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
