Articles of Confederation: A Train Wreck

The Article of Confederation, for the purposes of running and maintaining a successful government, are completely flawed in three main areas. Firstly, the articles don't mandate that there is a single currency for the United States. By not creating a unified currency, the individual states had free reign to create and use their own currency, on top of the federal currency that was being minted at the same time. This is the first of two major problems because it does not allow for easy trade with the West Indies and Europe, the two places the United States needed to trade in order to survive as a country.

Secondly, the congress had no way to write tax law or enforce any taxes. By not allowing for any taxes to be levied, the congress was disabled in providing public services such as education among other things. It also meant that congress had no way to purchase land or items, or provide the money expeditions. Imagine, the U.S. not having the monetary means to sponsor the Lewis and Clark expedition. However, and more importantly, it disabled the congress in funding any sort of military.

Finally, the Articles of Confederation banned the congress from creating an army. This essentially made the U.S. very vulnerable. This is because if one state is to be attacked, there is no motivation for another state to send its own militia to defend it. This leaves the entire U.S. open to attack, as a super power such as Great Britain (who had motivation at the time), could simply start attacking states individually and start taking them out one by one. It also prevents any westward expansion, because without a good army to both explore and defend the settlers, there a lesser motive to expand. Imagine again, attempting to try and find a Lewis and Clark (both of whom had military experience in real life) without a military institution already in place.

In conclusion, the Articles of Confederation were simply a hindrance to the early United States, and provided near nothing in terms of organization. They just merely showed where the U.S. needed to improve upon their constitution.