when drafting the constitution, why did the federalists advocate a singular president over a plural presidency
90001
seperation of powers.  they tried to make a balence between the presidency and congress to guarantee that the president wouln't become a king and the people could get him out if he tried\n  or think of congress as the other president, nothing will get done without both powers
333360
In the summer of 1787, delegates from 13 new American states, recently British colonies, met in Philadelphia to write a constitution for a unified nation. By September, they had produced a document that then began to circulate among the state legislatures for ratification. The new constitution provided a blueprint for how the national government would function, but it did not contain a section specifically outlining the rights of individual citizens. A public debate quickly arose. Advocates of the draft constitution argued that guarantees of individual rights were not needed. Others, however, aware of the explicit rights guaranteed in earlier documents such as the British Bill of Rights (1689) and the Virginia Declaration of Rights in 1776, believed that some specific provision stating the rights of individuals was necessary.\n\nAt the height of the debate, in December 1787, Thomas Jefferson, then serving as ambassador to France, wrote a letter to his friend James Madison, one of the chief authors of the new constitution. "A bill of rights," Jefferson wrote, "is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular, and what no just government should refuse, or rest on inference."\n\nJefferson's position gained advocates, and a compromise was reached. State legislatures agreed to ratify the draft document with the understanding that the first national legislature meeting under the new constitution would pass amendments guaranteeing individual liberties. That is precisely what occurred. By 1791, these 10 amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, had become part of the supreme law of the land.\n\nMuch about this controversy at the very beginning of the American experiment in democracy prefigures later developments in U.S. politics and constitutional law. Intense views on both sides were moderated by a complicated, yet highly pragmatic compromise. Also significant is that Jefferson saw explicit limits on government power as a necessity. In fact, the Bill of Rights can be read as the definitive statement of that most American of values: the idea that the individual is prior to and takes precedence over any government.\n\nAs the title "The Rights of the People: Individual Freedom and the Bill of Rights" suggests, this book is our effort to explain how the core concepts of individual liberty and individual rights have evolved under the U.S. legal system down the present day.\n\nIt is intended for a great variety of readers. One obvious use is in secondary school or university classrooms. To that end, we are creating an on-line Discussion Guide with accompanying questions and background references. Please look for it on the World Wide Web at: http://usinfo.state.gov/products/pubs/\n\nA non-American reader may well ask, "But what does all this have to do with me? In my country we have a different legal tradition and there is no bill of rights."\n\nIt is true that the U.S. Bill of Rights is the historical product of a particular time and place. It arose out a long British tradition of enumerated rights within the British legal system that governed the American colonies. Some would say it has unique application to the circumstances of the United States.\n\nYet many others believe that the American Bill of Rights has transcended its historical roots. The concept of individual rights can be seen as one of the building blocks in any civil society. And in many times and many places, the Bill of Rights has served as beacon to those living under tyrants.\n\nConsider the post-1989 revolutions that ended Communist control of Eastern Europe. Looking back on these events, Adam Michnik, the Polish journalist and Solidarity leader, posed the question of which revolution has been a greater inspiration for modern Europeans — the French Revolution or the American Revolution. His answer is unequivocal.\n\n"The American Revolution," says Michnik, "appears to e
436567
IMHO, the spirit of compromise imbedded in the document, and reinforced with checks and balances.  I.e., it exists at all because both ends of the political spectrum knew they couldn't get everything they wanted, so they compromised: everyone got something, and then built into the document the processes and mechanisms to ensure that future generations would be forced to compromise as well.  (Interesting that the one civil war we've had in the US was due to the founders' one failed compromise: the existence and spread of slavery.  They put it off 'til later, and so we had to fight it out.)  A bicameral legislature--each chosen differently--so legislation has to be worked out between them; an executive with some power over legislation but also subject to it; a court which has to be appointed by the executive and ratified by the legislature but then can overrule both; a system for amending the document that's doable but not easy; frequent, staggered elections to change the makeup of the executive & legislature...and so on.\n\nAlso IMHO, that's the danger with the current use of war powers to expand the executive: when the President, in the name of security and for the sake of expediency, argues that special circumstances entitle him to act without Congress, and not have to get court warrants for certain activities, he essentially subverts the mechanisms of the Constitution that have made it survive.  Compromise is no longer necessary; power and its exercise falls into fewer (and unchecked) hands; and the Constitution is potentially not so much repealed as simply ignored.
20748
Washington was the better president simply because he was the first. He had no example of how he should act or conduct business. While Lincon had to deal with a split country, Washington had to run a absolutly new country that could of fallen apart at any second.
792430
The Articles of Confederation didn't create a functioning nation, so the Constitution created a federal system with a unified currency, post, foreign policy etc., while letting the states decide less national matters.
90379
Because the writers of the state constitution decided to call it the Court of Appeals instead. There's not really much of a difference. The Federal Supreme Court is a court of appeals.
202691
It doesn't. The Federalist Papers, published in 1788 arguing for the ratification of the Constitution, serve as a primary source for interpretation of the Constitution, as they outline the philosophy and motivation of the proposed system of government. \n\nThe articles were written by James Madison (4th President), Alexander Hamilton (the first Secretary of the Treasury), and John Jay (the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court).
542121
Why?  Quite simply because the constitution was written that way.  One other attribute of the constitution was that changing it is very hard to do.  Changing the constitution to require term limits for US Senators or House Members would require them to support it; and that isn't going to happen now or probably ever.
1138723
Abraham Lincoln was the first "Republican" President, elected in 1860.  It is simplistic to think that one side was Democrat and the other was Republican.  Just like today, there are Democrats and Republicans in all States.  The correct way to look at this would be in terms of political ideology rather than parties.  That is "Federalists"; those that believed in a strong national government and "Anti-federalists"; those that believed in strong states rights and a weak national government.  The "North" was "Federalist" and the "South" was "Anti-federalist"\n** Note:Prior to the 1860 election, the two major parties were the Whigs and the Democrart-Rebublicans (Democrats for short) originally founded by Thomas Jefferson.
456545
1     When writing the constitution, the delegates to the Constitutional Convention ran into a problem. The states were in fierce disagreement over how to establish the Congress. The smaller states wanted equal division of representatives. The larger states wanted representatives based on population. In coming to a compromise – called The Great Compromise – the delegates divided the Congress into two houses, the Senate, and the House of Representatives.\n \n2     The Senate gives the small states an equal voice in the government. Each state has two Senators who serve six-year terms. In order to serve in the Senate, a person must be thirty years old, have been a U.S. citizen for nine years, and be a resident of the state where elected. The Senate is the more distinguished house in Congress. Members are older and usually have more experience in government. Of the one-hundred members, one-third of the Senate comes up for election every two years. The rotating elections help to maintain the stability of this house of Congress.\n \n3     The Senate has many important jobs of its own. In addition to working on bills, the Senate is responsible for approving many of the decisions of the president. Treaties and appointments of judges, department heads, ambassadors, and agency leaders receive final approval in the Senate. Treaties are given special consideration and must be approved by a two-thirds vote to become law.\n \n4     The leader of the Senate is the vice-president. As leader, the vice-president decides who will speak to the Senate and casts a deciding vote when a tie occurs. However, the vice-president is not a member of the Senate and does not participate in debates about bills.\n \n5     When the Senate discusses a bill, they do not have a strict set of rules to follow. Standard procedures allow debating and amending a bill to continue indefinitely. However, an agreement called "unanimous consent" can change the standard procedures followed. Under "unanimous consent," all of the Senators must agree to modify the procedures. If one individual Senator disagrees, that Senator has the power to stop the modification. When this happens, a bill becomes the victim of a filibuster. In a filibuster, the Senator in disagreement talks on and on about the bill to delay the final vote. In order to end this, sixty Senators must call for cloture, which sets a time limit for debate.\n \n6     The House of Representatives is called the lower house of Congress. There are four-hundred and thirty five members in the House. Every two years the entire House of Representatives is up for election. Representatives must be careful to be the voice of the people for their state. The shorter term gives the people the opportunity to choose someone else when a representative does not follow their wishes. To serve as a representative, a person must be twenty-five years old, a U.S. citizen for seven years, and a resident of the state where elected.\n \n7     Population determines the number of representatives allotted to a state. In order to determine allotment, the federal government takes a census every ten years. State leaders form districts in each state based on the census results. Each district gets one representative. Every state receives at least one representative no matter how small their population may be.\n \n8     In addition to working on laws with the Senate, the House of Representatives has other responsibilities. In a presidential election where a candidate does not receive a majority of the electoral votes, the House of Representatives meets to choose the next President.\n \n9     In addition, a bill concerning taxes must start in the House.
283095
The constitution was intended to restrict the actions of the federal goernment.  Any powers not given to the federal government nor denied to the states shall be invested in the states or in the people.\n\nThe constitution limits federal power to needs of the nation as a whole.  Laws which directly affect the lives of individuals are supposed to be left to the states.  That would include abortion.
285989
The Constitution gave the federal goverment more power.  Go to this site for a comparison:\n\nhttp://home.earthlink.net/~gfeldmeth/chart.art.html
39135
It was also the second consitution.  The first, called the Articles of Confederation, existed for the first decade of the republic and left out many Congressional powers such as the power to coin money, and was thus replaced.  The more federalized Constitution has been the governing document ever since.
489805
Certainly within the Founders True Intent of the Constitution, States rights were recognized.  With the Union federal government winning of the civil war and the application of the 1868 14th Amendment (justified in Texas v. White [1869] since it never met Constitutional ratification requirements), States came under the power of the federal government and States rights began to diminish.  \n\nThrough the years the federal government has increasingly intruded into what the Founders would have considered as the Constitutional territory of the States.  One of the primary roles of the States (prior to the Civil war) was to protect the rights of its citizens relative to actions of the federal government through an action termed State Nullification.  In this function a single State legislature could decide that federal action was not Constitutional and nullify it in that single State.  \n\nTo get this back where it once was, a Constitutional Amendment would have to be ratified noting the Sovereign role of the States and their power to nullify federal action.
155955
Federalist No. 10 was basically about how a Republic (the kind of country and government we now have) can work to govern and manage a really large, really diverse country with lots of different types of people and groups (what the authors call "factions" in the paper itself). The idea was that the republic-style checks and balances and the lawmaking process in the Constitution gave minority groups a way to express their differences and be heard, and it forced negotiated settlements between majority positions and minority positions (these are political positions, by the way, not minorities like African-American, Native American, etc.).\n\nIn fact, the brilliant part of how the Founding Fathers did this was that exactly BECAUSE there were all these minority viewpoints and widely varying types of people represented in the republic, it would PREVENT a majority from exercising tyranny over those who disagreed but were smaller.\n\nThe Federalist Papers were published at a time when our population was arguing about the Constitution (remember, we were a very young country). The Federalists were the pro-Constitution people, and they were trying to win popular support for the Constitution among the people.\n\nOne of the main arguments against the Constitution was that the U.S. was such a big place, with so many different kinds of people (and religions, and backgrounds, etc.), that a Republic couldn't work. That's why out of all 85 Federalist papers, Federalist No. 10 is considered one of the most important. It argued that a constitutional republic was the right way to form our country...and for the past 230 years, it's basically worked!\n\nThere's a pretty good answer in Wikipedia, too.
1140029
I chose number 1 because it illustrates federalism - power is divided between federal and state government. \n\nFurther explanation: Federal government has specific powers, and state governments have their own powers.\n\n#2 is an example of separation of powers.\n#3 is an example of powers delegated only for the House of Representatives.
487823
At the Constitutional Convention 1789 each State considered itself a separate soverign country and the Constitution was essentially, the States giving up some of their inherent rights to a central government.  Think of the formation of the European Union. \nTransportation was by horse and wagon.  People did not know of anyone not within their local area.  Most delegates were afraid that voters just would not know enough about the canidates to make an educated choice.  Delegates did think that voters would know their local personages and could make a choice among those persons.\nDelegates from small states were afraid that their interests would be ignored if a candidate could be elected just with the votes from Virginia and Massacusuts (the two most populated states).\nFrom all of this, and a few other more minor factors, a compromise was reached:\n    So that voters would be able to intelligently exercise their choice, they would vote for state delegates (electors) who would then use their better knowlege of the candidates to vote for the person the delegates thought the persons who voted for them would choose if they knew the candidates.  For example, I'm in Goose Fork and I've never been outside of Goose Fork.  I know Dr. Smith and Rev. White.  I vote for Dr. Smith as a elector.  Dr. Smith goes to the state capital talks with the other electors and decides that the people who voted for him would prefer John Adams to Aaron Burr.\nTo minimize the advantage candidates from larger states might have, the Convention gave each state electors equal to the number of Senators and Representitives the state had.  Each state gets two Senators and Representatives are allocated by population, thereby giving votes in smaller states greater weight.\n\nExcuse the spelling but the spell check is on the fritz.