Where the Americans right to worry about having a strong central government?
America wrote the Articles of Confederation to provide a weak central government. This was an understandable move, considering their previous experiences with strong central governments like those of Britain and France: France got into a war with Britain that many colonists got stuck in the middle of, and Britain caused enough anger among the Americans to result in a revolution. After all the trouble strong governments that the people had no say in, go the people into, it makes sense they would want to try something else. There is logic to their worry about making another governmental position that could become too strong to be checked. All the same, I am not sure that it was a truly necessary action.
While it was logical, yes, to fear a strong government, they did not need to go as far as they did: to handi-cap their leading body. Government is defined, among other things, as A) a form or system of rule by which a community of some sort is governed, and B) direction; control; management; rule. The government makes the laws, enforces the laws, and generally deals with the system. It is meant to protect the people and the greater interests of the people, as defined in the social contract. The Americans were worried about giving a loaded gun to a crooked cop. But they went too far in the other direction: if you give a policeman a bubblegun, he won't be able to stop much crime. An ineffective government is just that- ineffective
The Americans should have, instead of weakening the government, left the government with moderate power and worked on weeding out the 'crooked cops': perhaps by adding requirements on who can run for what office, how.
What do you think? Were the Americans right to react as they did, to prevent a strong government? Were their actions logical?
AoC
water gun
Thea, it's interesting that you should end the way you do, because the Framers of the Constitution explicitly rejected the "crooked cop" theory of government. Madison, in Federalist Paper #51, essentially assumes that you can't clean up human nature, and you have to design the government to take the "crooked timber of humanity" (as Kant put it) into consideration when designing it. His famous quote: "If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself."
ReplyDeleteThea, I agree with you on the point that the Articles of Confederation were not the best way of running a country (in fact, they were absolutely ridiculous). However I can't blame America for limiting the amount of power that the government was given. The colonists started the revolution for one reason, to escape the so called "oppression" of the English government. To me it only seems logical that the first draft of their government would want to break away from the strong central government model and instead give the individual states more power and the ability to choose for themselves.
ReplyDeleteI agree with you. I like the gun idea.
ReplyDeleteHowever, in order to be the devil’s advocate…
I am surprised that the colonies did not recognize how crucial a strong government is. While under England's powerful authority, the people were suppressed. However, when England was weak, the people got away with many wrongdoings. For example, salutary neglect was prevalent, which exhibited how England’s executive power was not continuously overbearing. As a result, smuggling became common in the colonies. England created the Proclamation of 1763, but many people still moved out West. This one example should have demonstrated to the colonists that weak executive powers leads to disarray. (The colonies adapted to their quasi- independence which led them to rebel against England when Parliament finally decided to start ruling the colonists.) Apparently, the colonists did not learn their lesson.
It is true that America's fear of a strong central government was purely out of hate for Britain and the oppressive form of government that they just fought their way out of. The Articles of Confederation were a failure, but, I not only understand their reasoning, but think that The Articles were important to the development of our current government. First, although the articles of confederation were not a good way to run a government, there were many problems already stacking upon the new country that were independent of the government form (just the first paragraph). I didn't, in any way, believe that America's first trial at a new, radical, government would be a success. Creating a new independent government is like trying anything new for the first time; others have done it, succeeded in one way or another, and have added their own variations to their specific needs, but you have not done it and you will most likely fail the first time. However, the articles of confederation gave America the information and experience they needed to form a new, more successful, government. In the long run the Articles of Confederation's brief failure only helped America find a way to successfully run a democratic government.
ReplyDeleteI agree with your belief that the Americans were afraid of repeating the same type of government structure that Britain imposed on them,however, I don't think that we can truly say that the purpose of a government under the Articles of Confederation was intended to be weak. A better description would be a less oppressive or domineering government than what Britain had provided. The purpose of the Articles of the Confederation were to allow colonial assemblies to have the powers that they were denied by Britain, it just so happened that this form of government was weak. Weakness was not intended, but rather the result of America's fear of becoming tyrannical leaders like British monarchy and parliament were. I agree with you stating that they did such to avoid an overbearing government, but I do not support it fully when you say that: "America wrote the Articles of Confederation to provide a weak central government" just for the mere fact, that a weak central government so happened to be the result, but not the intention.
ReplyDelete