June 7, 1776, second continental congress votes to draw up a charter to make the colonies a confederation

• a close alliance of sovereign states

Following a year of debate and revision, John Dickinson and his committee published the Articles of Confederation - AoC - by 1781 all 13 states had approved the Articles and they went into effect

Dickinson proposed strong central government but the other states shot the idea down

In effect the central government was only as strong as the states allowed, and that was not very strong

Legislature was the only component of Confederation - each legislature could elect 2-7 reps but only had one vote regardless

declaring war, approving treaties, and coining money had to be approved by 9 states

amending and ratifying had to be a unanimous vote

CoC (congress of confederation) was unicameral (one house)

Chief Exec. was chosen by legislature and was completely under its control

Superintendent of Finance, Sec of War, and Sec of F.A. handled administrative duties

Congress was unable to levy taxes and therefore had to get loans from other countries

Treaty of Paris allowed America to :

1. restore seized property of Loyalists

2. allowed British subjects access to courts to recover debts

AoC publication had been delayed until 1781 because Maryland refused to ratify them until the matter of the Western Lands had been settled

• other states gave their claims of land to the federal government after Virginia and New York did to get the AoC ratified, which ended up happening

North of the Ohio River passed into the national gov’t and became known as the Northwest Territory

Ordinance of 1784 - written by Tommy J : proposed that the territory create 10 new states that would be equal to other states in the Union, banning slavery in the region, giving land to settlers instead of selling it - did not pass

Land Ordinance of 1785 - proposed dividing lands into orderly townships for sale and development, each township contained 36 lots of 1 square mile (640 acres), each lot would be sold for a dollar an acre, proceeds would go to schools - did not go into effect

Northwest Ordinance of 1787 - concerned gov’t, Northwest Territory would be split into 3-5 states, each region would be completely under control of federal gov’t, when a region had at least 5,000 free inhabitants it became a territory and could elect people for legislature and send a rep to congress, once it had 60,000 free inhabitants, it could draw up a state constitution and be admitted into the Union on an equal basis with other states - did go into effect

National government was almost always in debt

Hard money was scarce

Paper money value dropped very low

Britain, France, and Spain decided to undercut the US in foreign affairs

Newburgh Conspiracy - officers intended to force congress to grant them back pay, some wanted to establish a new gov’t with a king or dictator - Washington being their first choice

• Washington went to the meeting, uninvited, the party crasher, and persuaded the men to drop the uprising

Daniel Shays led an insurrection 1786 led an insurrection of Farmers who couldn’t pay the inflated price they paid for their land. The rebellion was squashed when militia forces came in to stop the uprising