Articles of Confederation and US Constitution Review

The first plan of American government was inspired by state constitutions and the interests of the separate states. What were some of the key ideas in these state constitutions? Check BOTH.

• Government power should be divided among different people or groups.

• A single, strong leader is better than electing many leaders.

• Legislatures (law-making groups) can be divided into two “houses.”

• The national government should have total authority over the states.

Which best describes the structure of the United States government under the Articles of Confederation?

• The states agreed to cooperate and follow the laws of a Congress, but that did NOT create a president or Supreme Court.

• The states created a legislative, executive, and judicial branch that had TOTAL authority over the states.

• The states created a monarchy, BUT the king was much less powerful than the king of England had been.

• The states created an empire modeled on the emperor of France.

Under the Articles of Confederation, states could refuse to follow laws passed by Congress.

• True

• False

What was the Constitutional Convention meant to accomplish?

• To make certain every state had the same laws and way of doing things.

• To pass the Bill of Rights.

• To create a new plan for government that made the federal government stronger and better able to solve problems.

• To create a new plan for government that made the federal government weaker than it was under the Articles of Confederation.

Below are the two different “plans” for government that the Framers had to decide between. They chose some parts of both plans. CIRCLE the 3 parts of the plans that they used in the US Constitution.

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What was the Three-Fifths Compromise?

• It counted every three women and five slaves in a state’s population to see how many votes in Congress that state got.

• It counted every slave as three-fifths of a person when counting the state’s population.

• It allowed any state to reject a law if 3/5 of the people in the state voted against it.

• It determined that a 3/5 majority was needed to elect the president.

The Three-Fifths Compromise made slave states LESS powerful in Congress than if slaves had counted as whole people.

• True

• False

What was the purpose of the Bill of Rights?

• Antifederalists wanted a list of rights that would be protected by the new government, or they would vote against the Constitution.

• Federalists wanted to make the federal government as strong as possible in order to protect people’s rights.

• The government wanted to know how much it would cost to protect people’s rights.

• Antifederalists wanted the national government to be strong enough to overturn the wishes of any state.

Write the correct “parts” of each branch of government in the chart below. Use the word list.

Read the Preamble to the Constitution. Write down, in your own words, two goals that the Framers had for the government planned out in the Constitution.

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