What Are The Articles Of Confederation Dbq

The Articles of Confederation were the first written constitution of the U.S. It served as the written document that established the functions of the national government of the U.S. after it declared independence from Great Britain. It was written in 1787 and ratified on March 1st,
1781. Ratification was delayed by disputes between the states with extensive western lands and the "landless" states such as Maryland. The Articles of Confederation were needed to make the state's sovereign and independent. People wanted the states to have more power than the government. Important terms that were in the Articles of Confederation were confederacy,
Confederation Congress, conservatives, impost, radicals, ratify, sovereignty and the second
Continental
Ratify - to formally approve and accept a legal document, such as a constitution. Sovereignty - an independent state has the power to govern its own affairs. The Second Continental Congress - met for the first time in Philadelphia in May of
1775, and continued to meet until the full ratification of the Articles of Confederation.
There were seven important events that were held around the time of the Articles of
Confederation. The Annapolis Convention was held on September 1786 by Virginia. This meeting of the states aimed to improve the uniformity of commerce. Jay-Gardoqui talks were when John Jay attempted to negotiate for American access to trade along the Mississippi River.
The Maryland ratifies the Articles made it so they could not go into effect until Maryland's ratification. The Mount Vernon Conference was a meeting between Maryland and Virginia statesmen at George Washington's Mount Vernon Plantation. The Land Ordinance of 1784 was proposed by Thomas Jefferson just a month after Virginia officially handed over western lands to congress. The Northwest Ordinance was a revision of the earlier Land Ordinance of 1784.