WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:04.480 You know, we are so incredibly obsessed with 00:00:04.480 --> 00:00:06.540 success stories, aren't we? Like, we study the 00:00:06.540 --> 00:00:09.619 winning companies, the triumphant leaders, the 00:00:09.619 --> 00:00:11.859 systems that just flawlessly execute whatever 00:00:11.859 --> 00:00:13.500 they're programmed to do. Right, the highlight 00:00:13.500 --> 00:00:16.260 reels. Exactly. But I mean, think about the device 00:00:16.260 --> 00:00:18.500 you're listening to this on right now. You don't 00:00:18.500 --> 00:00:20.800 actually learn how its operating system works 00:00:20.800 --> 00:00:22.960 when everything is running smoothly. Oh definitely 00:00:22.960 --> 00:00:26.059 You learn exactly how it works when it's spectacularly 00:00:26.059 --> 00:00:29.600 Systemically crashes. Yeah, the the blue screen 00:00:29.600 --> 00:00:32.700 of death is arguably the greatest teacher of 00:00:32.700 --> 00:00:34.539 architecture We have I mean whether that's in 00:00:34.539 --> 00:00:36.759 computing or you know in nation building nation 00:00:36.759 --> 00:00:39.740 building, right? And today we are going to look 00:00:39.740 --> 00:00:42.560 at the ultimate blue screen of death in American 00:00:42.560 --> 00:00:46.000 history we're taking a deep dive into the rough 00:00:46.000 --> 00:00:48.899 draft of the United States. The very rough draft. 00:00:49.240 --> 00:00:52.219 So rough. Today, we're pulling our insights from 00:00:52.219 --> 00:00:55.899 a massive source stack, specifically the Comprehensive 00:00:55.899 --> 00:00:59.159 Wikipedia Archive on the Articles of Confederation. 00:00:59.759 --> 00:01:01.759 Welcome to the deep dive. We are thrilled you're 00:01:01.759 --> 00:01:03.920 here with us. Glad to have you. Because today, 00:01:04.280 --> 00:01:09.000 we are exploring a spectacular failure. Understanding 00:01:09.000 --> 00:01:12.019 why the US's first operating system crashed is 00:01:12.019 --> 00:01:14.239 going to teach you everything about why systems, 00:01:14.620 --> 00:01:16.840 whether that's in government, business, or just 00:01:16.840 --> 00:01:19.879 like your own life, why they need this incredibly 00:01:19.879 --> 00:01:23.079 delicate balance between centralized structure 00:01:23.079 --> 00:01:25.799 and individual freedom. Yeah, it really is a 00:01:25.799 --> 00:01:29.400 masterclass in the unintended consequences of 00:01:29.400 --> 00:01:32.140 trying to design a perfect system. Because you 00:01:32.140 --> 00:01:33.900 have to remember that people designing this were 00:01:33.900 --> 00:01:36.180 incompetent. They were, I mean, some of the most 00:01:36.180 --> 00:01:39.140 brilliant political minds of their century, but 00:01:39.140 --> 00:01:42.040 they were designing a system while actively running 00:01:42.040 --> 00:01:44.400 away from a trauma. The trauma of a tyrannical 00:01:44.400 --> 00:01:46.719 king. Exactly, a very recent trauma. OK, let's 00:01:46.719 --> 00:01:49.219 unpack this. Yeah. Because before a system can 00:01:49.219 --> 00:01:52.459 fail, it obviously has to be built. But why was 00:01:52.459 --> 00:01:53.840 it built in the first place? You might think, 00:01:53.900 --> 00:01:55.579 oh, they just needed some rules for the colonists. 00:01:55.819 --> 00:01:58.459 Sure, just a basic rule book. Right. But looking 00:01:58.459 --> 00:02:00.659 through our sources, this wasn't just a domestic 00:02:00.659 --> 00:02:02.500 rule book. It was basically an international 00:02:02.500 --> 00:02:04.980 PR campaign. It was the ultimate startup pitch 00:02:04.980 --> 00:02:07.180 deck. I love that analogy. If we connect this 00:02:07.180 --> 00:02:10.139 to the bigger picture, the American colonies 00:02:10.139 --> 00:02:14.379 in 1776 were outlaws. I mean, they were committing 00:02:14.379 --> 00:02:16.979 treason against the most powerful empire on the 00:02:16.979 --> 00:02:19.960 planet. And they knew with absolute certainty 00:02:19.960 --> 00:02:22.439 they could not win that war alone. They needed 00:02:22.439 --> 00:02:24.840 foreign intervention. They needed angel investors. 00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:28.500 They needed France and Spain to give them money, 00:02:28.759 --> 00:02:31.520 weapons, naval support. But you can't just walk 00:02:31.520 --> 00:02:34.099 into the court of King Louis VI and say, hey, 00:02:34.539 --> 00:02:37.680 we're a bunch of chaotic rebels. Please give 00:02:37.680 --> 00:02:40.979 us millions of dollars. Right. The geopolitical 00:02:40.979 --> 00:02:43.159 reality of 18th century Europe simply didn't 00:02:43.159 --> 00:02:46.099 allow for that. Thomas Paine argued this point 00:02:46.099 --> 00:02:48.219 brilliantly actually in the closing pages of 00:02:48.219 --> 00:02:50.460 the first edition of Common Sense. Oh yeah. He 00:02:50.460 --> 00:02:52.560 pointed out that the custom of nations required 00:02:52.560 --> 00:02:54.979 a formal declaration of independence and a formal 00:02:54.979 --> 00:02:58.039 framework of government. Like European monarchies 00:02:58.039 --> 00:03:01.000 wouldn't mediate a peace or provide aid to subjects 00:03:01.000 --> 00:03:03.560 they viewed as merely rebelling against another 00:03:03.560 --> 00:03:05.740 legitimate monarch. Because that sets a bad precedent 00:03:05.740 --> 00:03:08.180 for them. Exactly. So they needed the Americans 00:03:08.180 --> 00:03:10.759 to look like a legitimate, organized nation. 00:03:11.500 --> 00:03:14.819 Proof that these colonies would be reliable trading 00:03:14.819 --> 00:03:18.280 partners after the war was over. So on June 7, 00:03:18.759 --> 00:03:21.680 1776, Richard Henry Lee stands up in the Continental 00:03:21.680 --> 00:03:25.740 Congress and says, we need to declare independence 00:03:25.740 --> 00:03:28.240 and we need to form a confederation. Right now. 00:03:28.379 --> 00:03:31.020 Right now. Yeah. And they create these overlapping 00:03:31.020 --> 00:03:33.520 committees. Yeah. John Dickinson ends up leading 00:03:33.520 --> 00:03:35.939 the committee of 13 to actually draft this thing. 00:03:36.400 --> 00:03:38.240 And they basically have to write a business plan 00:03:38.240 --> 00:03:40.259 that proves to the whole world they're a unified 00:03:40.259 --> 00:03:43.280 entity. But here is the profound irony of all 00:03:43.280 --> 00:03:46.030 that. They needed a system to impress Europe 00:03:46.030 --> 00:03:47.870 with their unity and strength, right? Right. 00:03:48.090 --> 00:03:50.550 But the system they actually designed was intentionally, 00:03:50.750 --> 00:03:53.430 fundamentally weak. It's wild. They essentially 00:03:53.430 --> 00:03:55.729 designed a government with zero teeth. Zero. 00:03:56.009 --> 00:03:57.870 Let's look at the actual rules they came up with. 00:03:58.169 --> 00:04:00.050 The Articles of Confederation didn't establish 00:04:00.050 --> 00:04:02.610 a strong nation. The document literally called 00:04:02.610 --> 00:04:05.370 it a firm league of friendship. Just a group 00:04:05.370 --> 00:04:07.849 of buddies hanging out. Yeah, that phrasing is 00:04:07.849 --> 00:04:10.909 so revealing of their mindset. Under the articles, 00:04:11.050 --> 00:04:14.069 each state retained its absolute sovereignty. 00:04:14.389 --> 00:04:16.310 Meaning they were basically their own independent 00:04:16.310 --> 00:04:19.649 countries. Exactly. The central government, this 00:04:19.649 --> 00:04:22.970 unicameral Congress, was only given the specific 00:04:22.970 --> 00:04:25.290 powers that the former colonies had recognized 00:04:25.290 --> 00:04:27.709 as belonging to the British Crown and Parliament. 00:04:27.829 --> 00:04:31.779 Which was what exactly? Mostly war. Peace, diplomacy, 00:04:32.259 --> 00:04:34.639 that's it. Everything else was left entirely 00:04:34.639 --> 00:04:36.379 to the states. Okay, I want to pause on that 00:04:36.379 --> 00:04:38.560 word, unicameral, just so we are all on the same 00:04:38.560 --> 00:04:41.879 page here. Today, we're used to a bicameral system, 00:04:42.019 --> 00:04:43.819 a House of Representatives and a Senate that 00:04:43.819 --> 00:04:46.220 kind of balance each other out. Right. Unicameral 00:04:46.220 --> 00:04:49.339 means there was just one single room of lawmakers. 00:04:49.680 --> 00:04:52.420 And the voting structure in that room was completely 00:04:52.420 --> 00:04:55.839 absurd. Each state got exactly one vote in Congress. 00:04:56.079 --> 00:04:58.339 Just one. Imagine you're living in Virginia at 00:04:58.339 --> 00:05:01.439 the time, right? You've got this massive population, 00:05:01.699 --> 00:05:04.879 a huge economy, and your state has the exact 00:05:04.879 --> 00:05:07.480 same voting power as tiny Delaware. You send 00:05:07.480 --> 00:05:10.439 a delegation of anywhere from, what, two to seven 00:05:10.439 --> 00:05:12.959 members to this Congress, but when it came time 00:05:12.959 --> 00:05:15.480 to actually vote, your entire state cast one 00:05:15.480 --> 00:05:18.040 single ballot. Which... practically guaranteed 00:05:18.040 --> 00:05:20.360 to gridlock on a structural level, I mean it's... 00:05:20.319 --> 00:05:23.339 It's bad. But it gets even more complicated when 00:05:23.339 --> 00:05:25.980 you look at how long it took just to agree to 00:05:25.980 --> 00:05:28.399 these rules. Oh, the timeline is crazy. Right. 00:05:28.740 --> 00:05:32.300 The drafting was finished in late 1777, but ratification 00:05:32.300 --> 00:05:35.100 required unanimous consent from all 13 states. 00:05:35.399 --> 00:05:37.459 It took three and a half years to get everyone 00:05:37.459 --> 00:05:39.879 to sign on. See, this is where I have to push 00:05:39.879 --> 00:05:41.759 back on the logic of these founding fathers. 00:05:42.240 --> 00:05:45.240 How did they possibly expect to win a war against 00:05:45.240 --> 00:05:48.339 the British Empire with a government where one 00:05:48.339 --> 00:05:50.990 single state could hold up the entire country 00:05:50.990 --> 00:05:53.189 for over three years. It's a great question. 00:05:53.350 --> 00:05:55.509 I mean, our source material highlights that Maryland 00:05:55.509 --> 00:05:58.850 literally refused to sign until March of 1781. 00:05:59.410 --> 00:06:01.490 The fighting was almost over by then. Yeah. And 00:06:01.490 --> 00:06:04.110 the reason Maryland held out is, well, it's fascinating 00:06:04.110 --> 00:06:06.810 because it exposes the deep internal fractures 00:06:06.810 --> 00:06:09.569 of the so -called friendship. It was over a massive 00:06:09.569 --> 00:06:11.990 real estate dispute. Of course it was. Real estate? 00:06:12.189 --> 00:06:15.129 Always, right. Maryland wanted the larger states, 00:06:15.389 --> 00:06:17.350 especially Virginia, to give up their claims 00:06:17.350 --> 00:06:20.889 to the Western lands, the territory west of the 00:06:20.889 --> 00:06:22.949 Ohio River. Because Maryland didn't have Western 00:06:22.949 --> 00:06:26.449 borders. Exactly. So they feared being economically 00:06:26.449 --> 00:06:29.310 eclipsed by these giant neighbor states who would 00:06:29.310 --> 00:06:31.889 just keep expanding westward and selling land 00:06:31.889 --> 00:06:35.310 to pay off debts. Maryland basically said, we 00:06:35.310 --> 00:06:38.329 won't budge until Virginia agrees to cede those 00:06:38.329 --> 00:06:42.100 lands to the National Union. Wow. It is staggering 00:06:42.100 --> 00:06:44.519 to think about conducting a desperate war under 00:06:44.519 --> 00:06:48.060 those conditions. I guess brings us back to that 00:06:48.060 --> 00:06:50.220 deep -seated fear you mentioned earlier. Why 00:06:50.220 --> 00:06:53.100 on earth would brilliant men design something 00:06:53.100 --> 00:06:56.120 so incredibly fragile? Because they were absolutely 00:06:56.120 --> 00:06:58.660 terrified of centralized power. You have to put 00:06:58.660 --> 00:07:00.699 yourself in their shoes. They were sacrificing 00:07:00.699 --> 00:07:03.420 blood and treasure to escape a king and a distant, 00:07:03.420 --> 00:07:06.120 unrepresentative parliament. The absolute last 00:07:06.120 --> 00:07:08.160 thing they wanted to do was accidentally create 00:07:08.160 --> 00:07:10.560 a new king or a new tyrannical parliament right 00:07:10.560 --> 00:07:13.120 in their own backyard. To them, liberty meant 00:07:13.120 --> 00:07:16.040 local control. A weak central government was 00:07:15.949 --> 00:07:17.970 wasn't a bug in the code. It was the feature. 00:07:18.189 --> 00:07:21.649 It was the primary feature. But, I mean, designing 00:07:21.649 --> 00:07:23.649 a weak government sounds great for freedom in 00:07:23.649 --> 00:07:26.430 theory. What happens when that weak design meets 00:07:26.430 --> 00:07:29.910 the brutal, unforgiving reality of actually fighting 00:07:29.910 --> 00:07:32.550 a war and, you know, managing a wartime economy? 00:07:32.870 --> 00:07:35.370 Total systemic failure, just total collapse, 00:07:35.430 --> 00:07:37.850 because the most glaring flaw of the Articles 00:07:37.850 --> 00:07:41.050 of Confederation was that Congress had absolutely 00:07:41.050 --> 00:07:44.339 no power to tax, none whatsoever. None. They 00:07:44.339 --> 00:07:47.180 could only request money from the states. And 00:07:47.180 --> 00:07:48.740 when I was reading this Parthasaurus material, 00:07:48.779 --> 00:07:50.680 I couldn't help but think about living in a chaotic 00:07:50.680 --> 00:07:52.839 shared house. Oh, this should be good. Like, 00:07:53.139 --> 00:07:55.199 imagine living with 12 other roommates and buying 00:07:55.199 --> 00:07:58.180 groceries and paying the rent. It's completely 00:07:58.180 --> 00:08:01.120 voluntary. Good luck with that. Right. You just 00:08:01.120 --> 00:08:03.000 put a jar on the kitchen counter and say, hey, 00:08:03.180 --> 00:08:06.079 guys, if you feel like it, chip in for the electricity 00:08:06.079 --> 00:08:08.740 bill. Eventually, the power gets shut off, and 00:08:08.740 --> 00:08:10.939 everyone is going to starve. It's a really fun 00:08:10.939 --> 00:08:13.660 analogy, but to make it historically accurate, 00:08:13.899 --> 00:08:15.899 you have to imagine those roommates are also 00:08:15.899 --> 00:08:18.620 heavily armed. Oh, right. Hold deep religious 00:08:18.620 --> 00:08:21.480 prejudices against one another and have conflicting 00:08:21.480 --> 00:08:24.160 legal claims to the backyard. Fair point. So 00:08:24.160 --> 00:08:26.600 it's even worse. Much worse. The reality was 00:08:26.600 --> 00:08:29.300 grim. The states rarely paid their requests in 00:08:29.300 --> 00:08:32.299 full. Often they paid nothing at all. So Congress, 00:08:32.919 --> 00:08:35.320 desperate to fund the Continental Army, just 00:08:35.320 --> 00:08:37.860 started printing paper money, which as anyone 00:08:37.860 --> 00:08:40.720 who has studied even basic economics knows leads 00:08:40.720 --> 00:08:44.139 to massive runaway inflation. Unbelievable inflation. 00:08:44.620 --> 00:08:47.279 The currency depreciated so completely that it 00:08:47.279 --> 00:08:49.799 birthed the phrase, not worth a continental. 00:08:50.000 --> 00:08:53.980 Wow. Imagine you're a farmer in 1779 trying to 00:08:53.980 --> 00:08:56.399 sell your wheat to the army. The quartermaster 00:08:56.399 --> 00:08:58.600 pays you in continental paper money, but by the 00:08:58.600 --> 00:09:01.159 time you walk home, that paper has lost half 00:09:01.159 --> 00:09:04.620 its purchasing power. Geez. By the late 1770s, 00:09:04.639 --> 00:09:06.519 George Washington was writing to the president 00:09:06.519 --> 00:09:09.139 of the Continental Congress, John Jay, stating 00:09:09.139 --> 00:09:11.740 that it took a wagonload of money just to buy 00:09:11.740 --> 00:09:13.919 a wagon load of provision. And the human cost 00:09:13.919 --> 00:09:16.799 of that is just heartbreaking. I mean, the Continental 00:09:16.799 --> 00:09:18.679 Army nearly starved to death during multiple 00:09:18.679 --> 00:09:21.480 winters. Congress had promised these soldiers 00:09:21.480 --> 00:09:25.240 pensions, like half pay for life, but they had 00:09:25.240 --> 00:09:27.519 absolutely no mechanism to actually fund those 00:09:27.519 --> 00:09:29.759 obligations. They were writing checks that their 00:09:29.759 --> 00:09:32.539 structural bank account just couldn't cash. And 00:09:32.539 --> 00:09:35.299 the military leaders were acutely aware of how 00:09:35.299 --> 00:09:38.779 dangerous this was. General Henry Knox, he was 00:09:38.779 --> 00:09:41.379 a brilliant artillery commander. He complained 00:09:41.379 --> 00:09:43.940 bitterly about the situation. He said the army 00:09:43.940 --> 00:09:47.120 hated being treated like 13 armies. They wanted 00:09:47.120 --> 00:09:50.720 to be one continental body. Exactly. Knox actually 00:09:50.720 --> 00:09:54.279 used to toast to a hoop to the barrel. A hoop 00:09:54.279 --> 00:09:56.360 to the barrel. Yeah. Meaning they desperately 00:09:56.360 --> 00:09:59.340 needed a strong, binding union to hold all the 00:09:59.340 --> 00:10:01.519 individual wooden staves of the states together. 00:10:01.360 --> 00:10:04.279 otherwise the barrel just falls apart under pressure. 00:10:04.419 --> 00:10:06.259 Well the barrel definitely started falling apart. 00:10:06.279 --> 00:10:07.860 Yeah. Because it wasn't just grumbling, right? 00:10:08.120 --> 00:10:10.779 You had unpaid Pennsylvania veterans who actually 00:10:10.779 --> 00:10:13.059 mutinied. They did. They marched on Philadelphia 00:10:13.059 --> 00:10:15.799 and literally forced the Continental Congress 00:10:15.799 --> 00:10:18.379 to flee the city. The national government had 00:10:18.379 --> 00:10:21.539 to run away from its own unpaid army. It's astonishing. 00:10:21.980 --> 00:10:24.240 Which brings up a really fascinating psychological 00:10:24.240 --> 00:10:27.549 shift. this trauma of a weak government. You 00:10:27.549 --> 00:10:29.950 know, the starving troops, the begging for funds, 00:10:30.190 --> 00:10:33.600 the mutinies. It fundamentally changed the worldview 00:10:33.600 --> 00:10:36.019 of the military leadership. It nationalized them. 00:10:36.340 --> 00:10:39.299 Exactly. It nationalized them. It explains exactly 00:10:39.299 --> 00:10:41.879 why generals like George Washington and Henry 00:10:41.879 --> 00:10:44.659 Knox, who suffered through the absolute worst 00:10:44.659 --> 00:10:47.080 of the article's inefficiencies, later became 00:10:47.080 --> 00:10:50.320 the fiercest advocates for a strong, muscular 00:10:50.320 --> 00:10:53.860 constitution in 1787. Because they lived it. 00:10:53.960 --> 00:10:56.159 Their wartime experience proved to them that 00:10:56.159 --> 00:10:58.940 without a strong central authority, the nation 00:10:58.940 --> 00:11:01.179 couldn't survive. OK, so you've got government 00:11:01.179 --> 00:11:03.639 that can't tax, can't pay its soldiers, and has 00:11:03.639 --> 00:11:06.419 to literally flee its own capital. You would 00:11:06.419 --> 00:11:08.379 think a system this broken would be completely 00:11:08.379 --> 00:11:11.240 useless, but here's where it gets really interesting. 00:11:11.240 --> 00:11:14.259 Oh yes. Despite all of this, despite massive 00:11:14.259 --> 00:11:17.590 embarrassments on the world stage, this paralyzed 00:11:17.590 --> 00:11:19.649 Congress managed to pull off something incredibly 00:11:19.649 --> 00:11:22.090 forward thinking right at home. The great paradox 00:11:22.090 --> 00:11:24.470 of the Confederation period. It was simultaneously 00:11:24.470 --> 00:11:27.850 a disaster and highly visionary. Yeah. Let's 00:11:27.850 --> 00:11:29.809 look at the disasters first because I was reading 00:11:29.809 --> 00:11:32.570 this section on their foreign policy and I honestly 00:11:32.570 --> 00:11:34.330 couldn't believe it. Am I reading this right? 00:11:34.889 --> 00:11:39.009 The 1783 Treaty of Paris, the actual treaty that 00:11:39.009 --> 00:11:42.409 formally ended the Revolutionary War, languished 00:11:42.409 --> 00:11:45.289 for months. because Congress couldn't even get 00:11:45.289 --> 00:11:48.110 enough delegates to show up to form a quorum 00:11:48.110 --> 00:11:51.190 to ratify it. That is entirely accurate. A quorum 00:11:51.190 --> 00:11:53.470 is the minimum number of members required to 00:11:53.470 --> 00:11:55.610 be present to make proceedings valid. Under the 00:11:55.610 --> 00:11:58.250 Articles, they needed nine states present to 00:11:58.250 --> 00:11:59.750 ratify a treaty. And they couldn't get them. 00:11:59.870 --> 00:12:02.529 They literally couldn't get enough guys in a 00:12:02.529 --> 00:12:05.350 room to officially end the war with Great Britain. 00:12:05.549 --> 00:12:08.149 That's so embarrassing. And the embarrassments 00:12:08.149 --> 00:12:10.809 continued. Thomas Jefferson was sounding the 00:12:10.809 --> 00:12:13.710 alarm about the Barbary Pirates American ships 00:12:13.710 --> 00:12:16.230 in the Mediterranean. Right, a huge crisis. He 00:12:16.230 --> 00:12:17.990 warned that European powers wouldn't respect 00:12:17.990 --> 00:12:20.429 them because the Confederacy needs to show its 00:12:20.429 --> 00:12:23.929 teeth. But they had no Navy and no money to build 00:12:23.929 --> 00:12:26.710 one. And furthermore, because the national government 00:12:26.710 --> 00:12:29.289 was so weak, they couldn't even force the British 00:12:29.289 --> 00:12:31.649 to evacuate their military forts on the American 00:12:31.649 --> 00:12:34.649 frontier, which the British had explicitly promised 00:12:34.649 --> 00:12:37.549 to do in the peace treaty. The British basically 00:12:37.549 --> 00:12:39.669 looked at the US government and said, who's going 00:12:39.669 --> 00:12:43.320 to make us leave? You. much they were an international 00:12:43.320 --> 00:12:47.179 laughingstock. Right. So keeping all that complete 00:12:47.179 --> 00:12:51.080 paralysis in mind, how does this exact same government 00:12:51.080 --> 00:12:54.000 manage to fundamentally shape the map of America 00:12:54.000 --> 00:12:57.909 and, incredibly, to ban slavery in a massive 00:12:57.909 --> 00:13:00.009 chunk of the country. What's fascinating here 00:13:00.009 --> 00:13:02.289 is that we have to look at the underlying mechanics. 00:13:02.590 --> 00:13:04.830 Remember how we said Congress had no power to 00:13:04.830 --> 00:13:07.389 tax? Yeah, the voluntary roommate jar. Exactly. 00:13:07.789 --> 00:13:10.090 That meant they had no revenue stream to pay 00:13:10.090 --> 00:13:12.370 off their massive war debts. But what did they 00:13:12.370 --> 00:13:16.019 have? They had land. Ah. the western lands that 00:13:16.019 --> 00:13:19.200 Maryland forced Virginia to give up. Bingo. The 00:13:19.200 --> 00:13:21.700 states had voluntarily given up their overlapping, 00:13:22.000 --> 00:13:24.220 conflicting claims to the territories west of 00:13:24.220 --> 00:13:26.740 the Appalachian Mountains. Selling that land 00:13:26.740 --> 00:13:29.139 was literally the national government's only 00:13:29.139 --> 00:13:31.600 mechanism to generate revenue. They couldn't 00:13:31.600 --> 00:13:33.299 tax your income, but they could sell you a farm 00:13:33.299 --> 00:13:35.899 in Ohio. But to sell it, they had to organize 00:13:35.899 --> 00:13:38.960 it. Makes sense. This led to two monumental pieces 00:13:38.960 --> 00:13:42.120 of legislation. First, the Land Ordinance of 00:13:42.120 --> 00:13:46.919 1785. This created the grid system, the townships, 00:13:46.960 --> 00:13:49.700 the square mile sections that organized the land 00:13:49.700 --> 00:13:51.879 for sale. Think about that the next time you 00:13:51.879 --> 00:13:54.139 are flying over the American Midwest. Like you 00:13:54.139 --> 00:13:55.960 look down out of the airplane window and see 00:13:55.960 --> 00:13:58.679 those perfectly square patches of farmland stretching 00:13:58.679 --> 00:14:01.200 for thousands of miles. Yeah. You're looking 00:14:01.200 --> 00:14:03.919 at the direct physical legacy of the Articles 00:14:03.919 --> 00:14:06.360 of Confederation. They had to draw those squares 00:14:06.360 --> 00:14:08.360 so they could sell them to pay the army. It's 00:14:08.360 --> 00:14:10.840 a perfect example of necessity driving innovation. 00:14:11.580 --> 00:14:14.360 And then came the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. 00:14:14.740 --> 00:14:16.980 This organized the Northwest Territory, what 00:14:16.980 --> 00:14:20.659 would eventually become Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, 00:14:21.080 --> 00:14:23.340 Michigan, and Wisconsin. A huge amount of land. 00:14:23.659 --> 00:14:26.539 Massive. It set up the brilliant protocol for 00:14:26.539 --> 00:14:30.360 how a territory becomes a new equal state rather 00:14:30.360 --> 00:14:32.580 than just remaining a subordinate colony of the 00:14:32.580 --> 00:14:36.759 original 13. But most remarkably, it abolished 00:14:36.759 --> 00:14:39.659 slavery in these new territories. It declared 00:14:39.659 --> 00:14:41.899 that new states admitted from this region would 00:14:41.899 --> 00:14:44.639 never be slave states. It's wild to hold those 00:14:44.639 --> 00:14:47.179 two thoughts in your head at the same time. Like 00:14:47.179 --> 00:14:50.019 the same government that couldn't collect a voluntary 00:14:50.019 --> 00:14:53.049 tax to keep its own lights on. was setting a 00:14:53.049 --> 00:14:55.330 precedent that the national government would 00:14:55.330 --> 00:14:58.610 expand westward, not the individual states. Right. 00:14:58.710 --> 00:15:01.110 And they were drawing a line in the sand on slavery 00:15:01.110 --> 00:15:03.330 that would basically set the stage for the next 00:15:03.330 --> 00:15:06.269 80 years of American history. It was unquestionably 00:15:06.269 --> 00:15:08.870 their greatest triumph. But unfortunately, drawing 00:15:08.870 --> 00:15:10.830 the map of the future wasn't enough to save the 00:15:10.830 --> 00:15:13.190 system from its own structural rot. The land 00:15:13.190 --> 00:15:15.149 sales were just too slow to fix the immediate 00:15:15.149 --> 00:15:16.970 economic crisis. It was too little, too late. 00:15:17.350 --> 00:15:20.110 Exactly. The breaking point finally arrived, 00:15:20.350 --> 00:15:23.279 forcing a radical and frankly highly controversial 00:15:23.279 --> 00:15:25.740 pivot. Let's talk about the collapse because 00:15:25.740 --> 00:15:27.460 this is where the story turns into a thriller. 00:15:28.259 --> 00:15:30.539 The economic anxiety among the political elite 00:15:30.539 --> 00:15:33.860 was peaking. Our sources highlight Shays' rebellion 00:15:33.860 --> 00:15:37.740 in 1786 in western Massachusetts. Yes. Now it's 00:15:37.740 --> 00:15:39.919 easy to just call this, you know, an uprising 00:15:39.919 --> 00:15:42.080 of debt -ridden farmers shutting down the courts. 00:15:42.580 --> 00:15:45.460 But the underlying mechanism here is tragically 00:15:45.460 --> 00:15:47.639 ironic. The bitter irony is what makes it so 00:15:47.639 --> 00:15:49.860 important. These farmers in Massachusetts, led 00:15:49.860 --> 00:15:53.340 by Daniel Shays, were largely revolutionary war 00:15:53.340 --> 00:15:56.539 veterans. Right. They were the exact same soldiers 00:15:56.539 --> 00:15:58.799 who hadn't been paid by the weak Continental 00:15:58.799 --> 00:16:01.700 Congress because Congress couldn't tax. Yep. 00:16:01.919 --> 00:16:04.820 So they go home, broke, and then the state government 00:16:04.820 --> 00:16:07.639 of Massachusetts decides to aggressively tax 00:16:07.639 --> 00:16:10.340 them to pay off the state's own war debts. It's 00:16:10.340 --> 00:16:12.840 brutal. And Massachusetts demands payment in 00:16:12.840 --> 00:16:15.100 hard currency, gold and silver, which didn't 00:16:15.100 --> 00:16:17.080 even exist because of the massive paper money 00:16:17.080 --> 00:16:19.659 inflation we talked about earlier. It was a vicious, 00:16:19.940 --> 00:16:22.950 inescapable cycle. The state was seizing their 00:16:22.950 --> 00:16:25.590 farms and throwing these veterans into debtor's 00:16:25.590 --> 00:16:28.230 prison for failing to pay taxes with money that 00:16:28.230 --> 00:16:29.950 the national government had failed to pay them 00:16:29.950 --> 00:16:32.509 in the first place. That's insane. And when Shays 00:16:32.509 --> 00:16:35.309 and his men took up arms and shut down the courts 00:16:35.309 --> 00:16:37.889 to stop the foreclosures, the national government 00:16:37.889 --> 00:16:40.870 was completely powerless to intervene. They had 00:16:40.870 --> 00:16:43.870 no standing army to send. Massachusetts had to 00:16:43.870 --> 00:16:47.070 raise a private militia funded by wealthy Boston 00:16:47.070 --> 00:16:50.210 merchants just to crush the rebellion. Which 00:16:50.210 --> 00:16:53.019 absolutely the political elite across all the 00:16:53.019 --> 00:16:55.139 states. I mean, state government suddenly seemed 00:16:55.139 --> 00:16:57.639 entirely incapable of maintaining basic order. 00:16:57.899 --> 00:16:59.940 Which gave Alexander Hamilton the opening he 00:16:59.940 --> 00:17:03.549 needed. Ah. Hamilton. Yeah. Hamilton was a fierce 00:17:03.549 --> 00:17:06.130 nationalist. He had served as Washington's top 00:17:06.130 --> 00:17:09.029 aide and saw the dysfunction firsthand. He spearheaded 00:17:09.029 --> 00:17:12.589 the Annapolis Convention in 1786, sensibly to 00:17:12.589 --> 00:17:14.829 discuss trade barriers between the states. But 00:17:14.829 --> 00:17:16.730 only five states bothered to send delegates, 00:17:16.789 --> 00:17:19.230 right? Right. It was a flop. But Hamilton used 00:17:19.230 --> 00:17:22.269 that failure to issue a sweeping call for a much 00:17:22.269 --> 00:17:24.289 larger convention to be held in Philadelphia 00:17:24.289 --> 00:17:28.250 the following year in 1787. And here is the absolute 00:17:28.250 --> 00:17:31.519 crux of the drama. I want to slow down here because 00:17:31.519 --> 00:17:35.039 this is the moment everything changes. The Confederation 00:17:35.039 --> 00:17:37.599 Congress officially endorsed this Philadelphia 00:17:37.599 --> 00:17:40.920 Convention, but they gave it a very specific, 00:17:40.920 --> 00:17:43.940 limited mandate. Extremely limited. The delegates 00:17:43.940 --> 00:17:46.559 were authorized for the sole and express purpose 00:17:46.559 --> 00:17:50.099 of revising the Articles of Confederation. Revising. 00:17:50.359 --> 00:17:51.700 That was the legal boundary they were given, 00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:54.099 but they didn't revise them. They closed the 00:17:54.099 --> 00:17:56.259 doors of Independence Hall. They swore themselves 00:17:56.259 --> 00:17:59.460 to absolute secrecy windows nailed shut in the 00:17:59.460 --> 00:18:01.819 sweltering summer heat. Miserable. And over the 00:18:01.819 --> 00:18:03.700 course of the summer, they threw the Articles 00:18:03.700 --> 00:18:06.299 of Confederation entirely in the trash. They 00:18:06.299 --> 00:18:08.299 wrote a completely new constitution that created 00:18:08.299 --> 00:18:11.160 a vastly more powerful central government, a 00:18:11.160 --> 00:18:13.559 president, federal courts, the power to tax, 00:18:13.900 --> 00:18:15.900 the power to regulate commerce. So what does 00:18:15.900 --> 00:18:17.880 this all mean? I really have to push back here 00:18:17.880 --> 00:18:20.339 on the mythology of the founding fathers. Did 00:18:20.339 --> 00:18:22.819 James Madison and Alexander Hamilton basically 00:18:22.819 --> 00:18:26.880 stage a quiet legal coup d 'etat? Well, look 00:18:26.880 --> 00:18:29.160 at the actual text of the Articles of Confederation 00:18:29.160 --> 00:18:32.779 article to 13. It explicitly states that any 00:18:32.779 --> 00:18:35.660 alteration to the document required the unanimous 00:18:35.660 --> 00:18:38.960 consent of all 13 state legislatures. It was 00:18:38.960 --> 00:18:41.500 a perpetual, unbreakable contract. That is what 00:18:41.500 --> 00:18:44.539 it said. But then they write this new document. 00:18:44.569 --> 00:18:47.329 And Article 7 of their new constitution says 00:18:47.329 --> 00:18:50.009 it only needs nine states to ratify it to go 00:18:50.009 --> 00:18:52.890 into effect. They broke their own unbreakable 00:18:52.890 --> 00:18:55.670 contract to save the country. That tension is 00:18:55.670 --> 00:18:58.109 exactly what historians and legal scholars have 00:18:58.109 --> 00:19:00.289 debated for centuries. Was it an illegal coup? 00:19:00.509 --> 00:19:02.529 Yeah. Let's synthesize the debate from the sources. 00:19:03.089 --> 00:19:05.490 Some modern legal scholars, like Francisco Forrest 00:19:05.490 --> 00:19:07.809 Martin, argue that the Articles of Confederation 00:19:07.809 --> 00:19:10.490 had already lost their binding legal force before 00:19:10.490 --> 00:19:12.670 the Philadelphia Convention even started. Wait. 00:19:12.829 --> 00:19:14.809 How does a constitutional document just lose 00:19:14.809 --> 00:19:17.589 its force? Through the concept of material breach 00:19:17.589 --> 00:19:20.329 in contract law, the states themselves had been 00:19:20.329 --> 00:19:22.190 constantly violating the rules of the Articles 00:19:22.190 --> 00:19:25.029 for years, making their own unauthorized trade 00:19:25.029 --> 00:19:27.930 deals flat out ignoring funding requests, failing 00:19:27.930 --> 00:19:31.450 to send delegates. In international or contract 00:19:31.450 --> 00:19:35.430 law, if multiple parties flagrantly violate the 00:19:35.430 --> 00:19:37.950 core tenets of a contract, the other parties 00:19:37.950 --> 00:19:40.230 aren't necessarily bound by its rules anymore. 00:19:40.609 --> 00:19:43.559 The contract is voided by behavior. Okay so the 00:19:43.559 --> 00:19:45.920 argument is the contract was already void because 00:19:45.920 --> 00:19:48.519 literally everyone was ignoring it. Right. What's 00:19:48.519 --> 00:19:50.319 the other perspective? The other perspective 00:19:50.319 --> 00:19:52.880 is the pragmatic one offered by James Madison 00:19:52.880 --> 00:19:55.660 himself at the time. In Federalist number 40 00:19:55.660 --> 00:19:58.160 Madison essentially just waves the legal objection 00:19:58.160 --> 00:20:00.420 away. Really? He just ignores it? Pretty much. 00:20:00.819 --> 00:20:02.920 He argues that the survival and happiness of 00:20:02.920 --> 00:20:05.099 the American people were vastly more important 00:20:05.099 --> 00:20:07.920 than adhering strictly to a flawed paralyzing 00:20:07.920 --> 00:20:10.859 document. He basically tells the public the issue 00:20:10.859 --> 00:20:13.259 of whether we exceeded our authority is moot. 00:20:13.460 --> 00:20:15.839 The system is broken beyond repair. The people 00:20:15.839 --> 00:20:18.359 need a government that works. So let's move on 00:20:18.359 --> 00:20:20.779 and vote on this new framework. It's the ultimate 00:20:20.779 --> 00:20:23.660 example of better to ask forgiveness than permission, 00:20:24.259 --> 00:20:26.740 but done on a national constitutional scale. 00:20:27.039 --> 00:20:30.319 Precisely. And it worked. By September 1788, 00:20:30.480 --> 00:20:32.500 the Confederation Congress essentially voted 00:20:32.500 --> 00:20:35.140 itself out of existence, acknowledging that the 00:20:35.140 --> 00:20:37.619 new constitution had received enough ratifications 00:20:37.619 --> 00:20:40.890 to take over. Wow. The transition was completely 00:20:40.890 --> 00:20:43.549 peaceful, which is historically rare, but it 00:20:43.549 --> 00:20:46.670 was absolutely a fundamental, radical break from 00:20:46.670 --> 00:20:49.029 the legal framework that had preceded it. It 00:20:49.029 --> 00:20:51.309 is such an incredible journey. We started with 00:20:51.309 --> 00:20:53.569 this deeply idealistic league of friendship, 00:20:53.869 --> 00:20:56.869 this voluntary roommate agreement built on the 00:20:56.869 --> 00:20:59.660 profound fear of central power. Yeah. And over 00:20:59.660 --> 00:21:01.619 the course of less than a decade, the harsh, 00:21:01.779 --> 00:21:04.960 pragmatic reality of fighting a war, managing 00:21:04.960 --> 00:21:07.420 an economy and preventing localized rebellions 00:21:07.420 --> 00:21:10.039 forced them to realize that a functioning society 00:21:10.039 --> 00:21:12.640 requires a government with the actual coercive 00:21:12.640 --> 00:21:15.140 power to govern. It's the ultimate lesson in 00:21:15.140 --> 00:21:17.839 the pendulum swing of power. If you push too 00:21:17.839 --> 00:21:20.519 far toward pure decentralization, you get chaos, 00:21:21.099 --> 00:21:23.279 rampant inflation and a government that has to 00:21:23.279 --> 00:21:25.980 flee its own unpaid soldiers. But if you push 00:21:25.980 --> 00:21:29.440 too far toward centralization, you risk tyranny. 00:21:30.119 --> 00:21:32.720 Exactly. The constitution they eventually wrote 00:21:32.720 --> 00:21:34.960 in Philadelphia was an attempt to find the middle 00:21:34.960 --> 00:21:37.700 ground, a federal system that shared power between 00:21:37.700 --> 00:21:39.960 the national center and the local states. And 00:21:39.960 --> 00:21:42.619 that balance between local autonomy and central 00:21:42.619 --> 00:21:45.440 authority. It isn't just a dusty history lesson. 00:21:45.900 --> 00:21:48.339 It is the exact same tension you see us still 00:21:48.339 --> 00:21:51.509 navigating. today. Every single day. Every time 00:21:51.509 --> 00:21:54.210 we debate states' rights versus federal mandates, 00:21:54.369 --> 00:21:56.369 whether that's regarding health care, environmental 00:21:56.369 --> 00:21:59.569 regulations, or education, we're having the exact 00:21:59.569 --> 00:22:02.690 same argument they were having in 1787. We are 00:22:02.690 --> 00:22:04.529 still trying to figure out how many hoops we 00:22:04.529 --> 00:22:06.869 need to keep the barrel together without crushing 00:22:06.869 --> 00:22:09.960 the staves. Perfectly said. Now, to wrap up this 00:22:09.960 --> 00:22:12.059 deep dive, we want to leave you with a fascinating 00:22:12.059 --> 00:22:14.380 what -if that we found buried in the source text. 00:22:14.599 --> 00:22:16.759 Something for you to ponder long after you finish 00:22:16.759 --> 00:22:19.099 listening. This is a wild one. It really is. 00:22:19.559 --> 00:22:21.660 In the original Articles of Confederation, Article 00:22:21.660 --> 00:22:25.000 11 contained a very special clause. It provided 00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:28.460 a blanket, automatic pre -approval, for the province 00:22:28.460 --> 00:22:31.859 of Quebec, essentially Canada, to join the United 00:22:31.859 --> 00:22:33.599 States if it wanted to. You know, debate needed, 00:22:33.819 --> 00:22:36.319 no vote required. The door was just wide open. 00:22:37.019 --> 00:22:38.759 Obviously, Canada never took them up on the offer. 00:22:39.079 --> 00:22:42.619 But imagine for a second, think about how completely 00:22:42.619 --> 00:22:46.059 paralyzed and intentionally weak this league 00:22:46.059 --> 00:22:49.259 of friendship was just trying to manage the eastern 00:22:49.259 --> 00:22:51.859 seaboard of the current U .S. Barely managing. 00:22:52.180 --> 00:22:54.859 Right. Now imagine them trying to govern a massive 00:22:54.859 --> 00:22:58.200 decentralized voluntary alliance that stretched 00:22:58.200 --> 00:23:00.880 all the way through the frozen expanses of the 00:23:00.880 --> 00:23:02.680 Great White North. The gridlock wouldn't have 00:23:02.680 --> 00:23:04.319 just been regional. It would have been truly 00:23:04.319 --> 00:23:06.180 continental. It makes you wonder how quickly 00:23:06.180 --> 00:23:08.640 that operating system would have crashed and 00:23:08.640 --> 00:23:11.220 what entirely different country might have emerged 00:23:11.220 --> 00:23:13.460 from the wreckage. Thank you for taking this 00:23:13.460 --> 00:23:15.500 deep dive with us. Keep questioning the systems 00:23:15.500 --> 00:23:17.019 around you and we'll catch you next time.