12 2.3 – ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION
2.3.
ARTICLES OF CONFEDERATION
The Articles of Confederation were introduced in 1776 as an attempt to create a new, permanent government in the American colonies. By 1781, the Articles had been ratified and had officially become the law of the land (McClain and Tauber, 2016). The framers opted for a confederate government where policy making power was placed in the hands of local (state) governments. In a confederatesystem, the national government’s powers are entirely derived from the sovereign local governments. Fearing a return to the oppressive policies associated with a strong unitary government, Americans were reluctant to give too much power to their new central government. While a confederate government was philosophically more comfortable for America’s early political leaders, over time it proved inadequate for governing the new, and soon to be growing, nation. The inability of the national government to effectively communicate and successfully pass public policies of interest to the entire nation-state, such as national defense, national transportation infrastructure, and regulation of interstate commerce, made the American confederation a poor long-term choice for national government. What the American democratic experiment needed was a revolutionary new form of government that would combine the advantages of unitary and confederate governments and increase the policy making abilities of the federal government. This new government would be born in Philadelphia in 1787.
