APUSH (D): 2/4

“Threatened by popular political victories [in the states] and widespread resistance, many elite Pennsylvanians launched an effort to remake the state and national governments so that they were less democratic. . . . Popular policies and resistance . . . threatened elite ideals. . . . Popular calls for a revaluation of war debt certificates, bans on for-profit corporations, progressive taxation, limits on land speculation, and every other measure designed to make property more equal promised to take wealth away from the elite. . . . It was also threatening that popular politics frightened off potential European investors. . . . [They] were alarmed by the Pennsylvania legislature’s 1785 [cancellation] of the Bank of North America’s corporate charter. . . .

. . . The push for the Constitution was based in part on the belief that state governments across the new nation had been too democratic and, as a result, had produced policies . . . that threatened elite interests. Most of the men who assembled at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia in 1787 were also convinced that the national government under the Articles of Confederation was too weak to counter the rising tide of democracy in the states.”

Terry Bouton, historian, Taming Democracy: “The People,” the Founders, and the Troubled Ending of the American Revolution, 2007

One piece of evidence Bouton uses to support his argument about why some United States political leaders sought to replace the Articles of Confederation in 1787 was that they?

• thought that a strong central government threatened Americans’ liberties

• opposed the economic policies that some state legislatures pursued

• believed that the national government should be more democratic

• sought to discourage Europeans from investing in the United States

“But if the reports which we now hear are true, that with England all hope of honorable accommodation is at an end, and that with France our negotiations are in a fowardness encouraging expectations of a favorable result, where is the motive for longer delay? The final step ought to be taken; and that step is WAR. By what course of measures we have reached the present crisis, is not now a question for freemen and patriots to discuss. It exists; and it is by open and manly war only that we can get through it with honor and advantage to the country. Our wrongs have been great; our cause is just; and if we are decided and firm, success is inevitable.

”What impact did the War of 1812 have on American politics?

• It ushered in the Era of Good Feelings

• It led to the birth of the Free Soil Party

• It had no effect on American politics

• It caused many Americans to be abstain from voting