Monday, September 5, 2011
Ch 2 - Articles of Confederation
Which 'weakness' of the Articles of Confederation do you think was the biuggest problem The inablity of the national government to tax, the inability of the national government to raise an army, or the inability of the national government to regulate interstate trade? Of course explain why!
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The biggest problem the Articles of Confederation had was the inability of the national government to tax. This is the biggest problem because the national government had no source of income, so they could not carry out any programs. The national government also could not provide any services that would have been beneficial to the citizens because they did not have enough money to carry out their services with. Since the power to raise money was up to the states, the revenue was oftentimes not raised at all or submitted late. Therefore, there were many shortfalls by the national government. Mainly, there was a severe lack of economic unity during the Article of Confederation.
ReplyDeleteI disagree, I think that the biggest problem of the Articles of Confederation was the inability of the national government to raise an army. I think this was the biggest weakness because the United States was left vulnerable at this time against other strong countries. The Treaty of Paris was not enforced, the result of this was the British continued to occupy U.S. forts in the Northwest Territory. Our country needed a strong army to lead and protect them from opposing armed forces.
DeleteI agree with Melissa and think that the biggest problem under the Articles of Confederation was the inability of the national government to tax. I think that this was the biggest problem because the national government had to rely on the states to give them money which commonly did not happen. I think that if the national government was able to tax, the Articles of Confederation would have stayed in place longer because the government would have been able to provide services to the people of America. Without a source of income, the national government was very weak and not able to accomplish much because they had to rely so heavily on the states.
DeleteI disagree with all three of these kind young ladies, I believe that the biggest problem under the Articles of Confederation was the federal government's inability to regulate interstate commerce. I believe that this was the biggest weakness because the states were left to control their own economy which caused non-uniformity between the states economies.
DeleteAdding to what Graham said, I believe that the inability to regulate trade and commerce was one of the biggest downfalls of the Articles of Confederation. America, at the time of the Articles of Confederation, was already going through major economic turmoil. At the time, the federal government was only allowed to regulate trade with Native American tribes, and even then only if it did not interfere with a state’s ability to monitor its own trade. Since the federal government had so little power, there was hardly any trade coordination among the states. States often had extremely different laws on imports and exports making it difficult for interstate trade to occur. Without a smooth running economy, it was hard for the states to trade amongst one another and even send and receive foreign goods. Without a stable economy it is hard for a country to even function properly so I think the lack of control on trade was the most detrimental aspect of the Articles of Confederation.
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ReplyDeleteI would agree in that the biggest problem in the Articles of Confederation was not allowing Congress to tax. The country was already in major debt because of the Revolutionary War and the government had no way of paying their debts back. And without taxes, the country would not have funding programs to provide for the public.
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