' 26:59.420 --> 27:03.210 And this varied in different states depending on a number of 27:03.208 --> 27:05.068 different kinds of factors. 27:05.068 --> 27:09.158 One dramatic way in which you could really see the sovereignty 27:09.163 --> 27:13.323 of the people being emphasized in these new state constitutions 27:13.323 --> 27:17.353 is through the way in which they curbed executive power. 27:17.348 --> 27:20.368 They curbed the power of state governors. 27:20.368 --> 27:22.788 They made state governors less important. 27:22.788 --> 27:26.538 They usually made the lower house of their legislatures more 27:26.537 --> 27:27.297 important. 27:27.298 --> 27:30.368 They often made the upper house of their legislatures less 27:30.373 --> 27:31.023 important. 27:31.019 --> 27:36.029 They're really trying to limit power, to curb power. 27:36.029 --> 27:38.419 Again, that's obviously really connected to what they had just 27:38.417 --> 27:41.567 experienced in the Revolution, which felt to them like this 27:41.566 --> 27:45.476 sort of monarchical unlimited power that they had no control 27:45.479 --> 27:46.009 over. 27:46.009 --> 27:49.089 So they're really worried about executive power, 27:49.088 --> 27:52.838 fear of a concentration of power, fear of executive power 27:52.844 --> 27:56.334 like the power of the monarch that they had just-- 27:56.328 --> 27:59.308 or were at least, were in the process of breaking 27:59.306 --> 28:00.046 away from. 28:00.048 --> 28:01.658 So as I said, almost every new state 28:01.655 --> 28:04.175 constitution increased the power of the lower house, 28:04.180 --> 28:06.500 decreased the power of the governor, 28:06.500 --> 28:09.490 decreased the power of the upper house of their 28:09.486 --> 28:10.456 legislatures. 28:10.460 --> 28:13.890 And, as we'll see in a moment, the national government that 28:13.890 --> 28:17.200 ends up being created under the Articles of Confederation 28:17.201 --> 28:19.391 follows the same general pattern. 28:19.390 --> 28:22.410 They just eliminate executive, and they don't have a judicial 28:22.413 --> 28:23.223 branch either. 28:23.220 --> 28:25.660 So basically, everyone's really scared of 28:25.662 --> 28:28.352 executive power, of centralized power at this 28:28.348 --> 28:28.958 point. 28:28.960 --> 28:29.240 Okay. 28:29.239 --> 28:31.699 So summing up what I've just been discussing, 28:31.700 --> 28:34.940 in essence: Most new state constitutions shared a few basic 28:34.943 --> 28:36.513 institutional features. 28:36.509 --> 28:38.749 They had a bicameral legislature. 28:38.750 --> 28:40.720 They had a weak executive. 28:40.720 --> 28:43.370 They had rotation in office. 28:43.368 --> 28:47.998 They had--As far as principles go, a lot of them at least had 28:48.000 --> 28:51.710 declarations of rights; the idea that representation 28:51.710 --> 28:55.020 should be based on consent; that the government rests on 28:55.019 --> 28:57.479 the people -- that the people are sovereign; 28:57.480 --> 29:02.390 a somewhat broader electorate voting in annual elections. 29:02.390 --> 29:05.840 Now that said, the most extreme constitutional 29:05.840 --> 29:09.600 revisions actually took place in Pennsylvania, 29:09.598 --> 29:12.358 and Pennsylvania is really where the constitution 29:12.363 --> 29:15.363 ultimately reflected the most radical impulses of the 29:15.355 --> 29:16.215 Revolution. 29:16.220 --> 29:20.100 The new Pennsylvania constitution had no property 29:20.097 --> 29:24.537 requirements for voting, it had a one-house legislature, 29:24.539 --> 29:28.039 and it had some special features that clearly, 29:28.038 --> 29:29.988 to the people who were devising that constitution, 29:29.990 --> 29:34.490 were aimed at making the government as responsible to 29:34.486 --> 29:37.076 popular consent as possible. 29:37.078 --> 29:39.538 So for example--and this is kind of wild to me. 29:39.538 --> 29:42.328 Imagine how many laws would actually pass if this is the 29:42.334 --> 29:42.694 case. 29:42.690 --> 29:44.910 For a law to become a law in Pennsylvania, 29:44.913 --> 29:48.013 a bill had to be passed in two consecutive sessions of the 29:48.007 --> 29:50.717 legislature, so a bill had to be passed twice. 29:50.720 --> 29:53.880 So--and between those two sessions, the politicians who 29:53.875 --> 29:57.325 were passing the bill had to go home and explain it to their 29:57.326 --> 29:58.316 constituents. 29:58.319 --> 30:00.239 So you would pass a law. 30:00.240 --> 30:03.200 The representatives would go to their constituents and explain 30:03.196 --> 30:05.566 why they liked it, and then they'd have to go back 30:05.573 --> 30:06.643 and pass it again. 30:06.640 --> 30:07.030 Right? 30:07.031 --> 30:10.631 Obviously, the idea being: okay, these people are really 30:10.625 --> 30:14.475 beholden to their constituents and nothing's going to happen 30:14.481 --> 30:17.751 unless the constituents really approve of it. 30:17.750 --> 30:21.400 The Pennsylvania constitution also created this nifty little 30:21.395 --> 30:24.235 sort of body called the Council of Censors, 30:24.240 --> 30:28.630 and this Council of Censors was kind of like a big grand jury. 30:28.630 --> 30:31.070 It would be elected every seven years. 30:31.068 --> 30:35.868 And the job of the Council of Censors was to evaluate all 30:35.865 --> 30:38.515 aspects of government action. 30:38.519 --> 30:42.019 So basically, they create this little body, 30:42.019 --> 30:45.289 and the job of it is to just police government and make sure 30:45.287 --> 30:48.547 that everything is above board and operating in the way it's 30:48.554 --> 30:50.164 supposed to be operating. 30:50.160 --> 30:51.900 So you can really see, in comparison with what I was 30:51.898 --> 30:53.738 just saying about the sort of generality of these state 30:53.740 --> 30:56.110 constitutions, Pennsylvania really has an 30:56.107 --> 30:59.477 extreme reaction to the experience of the Revolution 30:59.478 --> 31:03.178 against what the colonists perceive to be as tyranny. 31:03.180 --> 31:06.010 So in a sense, if you think of ideas about 31:06.005 --> 31:08.895 government as being kind of a pendulum, 31:08.900 --> 31:11.490 and on one end you've got sort of British monarchical 31:11.491 --> 31:13.371 centralized power, in Pennsylvania, 31:13.372 --> 31:16.182 boy, that pendulum went way over onto the other side. 31:16.180 --> 31:21.060 Like, 'we don't want any centralized executive power; 31:21.058 --> 31:24.618 we are just going to be over here sort of experimenting with 31:24.616 --> 31:28.416 this interesting government that we haven't ever had one like it 31:28.415 --> 31:29.135 before.' 31:29.140 --> 31:31.790 And, as we'll see as we look at what happens over the next ten, 31:31.788 --> 31:35.698 fifteen, seventeen years, the Constitution in a way 31:35.704 --> 31:40.644 represents a midpoint between these two ends of the spectrum. 31:40.640 --> 31:44.150 One last point I want to discuss about state 31:44.154 --> 31:48.084 constitutions before we get into the Articles. 31:48.078 --> 31:51.048 While all of this state constitution revision was taking 31:51.053 --> 31:54.113 place, there were actually two states 31:54.107 --> 31:58.337 that were not taking part in it, not out of protest but because 31:58.339 --> 32:01.159 their colonial charters actually had in a sense been more radical 32:01.156 --> 32:03.046 than the other colonies' to begin with, 32:03.048 --> 32:07.068 and of course they are Connecticut and Rhode Island. 32:07.068 --> 32:10.078 Continuing theme, Connecticut and Rhode Island. 32:10.078 --> 32:12.968 Their colonial charters had basically made them 32:12.967 --> 32:15.977 self-governing already in--on a certain level. 32:15.980 --> 32:19.660 So they didn't have to do dramatic changes to make them 32:19.660 --> 32:21.500 into state constitutions. 32:21.500 --> 32:23.900 So they basically--Rhode Island and Connecticut-- 32:23.900 --> 32:26.250 basically preserved their colonial charters as 32:26.253 --> 32:29.243 constitutions and didn't really change them until into the 32:29.236 --> 32:30.436 nineteenth century. 32:30.440 --> 32:30.840 Okay. 32:30.837 --> 32:35.607 That gets us out of the world of state constitutions and into 32:35.614 --> 32:40.554 the world of creating some kind of government for the new union 32:40.548 --> 32:44.358 of American states, and that ends up being the 32:44.358 --> 32:46.248 Articles of Confederation. 32:46.250 --> 32:54.340 Now on July 12,1776, just after they had declared 32:54.342 --> 32:58.742 independence, the Continental Congress also 32:58.740 --> 33:02.380 was trying to create some kind of a proposal for a new national 33:02.377 --> 33:03.197 government. 33:03.200 --> 33:07.850 And between 1776 and 1777, the Continental Congress 33:07.848 --> 33:11.568 drafted the Articles of Confederation. 33:11.568 --> 33:16.028 And the Articles are the document that literally created 33:16.027 --> 33:18.537 the United States of America. 33:18.538 --> 33:22.078 They literally gave that name to the United States of America, 33:22.084 --> 33:25.344 but it's important that--to note that they actually meant 33:25.338 --> 33:26.848 that really literally. 33:26.848 --> 33:29.168 We sort of don't think of what that phrase means, 33:29.174 --> 33:30.924 but it was meant really literally. 33:30.920 --> 33:33.470 In the context of what I'm talking about now, 33:33.473 --> 33:36.263 what that said was: this was not one consolidated 33:36.260 --> 33:36.900 nation. 33:36.900 --> 33:39.640 This was "united states "--what the articles 33:39.642 --> 33:41.792 created; it united some states together. 33:41.788 --> 33:45.568 That's what that phrase literally meant. 33:45.568 --> 33:48.768 As John Adams explained later, they never thought "of 33:48.765 --> 33:51.615 consolidating this vast Continent under one national 33:51.624 --> 33:54.034 Government" but instead erected "a 33:54.034 --> 33:57.254 Confederacy of States, each of which must have a 33:57.250 --> 33:58.970 separate Government." 33:58.970 --> 34:03.110 So when thirteen free and independent states had defeated 34:03.105 --> 34:07.385 England and now had to figure out how to come together, 34:07.390 --> 34:13.360 they were not thinking of one big unified republic at this 34:13.360 --> 34:14.200 point. 34:14.199 --> 34:15.699 They really definitely were not, and that's--the Articles of 34:15.699 --> 34:16.869 Confederation went along with that thinking. 34:16.869 --> 34:20.059 It did not create one unified government; 34:20.059 --> 34:23.939 it did not bond people together in anything other than a loose 34:23.936 --> 34:24.506 league. 34:24.510 --> 34:28.150 The Articles created a loose league of individual republican 34:28.146 --> 34:29.006 governments. 34:29.010 --> 34:34.440 Now if, as the founding generation assumed, 34:34.440 --> 34:37.590 absolute power corrupts absolutely, 34:37.590 --> 34:40.270 then the Articles of Confederation was a very 34:40.268 --> 34:43.798 virtuous form of government because under the Articles, 34:43.800 --> 34:50.520 the Confederation Congress had almost no power to enforce its 34:50.521 --> 34:52.091 will at all. 34:52.090 --> 34:55.870 The newly-created Confederation was almost more of a United 34:55.873 --> 34:58.943 Nations than a central governing institution. 34:58.940 --> 35:03.540 As the Articles themselves stated, they were intended to 35:03.541 --> 35:06.551 create, quote, "a firm league of 35:06.552 --> 35:08.062 friendship ... 35:08.059 --> 35:10.989 for their common defense, the security of their 35:10.994 --> 35:14.574 Liberties, and their mutual and general welfare." 35:14.570 --> 35:19.400 The Articles were basically a pact between thirteen sovereign 35:19.402 --> 35:24.242 states which agreed that certain powers would be delegated to 35:24.235 --> 35:29.065 this new central government for very specific purposes, 35:29.070 --> 35:34.080 but these thirteen sovereign states retained all powers not 35:34.083 --> 35:38.063 expressly delegated by them in the Articles. 35:38.059 --> 35:40.429 So under the Articles, the national government 35:40.431 --> 35:43.491 consisted of a one-chamber national Congress elected by the 35:43.487 --> 35:44.697 state legislatures. 35:44.699 --> 35:47.619 Each state had one vote. 35:47.619 --> 35:52.359 Congress could request funds from the states but it could not 35:52.362 --> 35:56.872 enact a tax of its own without every state's approval-- 35:56.869 --> 36:00.689 how likely is that to happen?--so it could not really 36:00.688 --> 36:02.228 make its own taxes. 36:02.230 --> 36:05.640 It could not regulate interstate commerce between the 36:05.639 --> 36:06.229 states. 36:06.230 --> 36:09.570 The Articles did not provide for any kind of an executive 36:09.574 --> 36:12.804 branch or any kind of an executive character at all. 36:12.800 --> 36:16.300 Instead, Congressional Committees oversaw anything 36:16.300 --> 36:20.660 having to do with finance or diplomacy or military affairs. 36:20.659 --> 36:24.239 There was no judicial system by which this new national 36:24.235 --> 36:27.475 government could compel allegiance to its laws. 36:27.480 --> 36:31.080 So basically as far as the powers of Congress were 36:31.079 --> 36:35.489 concerned, the Confederation Congress was kind of filling the 36:35.485 --> 36:37.905 place of the imperial system. 36:37.909 --> 36:40.659 It could regulate foreign affairs. 36:40.659 --> 36:43.809 It could declare war with foreign countries. 36:43.809 --> 36:46.009 It could negotiate peace treaties. 36:46.010 --> 36:48.560 It could fix standards for weights and measures. 36:48.559 --> 36:50.889 It could manage Indian affairs. 36:50.889 --> 36:54.609 It could borrow money although it couldn't really tax. 36:54.610 --> 36:58.500 Basically, the Confederation Congress had power over war and 36:58.501 --> 37:02.331 foreign affairs and the states maintained control over what 37:02.326 --> 37:05.356 they called "internal policing." 37:05.360 --> 37:09.190 Now it's important to realize that in the context of the time 37:09.193 --> 37:12.513 when they were created, the Articles of Confederation 37:12.514 --> 37:14.564 actually make perfect sense. 37:14.559 --> 37:16.729 I think it's really easy--and I'll talk a little bit more 37:16.731 --> 37:18.941 about this on Thursday -- I think it's really easy to look 37:18.940 --> 37:20.260 at the Articles and say, 'Huh? 37:20.260 --> 37:22.190 What were they thinking? 37:22.190 --> 37:23.650 How did that make sense? 37:23.650 --> 37:26.000 Let's create a government and give it no power. 37:26.000 --> 37:27.040 Go.' 37:27.039 --> 37:29.689 So I think the Articles get a bum rap basically, 37:29.688 --> 37:31.378 in the long view of history. 37:31.380 --> 37:34.490 And I think it's important to realize at that moment in time 37:34.487 --> 37:37.557 they made perfect sense, given the experience of the 37:37.556 --> 37:41.336 Revolution and what people had just experienced in the realm of 37:41.335 --> 37:42.185 government. 37:42.190 --> 37:47.150 Basically, the Articles denied to this new government the very 37:47.150 --> 37:51.950 powers and violations that they had seen at the heart of the 37:51.949 --> 37:53.169 Revolution. 37:53.170 --> 37:57.290 So the Congress can't tax; the Congress can't overrule 37:57.289 --> 38:00.529 local laws; the Congress can't alter a 38:00.527 --> 38:03.987 state constitution; it can't interfere with state 38:03.992 --> 38:05.372 judicial proceedings. 38:05.369 --> 38:08.679 All of these things are things that we saw in past weeks 38:08.677 --> 38:11.387 happening during the course of the Revolution, 38:11.385 --> 38:13.125 inflicted by the British. 38:13.130 --> 38:15.880 So this is a really--Again and again, 38:15.880 --> 38:17.390 when people are creating constitutions, 38:17.389 --> 38:20.319 they learn a lesson and then they act based on that lesson 38:20.320 --> 38:22.980 that they learned, and then they look at this new 38:22.983 --> 38:24.833 thing they created and go: 'okay, 38:24.829 --> 38:26.819 new lesson learned. 38:26.820 --> 38:29.060 Let's make another government because we didn't like that one 38:29.059 --> 38:29.469 so much.' 38:29.469 --> 38:32.089 But you can actually see people experiencing something, 38:32.090 --> 38:35.290 thinking about what that means, and then creating a government 38:35.286 --> 38:37.116 based on those immediate lessons. 38:37.119 --> 38:40.409 That's what we see here with the Articles of Confederation. 38:40.409 --> 38:43.199 And then to avoid an entrenched elite-- 38:43.199 --> 38:47.389 They don't want any kind of a little aristocracy coming up in 38:47.391 --> 38:50.121 America-- the Articles did establish 38:50.121 --> 38:51.631 rotation in office. 38:51.630 --> 38:55.050 So you could not be in office more than three or every six 38:55.050 --> 38:56.990 years; you couldn't be President of 38:56.989 --> 38:59.229 Congress more than one in any three years; 38:59.230 --> 39:04.510 and any delegate could be instantly recalled by his home 39:04.510 --> 39:05.280 state. 39:05.280 --> 39:05.760 Okay. 39:05.755 --> 39:09.935 So there we see this weak central government, 39:09.938 --> 39:12.788 lots of things it can't do. 39:12.789 --> 39:16.789 There were very, very few things that the states 39:16.789 --> 39:21.299 were restricted from doing under this new compact, 39:21.300 --> 39:23.850 but there were a couple of things that the states were not 39:23.846 --> 39:25.536 supposed to do-- and you'll hear, 39:25.539 --> 39:27.709 they're not exactly dire restrictions. 39:27.710 --> 39:27.970 Okay. 39:27.967 --> 39:30.857 So no state could enter into an alliance or treaty with a 39:30.862 --> 39:33.502 foreign nation without the consent of Congress, 39:33.500 --> 39:36.080 so New Jersey cannot make a treaty with France. 39:36.079 --> 39:36.469 Okay. 39:36.469 --> 39:39.119 They need to go through Congress. 39:39.119 --> 39:42.349 No two or more states could enter into a confederation 39:42.353 --> 39:44.433 without the consent of Congress. 39:44.429 --> 39:45.879 Okay. Think about that one. 39:45.880 --> 39:49.020 So New England can't break away and form its own confederation 39:49.018 --> 39:51.178 without at least checking with us first. 39:51.179 --> 39:54.449 Would you allow us to break off and form our own confederation? 39:54.449 --> 39:55.339 No? 39:55.340 --> 39:56.640 That would have been an interesting little game. 39:56.639 --> 39:58.709 No? Well, try to stop us. 39:58.710 --> 40:01.870 But at least it's saying, states are not supposed to form 40:01.869 --> 40:04.069 their own little mini-confederations. 40:04.070 --> 40:08.210 States were not to keep warships or troops in peacetime 40:08.213 --> 40:12.053 unless Congress deemed it necessary for defense. 40:12.050 --> 40:14.940 States were not supposed to declare war without consent of 40:14.943 --> 40:17.943 Congress--that's nice--except where sudden invasion admitted 40:17.936 --> 40:18.746 of no delay. 40:18.750 --> 40:20.230 Okay. Those are the restraints. 40:20.230 --> 40:20.660 Right? 40:20.661 --> 40:23.911 Ooh, [laughs] those are not dire restraints. 40:23.909 --> 40:27.229 Don't make war with another country all by yourself. 40:27.230 --> 40:29.930 Don't break away from the Articles, from the league of 40:29.927 --> 40:32.317 friendship, and form your own little country. 40:32.320 --> 40:34.810 Don't make a treaty with a foreign nation all by yourself. 40:34.809 --> 40:37.169 Those are the restrictions on the states. 40:37.170 --> 40:41.300 Obviously, none of these restraints placed too serious a 40:41.297 --> 40:45.797 check on the sovereignty of the states under this compact. 40:45.800 --> 40:49.990 So essentially the Articles of Confederation were designed so 40:49.994 --> 40:54.264 that the new nation's central government would not infringe on 40:54.260 --> 40:55.310 the states. 40:55.309 --> 40:58.109 As I said before, it would kind of fill the hole 40:58.106 --> 41:01.256 where the British imperial system had been before, 41:01.260 --> 41:04.160 have a very, very limited sphere of actions, 41:04.159 --> 41:06.569 not really have a power of enforcement, 41:06.570 --> 41:10.390 and leave everything that wasn't specified to the states 41:10.385 --> 41:12.185 to control on their own. 41:12.190 --> 41:15.940 Now, this is a document that's being drafted in the middle of a 41:15.942 --> 41:18.222 revolution, and what we're going to see 41:18.219 --> 41:20.969 over the course of the next few lectures is that once 41:20.971 --> 41:23.381 revolutions end-- Remember we started the course 41:23.376 --> 41:25.886 by talking about how the colonies came together basically 41:25.889 --> 41:28.399 when they needed to defend themselves and then as soon as 41:28.403 --> 41:30.473 they didn't need to defend themselves they went 41:30.469 --> 41:32.399 "boom" and sort of parted. 41:32.400 --> 41:32.680 Okay. 41:32.684 --> 41:35.194 So we had this Revolution, and the states, 41:35.190 --> 41:36.480 the colonies, they come together, 41:36.476 --> 41:38.146 they unite, they fight together, 41:38.148 --> 41:41.188 and then the war ends, so guess what the 1780s is 41:41.186 --> 41:42.496 going to look like. 41:42.500 --> 41:42.660 Okay. 41:42.657 --> 41:44.407 It's going to look like just what you think it will look 41:44.405 --> 41:44.655 like. 41:44.659 --> 41:46.949 The states basically all turn their back on each other and 41:46.952 --> 41:48.082 say, 'Well, that was nice. 41:48.079 --> 41:49.749 [laughs] Now we're going to do our own 41:49.748 --> 41:50.108 thing. 41:50.110 --> 41:51.470 Thank you very much.' 41:51.469 --> 41:54.329 So the Articles is drafted in a time when there is this 41:54.327 --> 41:56.547 cooperation going on between the states. 41:56.550 --> 42:00.140 What we're going to see in the next two lectures is what 42:00.141 --> 42:03.671 happens when these Articles actually go into effect. 42:03.670 --> 42:06.580 What do the 1780s look like? 42:06.579 --> 42:10.539 And that's going to take us on the road to new lessons being 42:10.536 --> 42:13.016 learned and yet another government. 42:13.018 --> 42:15.238 Think about the pace at which governments are being created in 42:15.239 --> 42:15.749 this period. 42:15.750 --> 42:18.140 It gets back to where I started at the beginning of this 42:18.135 --> 42:18.565 lecture. 42:18.570 --> 42:21.260 They're just: 'Hey, we need a new government. 42:21.260 --> 42:21.910 Let's make one now. 42:21.909 --> 42:23.079 Okay. How do you like that one? 42:23.079 --> 42:23.819 I don't know. 42:23.820 --> 42:24.740 We need to revise it.' 42:24.739 --> 42:26.449 They're also revising these governments throughout this 42:26.454 --> 42:26.744 period. 42:26.739 --> 42:29.789 That's also got to be a little unsettling. 42:29.789 --> 42:33.409 It's part of why in this period, people tend to get very 42:33.414 --> 42:34.804 upset, very scared. 42:34.800 --> 42:36.340 Something goes a little wrong and they think, 42:36.344 --> 42:37.754 'Aah, it's the end of the government!' 42:37.750 --> 42:42.160 Well, if it's only two years old, maybe it will collapse, 42:42.159 --> 42:45.479 and if these are the guys who actually made the government, 42:45.480 --> 42:47.700 then they kind of have a good reason for thinking that it 42:47.697 --> 42:48.447 could fall apart. 42:48.449 --> 42:50.609 They were there when they put it together. 42:50.610 --> 42:52.150 Maybe it's actually going to collapse. 42:52.150 --> 42:55.690 So that's actually--And we're going to see that particularly 42:55.690 --> 42:57.730 in the 1780s and then the 1790s. 42:57.730 --> 42:59.340 We won't be talking so much about the 1790s. 42:59.340 --> 43:02.630 If you want to take my Early National America course, 43:02.630 --> 43:05.260 that will start right where this one drops off actually, 43:05.260 --> 43:09.130 and takes us into the 1790s -- but you can see that spirit in 43:09.130 --> 43:10.840 the 1790s, of people saying, 'Wow. 43:10.840 --> 43:12.300 We've been creating a lot of governments. 43:12.300 --> 43:14.540 Do you think this one's going to stick around? 43:14.539 --> 43:15.289 I don't know. 43:15.289 --> 43:16.029 I hope so. 43:16.030 --> 43:17.300 Maybe it'll last for five years. 43:17.300 --> 43:18.150 That'll be exciting.' 43:18.150 --> 43:20.230 So--Okay. I will stop there. 43:20.230 --> 43:23.730 On Thursday we will look at what happened when the Articles 43:23.733 --> 43:24.763 go into effect. 43:24.760 --> 43:30.000