Reference no: EM133364830
After the Constitutional Convention of 1787 had ended and the proposed U.S. Constitution had been submitted to the American people for ratification, public debates raged between those who supported the U.S. Constitution (the Federalists) and those who opposed it (the Anti-Federalists). One of the central issues in the debates was whether it would be possible to unite the 13 states into one great nation, under one federal government, in such a way that the individual states and their respective governments would not be eliminated - and with them, the means of securing the liberties of the citizens of America.
1. Why did the Founders gather to replace the Articles of Confederation with the new U.S. Constitution?
2. What did each group believe influenced the U.S. Constitution?
3. Which group promoted federalism as a system of government and why?
4. Which group promoted individual civil liberties and why?
5. Which viewpoint is more important as it affects our lives today?
6. List at least four core principles of the American Revolution and American national government. How do these core principles apply in our modern federal republic?
7. What is federalism and how is a republic different from direct democracy? What is the purpose of a federal republic?
Important primary documents that influenced the U.S. Constitution are the Magna Carta, the Mayflower Compact, the English Bill of Rights, the Declaration of Independence, and the Articles of Confederation. Important primary philosophical thinkers who were influences on the U.S. Constitution are Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, as well as the British legal scholar William Blackstone.
1. What aspects of these documents and philosophical positions do you see represented in the U.S. Constitution?
2. How did these documents and philosophical positions influence the authors of the U.S. Constitution to divide political power and choose officers, in order to limit government power?
3. What was left out?
4. How is U.S. Constitution different from these early governing documents?
5. If you were using these early governing documents and philosophical positions as guides to produce a constitution, do you agree or disagree with what was included in the U.S. Constitution? And why or why not?