History The American Civil War Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

History The American Civil War - Essay Example The Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation on 15th Nov, 1777. At that point of time Congress was the sole federal governmental institution in the United States of America and final draft of the Articles empowered the Congress with various political capacities, including negotiation of diplomatic treaties, capacity of declaring war and power to solve various issues related to the Western Territories. However, the Articles of Confederation was not full proof and it just provided the Congress with highest level of legislative powers, but without any authority to execute them. The Federalists, or a group of reformers, who emerged from the American Revolutionary War, in this context, opined that the Articles were not perfect to form a powerful central state and lacked some of the most important provisions for complete governance. The biggest criticism against the Articles of Confederation was that, it did not give taxing authority to the government, rather in times of national emergency the government had to request for funds from the States. The Articles also failed to authorize government with the powers of uniform tariff imposition, granting lands and undertake the burden of unpaid debts. Another major criticism against these articles was that they did not have the balancing capacity between large and small states, when it came to legislative decision making process. Criticism of the Federalists soon proved to be true. The Treaty of Paris was signed in the year 1783 and United States gained its independence finally but the governmental structure of the newly formed nation was completely unsettled. Soon, in the aftermath period of signing the Treaty of Paris, the Revolution took place and it was followed by the collapse of continental dollar all over U.S, leading to the great economic depression. At the same time, due to its unsettled governmental structure, feasibility of the American Government was