Articles of Confederation
Click here to view links to the Articles of Confederation.
The Articles of Confederation were imposed in the years after the American Revolution and before the U.S. Constitution was adopted. One of the major flaws (?) was that the federal government created by the Articles could not collect taxes from the states. After the Revolutionary War, the U.S. owed money to France, but the states didn’t want to pay, and the government couldn’t force them. Also, because there was so much freedom for the states, they inflated their economies, and basically created chaos across the U.S. I tend to think that if they had been left alone, eventually the states would have become responsible, and then we wouldn’t have a massive federal government…but that’s just my opinion.
