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2. Why have Americans built a monument at Bunker Hill to commemorate a defeat?

3. Commit to memory the sentence in the Declaration of Independence beginning, "We hold these truths to be self-evident."

4. How were the Tories treated during the Revolution? Was this treatment just? Was it expedient?

5. Show how the War of the Revolution was influenced by the physical geography of America.

6. Who was to blame for the suffering at Valley Forge? Could these hardships have been avoided?

7. Question for debate: Could the Americans have won their independence without the aid of France?

8. Trace upon a map the route of Washington's army during the war. Locate Bennington, Oriskany, Morristown, Chad's Ford, Guilford Court House, Cowpens, Camden.

9. Who was Israel Putnam? Joseph Warren? Colonel Prescott? Colonel Moultrie? "Light Horse Harry" Lee? Silas Deane? Charles

Lee? John André? Count de Grasse?

CHAPTER VIII

THE BEGINNINGS OF OUR GOVERNMENT

Union

A Federal Government.-The United States is a nation composed of states. All of us who were born or naturalized in this country are citizens of the United States. At the same The states time, we are citizens of the state in which we live. In each of and the our states the people have set up a government which makes and enforces laws for the protection of life and property, provides schools, builds roads, and serves the people of that state in many other ways. But we also owe obedience to a United States government established by the people of the whole nation. The national government coins our money, carries the mail, maintains an army and navy, and does many other things to serve all the people. A government like ours, in which a part of the work of governing is done by the several states and a part by the nation as a whole, is called federal. Let us see how a federal government grew up in our country.

became

From Colonies to States.-During the colonial period, as we have already learned, governments somewhat like those in our states at the present time developed in each of the colonies. How the But these colonial governments had been set up in the first colonies place by the authority of England. In most of them the gover- states nor was appointed by the king or by a proprietor to whom the king had given the right to govern. When the Revolution began, these royal and proprietary governors were driven out of office. The people of each colony then took its government into their own hands and elected assemblies or conventions to manage public affairs. This arrangement, however, was only temporary. The people in each state soon felt the need of a permanent written constitution, and all the states, except Rhode Island and Connecticut, made such constitutions soon after the Declaration of Independence was adopted. In Rhode Island and Connecticut the people kept their colonial charters, under which they were practically free to manage their own affairs, and treated them as state constitutions.

What is a

A constitution is the fundamental law which the people of a state or nation draw up and adopt when they form a permanent government. In this document the people provide constitution? for the election or appointment of the officers who are to govern them, state what powers these officers are to have, and establish a way of getting rid of them if they neglect their duties or exercise power which has not been granted to them by the people. In brief, a constitution is a law by which the people establish and control their own government. A written constitution is very important to a free people, because it helps them to know their rights and to prevent any encroachment upon those rights by the men whom they have chosen to be their rulers.

The first

ments

The first state governments were much like the colonial governments which had just been overthrown and, at the same time, they strongly resembled the governments found in our state govern- states at the present time. In each state there was an elected legislature which made the laws. In all of them, except Pennsylvania and Georgia, this lawmaking body was made up of two houses. Each of the new states except Pennsylvania had a governor whose duty it was to enforce the law. In Pennsylvania, until 1790, the power to enforce the law was vested in an executive council of twelve members. Then, as now, there were judges in each state who interpreted the laws and applied them in cases which were brought before the courts.

Growing

more

democratic

Union

But the state governments which were set up during the Revolution were far less democratic than the governments of our states at present. Now the governors of all our states are elected by a direct vote of the people. Then the governors of some of the states were chosen by the state legislature. In our time the judges in most of the states are elected by popular vote. In those days all judges were appointed by the governors or by the legislatures. Now all citizens, both men and women, have the right to vote. Then the suffrage was generally limited to property owners or tax payers. Our country has been growing more democratic ever since it gained its independence.

Our First National Government. Our ways of living are very different from those of our Revolutionary ancestors. We but difficult read the news of the whole world in our daily papers and can

necessary

travel quickly to any part of the United States. Before the Revolution, people heard little news except that of their own neighborhoods, and few men ever traveled outside the colony in which they were born. Under such conditions it was very difficult to get the people of all the colonies to act together. Yet some of the wisest Revolutionary leaders had long seen that the colonists must unite if they were to succeed in maintaining their rights against the aggressions of the British government. "We must all hang together or we shall all hang separately," said Benjamin Franklin as he signed the Declaration of Independence.

union

The Albany Congress of 1754, the Stamp Act Congress of 1765, and the First Continental Congress of 1774 were all held because the dangers which threatened the colonists were slowly Early forcing them to realize the necessity of union. Yet the Plan attempts at of Union proposed at Albany in 1754 was rejected by the colonies, and the congresses of 1765 and 1774 did little, except to draw up petitions and pass resolutions. Although they were very important in bringing the leaders of the people together and in preparing the way for united action, these congresses were not real governments in any sense.

It was very different with the second Continental Congress, which met in Philadelphia on May 10, 1775. This Congress became at once the government of the United Colonies. As we The second have already seen, it appointed Washington to command the Continental Congress army and named other generals to serve under him. It borrowed money, adopted the Declaration of Independence, sent agents to foreign countries, and did many other things which only a government can do. In a word, that Continental Congress was our first national government. It continued to manage our national affairs from 1775 to 1781.

the Conti

As we had no written constitution during these years, the Continental Congress governed by common consent. It had all the power the people were willing to recognize and obey. Our governDuring the first year or two of the Revolution the people ment under looked up to the Continental Congress, and its authority was nental Convery great. The most influential men in the various states were gress sent to it. But after the new state governments were formed, the people more and more gave them the respect and obedience which at first they had shown the Continental Congress.

Origin

Some of the leading men now left the Congress to accept office in their own states. The states were well known and near at hand. The Congress was new and distant. The people began to distrust it, and the state governments grew jealous of its authority. Under these conditions its power steadily dwindled away. The Articles of Confederation. The members of the Continental Congress early saw the need of a written constitution which should tell them just how much power they really possessed. The same day that they appointed a committee to draw up the Declaration of Independence, they named another to draft a form of government. John Dickinson of Pennsylvania was the chairman of this committee, and the plan of government which it reported was, in the main, his work. A few days after the Declaration of Independence was adopted Dickinson laid the Articles of Confederation before the Congress. When they were adopted by that body and approved by all the states, these articles were to become the first written constitution of the United States.

It was no easy task to get the proposed plan of government adopted. The smaller states feared the growing power of The struggle the larger. New England and the southern section were

over their

adoption

jealous of each other. After discussing the Articles of Confederation, at intervals, for more than a year, the Continental Congress at last adopted them in November, 1777. It took more than three years longer to get all the states to ratify them. The chief reason for this delay grew out of a dispute about the ownership of the land between the Alleghany Mountains and the Mississippi River. Some of the states claimed this land by the terms of their colonial charters, and because of their efforts to settle it. But the states which had no such claims said that the western land was being won from the British and the Indians by the blood and the treasure of the people of all the states, and that it ought to be used for the benefit of all the people. Maryland refused to ratify the Articles of Confederation until it was understood that the states claiming western land would give it up to the United States. At last this assurance was given, and in March, 1781, the Articles of Confederation became the law of the land. The United States was governed under these articles from 1781 to 1789.

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