The Articles of Confederation

Summary

The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union were the first written frame of government for the United States. Richard Henry Lee's resolution of June 1776 asked Congress to prepare independence, foreign alliances and a plan of confederation together, and a committee chaired by John Dickinson produced a draft that summer. Wartime business, and sharp disputes over representation, the apportionment of expenses and western lands, delayed adoption until 15 November 1777, when Congress, driven from Philadelphia by the British, approved the text at York, Pennsylvania. Ratification required every state. Twelve had agreed by early 1779, but Maryland refused until states with claims to lands beyond the Appalachians, especially Virginia, agreed to cede them to the Union. Maryland's delegates signed on 1 March 1781, and the Articles took effect. The document has thirteen articles. Article I names the confederacy The United States of America. Article II states that each state keeps its sovereignty, freedom and independence, and every power not expressly delegated to the United States in Congress assembled. Article III describes the union as a firm league of friendship for common defense, the security of liberties and mutual welfare. Article IV guarantees the free inhabitants of each state the standing of citizens in the others, provides for returning fugitives from justice, and requires full faith and credit for other states' court records. Article V sets out Congress: two to seven delegates per state, appointed yearly and recallable, limited to three years in six, with each state casting one vote. Article VI forbids states to make treaties, keep standing forces in peacetime, or wage war without the consent of Congress, though each must keep a militia. Articles VII and VIII leave the appointment of regimental officers to the states and divide common expenses according to the value of each state's surveyed land, with the taxes raised by the state legislatures. Article IX, the longest, gives Congress power over war and peace, treaties, ambassadors, Indian affairs, coinage, post offices and the army and navy, and an elaborate procedure for settling disputes between states; the most important measures need the assent of nine states. Article X creates a Committee of the States to act during recesses, Article XI offers Canada admission, Article XII pledges the Union to pay earlier war debts, and Article XIII declares the Union perpetual and forbids any alteration not confirmed by every state legislature. A closing paragraph thanks the Great Governor of the World and records the delegates' ratification at Philadelphia on 9 July 1778. Under the Articles Congress won the war, made the Treaty of Paris of 1783 and passed the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. It had no separate executive or national courts, could only request money from the states, and could not regulate trade, and amendment proved impossible. After the Annapolis Convention of 1786 and Shays' Rebellion in Massachusetts, the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 proposed a new Constitution, which replaced the Articles in 1789. The library text, from the Avalon Project, omits the list of signers.

Top Lessons

• A league of sovereign states

  Article II keeps each state's sovereignty and every power not expressly delegated, and Article III calls the union a league of friendship. The Articles describe something between an alliance and a nation, and that choice shaped every other provision.

• Equal votes for unequal states

  Article V gives each state one vote in Congress regardless of population, and Article IX requires nine states for the most serious decisions. Small and large states argued over this rule, and the argument returned at the Constitutional Convention of 1787.

• Power to ask but not to compel

  Article VIII lets Congress set each state's share of common expenses but leaves the actual taxing to the state legislatures. When states failed to pay, Congress had no means to collect, one of the weaknesses that led to the call for a new Constitution.

• The difficulty of change

  Article XIII made the Union perpetual and required every state legislature to confirm any amendment. Proposals to give Congress a modest import duty failed because a single state could refuse, and the framers of 1787 instead wrote a new plan with its own ratification rule.

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Medical Lens

The Articles are a frame of government with no medical content; their provisions concern sovereignty, war, finance, diplomacy and disputes between states.