Key Features

• The Boston Tea Party

   

  In 1773, a group of merchants calling themselves the Sons of Liberty in Boston boarded ships owned by the British East India Company and threw the cargo of tea into Boston Harbour. Their protest was against the provision of the Tea Act 1773 which gave preferential tax rights to the BEIC. Their slogan was:
• "No Taxation without Representation"
• First Continental Congress (September 1774)
• The Connecticut Compromise

   

  The national legislature of the United States was to be made up of two chambers:

   

  The Lower House (House of Representatives) to be represented proportionally to their population

   

  PLUS

   

  The Upper House (the Senate) to be represented equally, regardless of population
•  

  The Constitution laid out the machinery government and provided for three branches of federal government: 

   

  • the Legislature
  •  the Executive

   the Judiciary. 
• Limited government was a key principle in the US Constitution
• The 13 colonies fought for independence from the perceived tyranny of the British Monarchy and against being taxed without representation by Parliament
• The founding fathers were unwilling to create a federal government with unlimited powers that could challenge the authority of the individual states
• The new government was designed to be only as big as necessary and its power was limited through the 'Separation of powers' and 'checks and balances'
• The 'Separation of powers' and 'checks and balances' were implemented to prevent any one branch from gaining too much power
• The founding fathers were concerned about individual freedoms of citizens being challenged by a powerful government
• Some argued for a Bill of Rights to ensure that the government could not remove the individual rights of the people
• Although, the Bill of Rights at this time did not extend to everyone in America
• Some states signed the constitution with the Bill of Rights being added to ensure a limited government
• Separation of powers

   

  • To achieve limited government, the founding fathers drew influence from the work of the baron de Montesquieu, argued for three entirely separate branches of government.

   

  Therefore us federal government is divided into 

   

  Legislature - congress

  Executive - president 

  Judiciary - Supreme Court 

   

  • -Separation of powers. Forbids any one person from holding office in more than one branch at any time to prevent an individual from gaining too much power. ‘Ineligibility clause’

   
• Checks and balances

  • The Founding Fathers also included checks and balances in the Constitution 
  • James Madison wrote that 'ambition must be made to counteract ambition' meaning that each branch of the federal government should be given the power to oversee the actions of other branches and even, in some cases, prevent the other branches from acting.
  • Checks and balances ensured that each branch of government had the power to oversee the other two 

   
• Federalism

  • They mostly recognised the need for a stronger central government
  • Federalism is a system of shared sovereignty, where the federal government would have authority over some aspects of political life while states would remain sovereign over others
  • This would ensure that the states' rights and individual cultures and beliefs were not ignored. By embedding federalism in the Constitution, not only would it guarantee states' rights, it would also limit both the federal and state governments' reach by dividing political power between them. 

   
• Amendments

  • First 10 are the Bill of Rights.