Could the U.S. have ended up keeping the Articles of Confederation?

Grimbald

Monthly Donor
Almost impossible

The AoC allowed any one state to veto almost anything. If it was kept you would see dis-union pretty quickly resulting in at least three new confederations. Eventual reunion might be possible but as the north-south differences grew that would become increasingly unlikely.
 

B-29_Bomber

Banned
The AoC allowed any one state to veto almost anything. If it was kept you would see dis-union pretty quickly resulting in at least three new confederations. Eventual reunion might be possible but as the north-south differences grew that would become increasingly unlikely.

Why get rid of something that ain't don't no harm to any particular state?

All the states would have to do is send some statesmen up to Philadelphia to hem and haw about irrelevant things, while you have a convenient defensive pact incase you're invaded.
 
Plans and changes...

The Constitutional Convention was supposed to be a convention to fix the articles. I suppose that some major fixes (close to throwing out the old ind bringing in something all new, but under the fiction of a revision) might have happened. Then it would be, legally, still under the revised articles
 
The Constitutional Convention was supposed to be a convention to fix the articles. I suppose that some major fixes (close to throwing out the old ind bringing in something all new, but under the fiction of a revision) might have happened. Then it would be, legally, still under the revised articles

No, because ANY changes required unanimity, and some state (I'm looking at you Rhode Island) is going vote against any significant change.

Some minor tweaks might be possible, but not anything that would allow the union to function long term.

So, unless the US goes to war with, say France over the equivalent of the XYZ affair, and the necessity for a real union is FORCED on them, I don't see the AoC being amended enough to matter.
 
The Articles of Confederation were essentially dysfunctional at best and nonworkable at best. There were way too many differences between states, not just slave vs free for a single veto to stop anything. Furthermore the powers of the federal government were bot too limited and too unlimited. Things like tax policy were too limited, yet no bill of rights. The AoC were replaced because the politicians/statesmen of the time realized they were unworkable.
 
See https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/RQglKDaK4s0/LJH41-_Rof0J for John Kaminski's argument that Congress could have reached agreement with New York on the impost. I quote Calvin H. Johnson:

"Professor Kaminski argues that Congress should have accepted New York's
counter offer or continued conciliatory negotiations, as, for instance,
James Monroe recommended. 144 'Had Congress followed this advice,'
Kaminski says, 'its financial needs would have been met and no federal
convention would have been called to meet in Philadelphia in the Spring of
1787.'145 With the impost and sale of western land, the federal government
could have made the minimal payments on the war debts until imports grew
important enough to carry the debt comfortably. Kaminski believes that
confederation form of government would have been better for 1787 America
than was the strong national government the Constitution ordained. He
believes that Congress would have evolved into a Parliamentary form of
government with John Jay, as prime minister.146 The Founders would have
avoided an imperial President, modeled on the King."
 
See https://groups.google.com/d/msg/soc.history.what-if/RQglKDaK4s0/LJH41-_Rof0J for John Kaminski's argument that Congress could have reached agreement with New York on the impost. I quote Calvin H. Johnson:

"Professor Kaminski argues that Congress should have accepted New York's
counter offer or continued conciliatory negotiations, as, for instance,
James Monroe recommended. 144 'Had Congress followed this advice,'
Kaminski says, 'its financial needs would have been met and no federal
convention would have been called to meet in Philadelphia in the Spring of
1787.'145 With the impost and sale of western land, the federal government
could have made the minimal payments on the war debts until imports grew
important enough to carry the debt comfortably. Kaminski believes that
confederation form of government would have been better for 1787 America
than was the strong national government the Constitution ordained. He
believes that Congress would have evolved into a Parliamentary form of
government with John Jay, as prime minister.146 The Founders would have
avoided an imperial President, modeled on the King."

Part of a parliamentary system is that essentially, the members are fungible. Whether the constituency is West Ham or Duny on the Wold, or wherever, the member is the member. It's a stew; the cream rises, the whips keep track of who's put what sex organ in which prostitute/boy/pig to keep the riff-raff in line, and the system runs. You need a unitary government for that, not a system where the rep from New York will be the big fish, regardless of anything else.

Now, I know the prospect of the the Articles of Confederation is occasionally, ahem, "broached" here. But the, ah, probability, of this producing anything more than a dysfunctional North German Confederation are low; the reasons behind Philadelphia and the Annapolis convention especially means that enough people want a body strong enough to keep commerce flowing. Without an arbiter and authority, it's very hard to have a functioning economy. Philadelphia provided what the Articles never could.
 
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