College Government Test 1

Greek Civilization

served as a model for the Romans, medieval Europeans, and later the American founders

Greece

made up of independent city states

Classical Age Athenians

remembered for architecture, dramas, math, and philosophy.

Socrates, Plato, Aristotle

form an intellectual chain that raised wisdom as the greatest good and believed in forming rational answers to meaningful questions

Athenians Practiced

direct democracy from 503-400 BC - Assembly (ekklesia), Council of 500, and popular jury/tribunal courts (excluded women, slaves, resident aliens)

Plato's Republic

dialogue between Socrates and his interlocutors concerned with analyzing society in an effort to arrive at a definition of justice

Plato's Republic

famous for analogy of The Cave (over my favorite, the Myth of the Metals), ignored for its recommendations for education and family life in a totalitarian state ruled by a philosopher-king in a perfect polis

Plato's experience with demokratica

informed his criticisms of an obviously flawed system.

Rome

mythological history starts with Romulus ; relevant history starts in 586 with expulsion of a king and the start of the Res Publica.

Roman Government

valued rule of Law (Twelve Tables), organized around a Senate (from Latin for old men), and elected two consuls for military and political leadership

Roman class conflict

led to more rights for non-aristocrats, civil war led to the rise of Caesar (and others)

Line of Caesars

continued to uphold notion of SPQR, never claimed the title king.

Rome lived on

after the "fall" in the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine), the Roman Catholic Church, and eventually the Holy Roman Empire (Charlemagne, AD 800)

Jewish messiah

claimed universal lordship ; known as the Way, became the world's largest religion.

Jewish History

begins with Books of Moses (circa 1400 BC), continues through era of prophets and kings - claims of Holy Land and exile fueled reform

Augustine of Hippo

wrote about a City of God - a true "eternal city" that would outlast Rome

Dominated by Judaism

western art, literature, origin stories

Old Testament Theocracy

inspiration to John Calvin in Switzerland and Puritans in America

Medium Aevum

not as "dark" as it often maligned but feudal system made political theory less relevant. .

Feudalism

consisted of overlapping layers of allegiance centered around warfare

The Prince

1400s, Machiavelli, viewed as heretical at the time, which recommended a realpolitik approach. "Better to be feared than loved" illustrates the idea that a ruler should do whatever works not what custom or the bible dictates.

Angle-Land

England unique as a result of the Magna Carta (signed by King John I in 1215) made kings subservient to at least one written law

Magna Carta

Law primarily about respecting the land rights of aristocrats but will be understood later to be a limited monarchy.

Nation-state

developed in the late middle ages partly as a result of the Hundred Years' War, kings reeled in power from the nobles in order to wage war against France

Protestant Reformation

resulted in crumbling religio-political power across Europe, in England the king became the head of the church

Scientific Revolution

led to looking for natural laws elsewhere; "natural light" of reason (Enlightenment) focused on religion, morality, and politics

Thomas Hobbes and John Locke

most widely read English political philosophers

Hobbes

lived during the English Civil War, envisioned a state of nature that saw humans as brutal and nasty towards one another. The solution was a Leviathan, a powerful king who embodied the individual rights of its citizens.

Locke

fled and returned during the Glorious Revolution, wrote in the Second Treatise of Government of a the natural rights of man: life, liberty, and property. And included, briefly, that when governments were destructive towards these ends, rebellion was permitted

Companies granted charters

to use New World as money-making ventures (mercantilism), eventually companies asserted a level of political independence (e.g. Massachusetts Bay Company)

Colonies founded by religious minorities

Quakers in Pennsylvania, Catholics in Maryland

Colonial Wars

1600 and 1700s led to more direct rule in the colonies by the king, charters revoked and the king the legal head of each colony

Developed new identity in new world

English, German, Swede, Scots-Irish ; most remained allegiant to the king but refused to be considered second-class citizens

Founding US Documents

Virginia Charter, Mayflower Compact, Fundamental Orders - Connecticut

Colonial Government

13 diverse colonies, (new england, middle, southern)

Leading to Revolution

• French and Indian War (1754-1763)

• George Washington

• Battle for Quebec

• 7 Years War in Europe

• Albany Plan of Union

Close to Wartime

• Stamp Act to pay for the War

• Declaration of Rights and Grievances of the Colonies (1765)

• The Townshend Act

• Boston Massacre (1770)

H.M.S. Gaspee

ran aground off Rhode Island in June 1772, crew captured, ship burnt

Committees of Correspondence

formed across the colonies to report British threats to liberty

Liberty Trees

people gathered near these

Tea Act of 1773

designed to aid the East Indian Tea company, responded to with another boycott and the Boston "Tea Party" (Dec. 1773)

Intolerable Acts (March 1774)

1\. Closed Boston Harbor

2\. Annulled Massachusetts Charter

3\. Massachusetts courts could not try British officials

4\. Soldiers could be quartered in private homes

Response to Intolerable Acts

First Continental Congress - September-October 1774

First Continental Congress

Formation of a Continental "Association”

• What was the basis of American rights?

• How should those rights be defended?

First Continental Congress

Goal: to repeal Intolerable Acts

Method: banned trade to Britain, Ireland, and E. Indies

__Declaration of the Rights and Grievances - October 14, 1774__

"Shot Heard Round the World"

• General Thomas Gage

• 19 April, 1775

• Lexington

• Concord

• Old North Bridge

Second Continental Congress

May 10, 1775

George Washington

Commander of the Continental Army

16 June

Battle of Bunker Hill

Olive Branch Petition

July 5, 1775

Henry Knox and Benedict Arnold

returned with cannons and force the British to evacuate

1776 January

Common Sense

1776 March

NC legislature instructed delegates to vote for independence. Congress sent delegates to France.

1776 May

news of 12,000 Hessian mercenaries en route. Independent state legislatures forme

1776 June

motion put forward to declare independence

* Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, Roger Sherman, Robert Livingston

1776 4 July

Declaration of Independence adopted by Congress.

America Under Articles

"A firm league of friendship"

Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union

• Organized on the principle that the Congress would have no more power than the King or Parliament.

• 2-7 delegates sent annually by state legislatures.

13 articles

15 November 1777

Defects of Articles

• No power over tax or trade

• No federal executive or judiciary

• No sanction of actual federal powers

National Congress

lacked the power to tax; instead they printed money and attempted to pay down the interest on debts through loans

Robert Morris

a Philadelphia banker organized finances during the war, resigned in despair in 1783 - "our public credit is gone"

Newburgh Conspiracy

officers threatened to overthrow civil government over the lack of pay before Washington put a stop to it (before war ended)

Land

easy income source for congress

Led to Northwest Ordinance

Early land policy abused by private companies

The Northwest Ordinance (1787)

• 5,000 free male adults = assembly

• Council and governor appointed by Congress

• 60,000 “free inhabitants” – draft constitution and become a state.

Ohio

First state added through Northwest Ordinance, rest added this way too

Issues with Britain

• Garrisons in the west, fur trade through Canada

• Shut off trade with West Indies and Canada

Issues with Spain

• Alliances with Indian tribes

• Shut off New Orleans

All Bills of Credit

shall be deemed and considered as a charge against the United States

National Debt

was $7.7 m. in 1783, up to $10 m in 1789 with a growing interest of $1.7 m

Early 5% Tariff

rejected by New York and other states, led to an economic depression

Maryland

refused to return loyalists' land

Rhode Island

created a way to force citizens to use paper currency and benefit debtors

Shay's Rebellion

response to land and poll taxes by western Mass. farmers led by army captain Daniel Shays

1779 Constitutional Convention

authorized paper currency. Congress backed up notes with gold or silver to encourage their acceptance. Insignia a wild boar charging into a spear with the Latin motto "either death or an honorable life."

Unanimous Vote

only way to amend the articles

George Washington

gave his support after delegates approached him at Mount Vernon

Hamilton

secured a resolution calling for "further provisions...to render the Federal Government adequate...." (Annapolis)

Congress Agreed to

a convention in February; to meet in Philadelphia in May, 1787.

Indispensable Men

George Washington, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton

Convention of 1787

George Washington presided over the convention, holding it together as he did the army during the War.

James Madison

considered the "Father of the Constitution" for his role in the debates

Alexander Hamilton

orchestrated the convention and was a leading advocate for a strong national government

The Convention

• May 25, 1787

• 55 delegates from 12 states

• Realistic and objective

• Enlightenment philosophy - men can better politics, economics, etc. through reason.

Virginia Proposal

for a two-chamber legislature, the lower house popularly elected

John Dickinson

proposed the Senate consist of state legislature appointees

Key Features of 1787 Convention

• Power to regulate interstate commerce

• Primacy of federal laws

• Checks and Balances – “separation of powers”

  • Montesquieu – Esprit de Lois (“Spirit of the Laws”)

Slavery Compromise

• New England and SC/GA concerned about Virginia’s population of slaves counted.

• Retained 3/5 for “all other persons” clause from Articles.

• Slave trade to end  in 20 years - 1808

• However, Eli Whitney developed the cotton gin on a plantation in Georgia (that had been confiscated from a loyalist governor) in 1793.

Constitution SIgned and Convention Ended

17 September 1787

Article I

Legislative Branch

Article II

Executive Branch

Article III

Judicial Branch

Article IV

States Rights

Article V

How the Constitution is amended

Article VI

Certain debts, treaties, nor religious test

Article VII

Ratification that establishes the Constitution

Ratification of the Constitution

• Federalists and Anti-Federalists

• The Federalist Papers

• Opposition strongest in NY & VA

Bill of Rights

arose out of a concern that the national government would not work to protect individual rights

Madison promised

Bill of Rights could be amended to the Constitution, passed by the first Congress and ratified by the states