When the revolutionary war was over, the American colonists had found themselvesfree of British domination. Due to the fact that they were free from Britishcontrol, they wanted to create their own system of government where tyrannywould be practically diminished.
Originally, The Articles of Confederationconnected the separate states. But this document gave the central government nopower of its own. Because of this, the states had many problems ininternational politics since they had just found freedom and did not have therespect of other countries. This caused a lot of thinking and it was decidedthat a document needed to be created to strengthen the central government and atthe same time ensuring the safety of the states.
So came to be the constitution. The constitution brought about a division between the American people. These twogroups were the federalists, who believed that the constitution was good, andthe anti-federalists who thought that the constitution would not be able toprotect the rights of the people. These two groups had conflicting views buttogether, they both wanted the same thing. The same thing was that the peopleshould control America by the principles of Federalism Essay. Both groups, thefederalist and anti-federalists recognized the fact that power was being abused.
They witnessed what had happened in the war and that their had been negativeeffects of power and the result was very clear. British vocation had made themvery aware of the threat of corruption. Therefore, they wanted to make agovernment that would ensure the duration of a just republic. The Federalistsexclaimed that the constitution was the only way they could reach this goal of ajust society. As James Wilson had said, the constitution would not give all thepower to the legislature unless it was legally written down to ensure power wasnot mistreated.
In the constitution, it does allow Congress to make laws thathelp out the government in the area of execution of foreign powers. The views ofthe anti-federalists were obviously different. They believed that the powergiven to the congress was not safe since it put them too much in control. Hencethey created the Bill of Rights to “establish justice, ensure domestictranquillity and provide for the common defense.
. . ” The anti-federalistsfeared that the actual people would not be fairly represented by their newgovernment since they would have the power to get rid of the individual rightsof the people. The Bill of Rights claims it is for and by the people. Especiallysince America is so large, it does not ensure everyone’s opinion would be heard.
Many people did not like the idea of having representatives from each statebecause one man can not bring forth many different opinions. Anti-federalistsbelieve that liberty only is present when there are few people and they canactually get their voice projected. In a large population, like America, thecitizens do not get Individual freedom and are deprived of their rights. Yet,Madison a federalist stated that in a small republic, tyranny could be much moreassessable since it would be easier to dominate others. Unlike in a largerepublic which is made up of many views where as it is less chance that a fewcan dominate others. Even in individual states it is easy to elect officialssince people can be easily controlled when there aren’t many people.
In otherword, the more the people, the less chance of bribery and inducement. Anotherbenefit of a larger republic is that there would be a variety of peoplerepresenting them and there would be many candidates to pick from. Ensuring thehighest quality government. In a small republic, options would be very selectmaking it an unfair election. Besides finding officials to best represent thepeople, there were many other controversial topics that faced the Americanpeople.
The topic of taxation brought about many different ideas of what shouldbe. The anti-federalists believed that by forming a new system would be verychallenging because that is what they know and use. The first problem they foundwas that states would not want to have two state taxes. This is unfair to thepeople.
They also argued that a state tax was unfair since each state wasdifferent with different needs. This could very well destroy a stateeconomically while other states are fine. The federalists believed that congresshad all the right to have direct taxation in ensure the safety of nationalsecurity. The claimed that the .
