Under the Articles of Confederation, the United States government had very little money because it did not have to power to collect these.
What are taxes?
The original purpose of the Constitutional Convention was to revise this.
What is the Articles of Confederation?
This branch of government makes the laws.
What is the legislative branch (or Congress)?
The first three words of the Constitution, "we the people," refer to this idea.
What is popular sovereignty?
What is the First Amendment?
The states near the Great Lakes (Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin) were created because of this ordinance.
What is the Northwest Ordinance of 1787?
This state presented a plan of the same name that would have had all states represented equally in Congress.
What is New Jersey?
The population of each state determines representation in this branch of Congress.
What is the House of Representatives?
When power is shared between national and state governments, it is known as this.
What is federalism?
Several states would not ratify the Constitution unless this was added to the Constitution.
What is the Bill of Rights?
The founders deliberately made the Articles of Confederation this because they feared a strong central government.
What is weak?
This state presented a plan of the same name that would have had states represented proportionally according to their population.
What is Virginia?
This group elects the president of the United States.
What is the Electoral College?
If business partners want to part ways, but argue over what parts of the business belong to whom, the case would be tried in this legal system.
What is a civil court?
What is the Bill of Rights?
The Constitutional Convention was called in response to this event.
What is Shays' Rebellion?
This compromise created a two-house Congress. One would represent all states equally (the Senate) and the other would represent states proportionally, based on population (the House of Representatives).
What is the Great Compromise?
Members of this branch of the government are the only government officials directly elected by United States citizens.
What is Congress (or the legislative branch or legislature)?
A system of government in which the citizens elect representatives who lead the country is called this.
What is a republic?
Amendments four through seven all deal with these two legal systems.
What are criminal and civil?
This future president did not think Shays' Rebellion was a serious problem and was afraid the Constitutional Convention would overreact to it.
Who is Thomas Jefferson?
The Virginia and New Jersey plans both include this.
What is a government divided into three branches?
Article II of the Constitution creates this branch of government.
What is the office of the president?
The US Constitution creates three branches of government with different powers that do not overlap which is an example of this idea.
What is separation of powers?
The Tenth Amendment reserves all powers not given to the federal government to these.
What are the states or the people.