American Democracy in Context. Joseph A. PikaЧитать онлайн книгу.
first of the colonies to call for such a resolution. That same month, the Continental Congress urged colonies to adopt constitutions in anticipation of impending independence and statehood. Then, on June 7, Virginia’s Richard Henry Lee proposed before the Continental Congress “that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.”19 To implement Lee’s resolution, the Continental Congress created a committee consisting of John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, Robert Livingston, and Roger Sherman to prepare what would eventually become the American Declaration of Independence.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,20 that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,—That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government.
In writing these words, Jefferson drew upon John Locke’s Two Treatises of Government (1689). Locke believed that people enjoy certain natural rights, including “life, liberty, and property,” that cannot be taken away without their consent. Through a social contract, people come together in a society under a government whose authority they agree to obey. If, however, a government deprives them of their natural rights without their consent, the social contract is broken, and the people have a right to rebel and replace that government with one that will honor the terms of the social contract. This concept of a social contract led the newly independent states, and eventually the new federal government, to adopt written constitutions. These constitutions served as contracts spelling out the powers of government and the rights of the people.
Declaration of Independence A statement written by Thomas Jefferson and approved by the Second Continental Congress on July 4, 1776, that asserted the independence of the American colonies from Great Britain.
social contract The idea, drawn from the writings of John Locke and others, that government is accountable to the people and bound to protect the natural rights of its citizens. If the government breaks this contract, the people have the right to rebel and replace the government with one that will enforce it.
In making his case for rebellion in the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson listed a specific set of grievances against Britain. In doing so, he did not even mention Parliament but rather took aim exclusively at King George III: “The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States.” Jefferson listed 27 specific grievances and, finally, declared that
these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved.
Popular uprisings, such as the Yellow Vest movement in France, which calls for economic justice for the working class, illustrate citizens claiming a broken social contract in the contemporary world.
Kiran Ridley / Getty Images
Meanwhile, some delegates to the Continental Congress thought it premature to declare independence. South Carolina and Pennsylvania opposed independence in a preliminary vote on July 1, and New York abstained because its delegates did not have clear instructions from home about how to vote. (Each colony had a single vote in Congress determined by a majority vote of the delegates from that colony.) In an attempt to secure unanimity among the colonies, Congress delayed the final vote on Lee’s resolution until the next day. The tactic worked. South Carolina reversed its vote and, as the result of strategic abstentions by two of its delegates, Pennsylvania now voted 3–2 in favor of independence instead of 4–3 against it. New York still abstained, but the New York Provincial Congress formally voted to support independence a few days later. Congress approved the final language of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, and the first public reading of the Declaration took place four days later in Philadelphia. The next day, July 9, George Washington ordered that the Declaration be read to members of the Continental Army in New York.
Independence had been declared, but the Revolutionary War dragged on for five years. The official peace accord, in which Great Britain recognized the independence of the United States, was not signed until 1782.
The Articles of Confederation
With the Declaration, the colonies asserted their independence but still mostly lacked a formal government. In the months preceding the Declaration, would-be states had begun drafting their own written constitutions. By the end of 1776, all but three of the states had drafted and ratified constitutions. Georgia and New York followed suit in 1777, as did Massachusetts in 1780. These constitutions created state governments. However, a new national government to oversee the 13 states was also needed. The problem—similar to the one faced in Iraq in 2005—was how to balance regional autonomy with national power.
In the short run, the Second Continental Congress operated as the national government. The Continental Congress also took responsibility for writing a national constitution and, in fact, had appointed a committee for this purpose even before voting to approve the Declaration of Independence. But the process of drafting the constitution proved to be slow. The problem, above all, was that the new states were understandably wary of central authority. Furthermore, differences among the states led to heated debates. Large states wanted proportional representation in the national government, while small states wanted equal representation. Similarly, there was debate about whether states should supply funds to the national government in proportion to their population. If so, did the slave population count? Southern states, with large slave populations, said no. Later, during the Constitutional Convention of 1787, southern states would take a contradictory stance and argue that their slave population should count for purposes of representation in Congress. At this juncture, however, the issue did not arise because all states had equal representation in the Continental Congress and the states assumed that this practice would continue.
Debate also revolved around control of the land west of the colonies. The western boundaries for some states were not yet established. Should the new national government have the power to set those boundaries?21 As a result of such debates, the drafting of the first national constitution, known as the Articles of Confederation, took well over a year; on November 17, 1777, the Continental Congress finally voted to approve the Articles. Ratification by the states was an even slower process, and the Articles of Confederation did not officially take effect until March 1, 1781.22
As its title indicates, the relationship that the Articles of Confederation established among the states was that of a confederation, a union of independent, sovereign states. In a confederation, the primary power, especially with regard to domestic affairs, rests with the individual states; the central government is limited to such functions as leading the nation’s defense and foreign affairs. Confederations are relatively rare. A recent example is the State Union of Serbia and Montenegro, a confederated union of two former republics of Yugoslavia. Serbia and Montenegro maintained autonomous governments; they were united only for the purpose of defense. Their confederation lasted only from 2003 to 2006, when it was dissolved as the result of a referendum.
Articles of Confederation The first constitution of the United States (1781–1788), under which states retained sovereignty over all issues not specifically delegated to the weak central government, comprising a unicameral (one-house) legislature and no independent executive or judicial branch.
confederation A union of independent, sovereign states whose central government is charged with defense and foreign affairs but where the primary power—especially with regard to domestic politics—rests