document_title: Broca's area

question_text: what problem does damage to broca area cause

text: Broca's area

text: Structure[edit]

text: Broca's area is often identified by visual inspection of the topography of the brain either by macrostructural landmarks such as sulci or by the specification of coordinates in a particular reference space. The currently used Talairach and Tournoux atlas projects Brodmann's cytoarchitectonic map onto a template brain. Because Brodmann's parcelation was based on subjective visual inspection of cytoarchitectonic borders and also Brodmann analyzed only one hemisphere of one brain, the result is imprecise. Further, because of considerable variability across brains in terms of shape, size, and position relative to sulcal and gyral structure, a resulting localization precision is limited.[5]

text: Nevertheless, Broca's area in the left hemisphere and its homologue in the right hemisphere are designations usually used to refer to pars triangularis (PTr) and pars opercularis (POp) of the inferior frontal gyrus. The PTr and POp are defined by structural landmarks that only probabilistically divide the inferior frontal gyrus into anterior and posterior cytoarchitectonic areas of 45 and 44, respectively, by Brodmann's classification scheme.[6]

text: Area 45 receives more afferent connections from prefrontal cortex, the superior temporal gyrus, and the superior temporal sulcus, compared to area 44, which tends to receive more afferent connections from motor, somatosensory, and inferior parietal regions.[6]

text: The differences between area 45 and 44 in cytoarchitecture and in connectivity suggest that these areas might perform different functions. Indeed, recent neuroimaging studies have shown that the PTr and Pop, corresponding to areas 45 and 44, respectively, play different functional roles in the human with respect to language comprehension and action recognition/understanding.[6]

text: Functions[edit]

text: Language comprehension[edit]

text: For a long time, it was assumed that the role of Broca's area was more devoted to language production than language comprehension. However, there is evidence to demonstrate that Broca's area also plays a significant role in language comprehension. Patients with lesions in Broca's area who exhibit agrammatical speech production also show inability to use syntactic information to determine the meaning of sentences.[7] Also, a number of neuroimaging studies have implicated an involvement of Broca's area, particularly of the pars opercularis of the left inferior frontal gyrus, during the processing of complex sentences.[8] Further, it has recently been found in functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) experiments involving highly ambiguous sentences result in a more activated inferior frontal gyrus.[9] Therefore, the activity level in the inferior frontal gyrus and the level of lexical ambiguity are directly proportional to each other, because of the increased retrieval demands associated with highly ambiguous content.

text: There is also specialisation for particular aspects of comprehension within Broca's area. Work by Devlin et al. (2003)[10] showed in a repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) study that there was an increase in reaction times when performing a semantic task under rTMS aimed at the pars triangularis (situated in the anterior part of Broca's area). The increase in reaction times is indicative that that particular area is responsible for processing that cognitive function. Disrupting these areas via TMS disrupts computations performed in the areas leading to an increase in time needed to perform the computations (reflected in reaction times). Later work by Nixon et al. (2004)[11] showed that when the pars opercularis (situated in the posterior part of Broca's area) was stimulated under rTMS there was an increase in reaction times in a phonological task. Gough et al. (2005)[12] performed an experiment combining elements of these previous works in which both phonological and semantic tasks were performed with rTMS stimulation directed at either the anterior or the posterior part of Broca's area. The results from this experiment conclusively distinguished anatomical specialisation within Broca's area for different components of language comprehension. Here the results showed that under rTMS stimulation:

text:
Semantic tasks only showed a decrease in reaction times when stimulation was aimed at the anterior part of Broca's area (where a decrease of 10% (50ms) was seen compared to a no-TMS control group)
Phonological tasks showed a decrease in reaction times when stimulation was aimed at the posterior part of Broca's area (where a decrease of 6% (30ms) was seen compared to control)

text: To summarise, the work above shows anatomical specialisation in Broca's area for language comprehension, with the anterior part of Broca's area responsible for understanding the meaning of words (semantics) and the posterior part of Broca's area responsible for understanding how words sound (phonology).

text: Action recognition and production[edit]

text: Recent experiments have indicated that Broca's area is involved in various cognitive and perceptual tasks. One important contribution of Brodmann's area 44 is also found in the motor-related processes. Observation of meaningful hand shadows resembling moving animals activates frontal language area, demonstrating that Broca's area indeed plays a role in interpreting action of others.[13] An activation of BA 44 was also reported during execution of grasping and manipulation.[14]

text: Speech-associated gestures[edit]

text: It has been speculated that because speech-associated gestures could possibly reduce lexical or sentential ambiguity, comprehension should improve in the presence of speech-associated gestures. As a result of improved comprehension, the involvement of Broca's area should be reduced.[6]

text: Many neuroimaging studies have also shown activation of Broca's area when representing meaningful arm gestures. A recent study has shown evidence that word and gesture are related at the level of translation of particular gesture aspects such as its motor goal and intention.[15] This finding helps explain why, when this area is defective, those who use sign language also suffer from language deficits.[16] This finding that aspects of gestures are translated in words within Broca's area also explains language development in terms of evolution. Indeed, many authors have proposed that speech evolved from a primitive communication that arose from gestures.[13][17] (See below.)

text: Speaking without Broca's area[edit]

text: Damage to Broca's area is commonly associated with telegraphic speech made up of content vocabulary. For example, a person with Broca's aphasia may say something like, "Drive, store. Mom." meaning to say, "My mom drove me to the store today." Therefore, the content of the information is correct, but the grammar and fluidity of the sentence is missing.[18]

text: The essential role of the Broca's area in speech production has been questioned since it can be destroyed while leaving language nearly intact. In one case of a computer engineer, a slow-growing glioma tumor was removed. The tumor and the surgery destroyed the left inferior and middle frontal gyrus, the head of the caudate nucleus, the anterior limb of the internal capsule, and the anterior insula. However, there were minimal language problems three months after removal and the individual returned to his professional work. These minor problems include the inability to create syntactically complex sentences including more than two subjects, multiple causal conjunctions, or reported speech. These were explained by researchers as due to working memory problems. They also attributed his lack of problems to extensive compensatory mechanisms enabled by neural plasticity in the nearby cerebral cortex and a shift of some functions to the homologous area in the right hemisphere.[4]

text: Mirror neurons[edit]

text: Communication, both verbal and nonverbal, requires that the interacting individuals stay "tuned" to one another. Mirror neurons were discovered in the 1990s in frontal area F5 of the monkey cortex. These neurons are active during execution of object-related hand actions, but they are also active, importantly, when the monkey is just observing similar acts. For example, the mirror neurons are activated when the monkey takes a raisin from a tray and also when he views another monkey or the human experimenter doing the same. No information is yet available about possible hemispheric lateralization of the monkey mirror neurons.

text: Mirror neurons have visuomotor properties, being sensitive to goal-related motor acts, but they can also be activated by sounds that imply actions. Importantly, the mirror neurons do not only react to visual input and then project, via some transformational step, to motor-output-related neurons but are also part of a system that forms a neuronal representation of the observed motor acts. Similar to F5, the rostral part of the inferior parietal cortex contains neurons that are active during action observation and execution; this region receives input from the STS, which is known to contain neurons responding to biological motion.[19]

text: Clinical significance[edit]

text: Stuttering[edit]

text: A speech disorder known as stuttering is seen to be associated with underactivity in Broca's area.[20][21]

text: Aphasia[edit]

text: Aphasia is an acquired language disorder affecting all modalities such as writing, reading, speaking, and listening and results from brain damage. It is often a chronic condition that creates changes in all areas of one's life.[22]

text: Expressive aphasia vs. other aphasias[edit]

text: Patients with expressive aphasia, also known as Broca's aphasia, are individuals who know "what they want to say, they just cannot get it out".[22] They are typically able to comprehend words, and sentences with a simple syntactic structure (see above), but are more or less unable to generate fluent speech. Other symptoms that may be present include problems with fluency, articulation, word-finding, word repetition, and producing and comprehending complex grammatical sentences, both orally and in writing.[3]

text: This specific group of symptoms distinguishes those who have expressive aphasia from individuals with other types of aphasia. There are several distinct "types" of aphasia, and each type is characterized by a different set of language deficits. Although those who have expressive aphasia tend to retain good spoken language comprehension, other types of aphasia can render patients completely unable to understand any language at all, unable to understand any spoken language (auditory verbal agnosia),[23][24][25] whereas still other types preserve language comprehension, but with deficits. People with expressive aphasia may struggle less with reading and writing (see alexia) than those with other types of aphasia.[26] Although individuals with expressive aphasia tend to have a good ability to self-monitor their language output (they "hear what they say" and make corrections), other types of aphasics can seem entirely unaware of their language deficits.

text: In the classical sense, expressive aphasia is the result of injury to Broca's area; it is often the case that lesions in specific brain areas cause specific, dissociable symptoms,[27] although case studies show there is not always a one-to-one mapping between lesion location and aphasic symptoms.[24] The correlation between damage to certain specific brain areas (usually in the left hemisphere) and the development of specific types of aphasia makes it possible to deduce (albeit very roughly) the location of a suspected brain lesion based only on the presence (and severity) of a certain type of aphasia, though this is complicated by the possibility that a patient may have damage to a number of brain areas and may exhibit symptoms of more than one type of aphasia. The examination of lesion data in order to deduce which brain areas are essential in the normal functioning of certain aspects of cognition is called the deficit-lesion method; this method is especially important in the branch of neuroscience known as aphasiology. Cognitive science - to be specific, cognitive neuropsychology - are branches of neuroscience that also make extensive use of the deficit-lesion method.[28]

text:
Major characteristics of different types of acute aphasia[22]

Type of aphasia

Speech repetition

Naming

Auditory comprehension

Fluency

Expressive aphasia

Moderate–severe

Moderate–severe

Mild difficulty

Non-fluent, effortful, slow

Receptive aphasia

Mild–severe

Mild–severe

Defective

Fluent paraphasic

Conduction aphasia

Poor

Poor

Relatively good

Fluent

Mixed transcortical aphasia

Moderate

Poor

Poor

Non-fluent

Transcortical motor aphasia

Good

Mild–severe

Mild

Non-fluent

Transcortical sensory aphasia

Good

Moderate–severe

Poor

Fluent

Global aphasia

Poor

Poor

Poor

Non-fluent

Anomic aphasia

Mild

Moderate–severe

Mild

Fluent

text: Newer implications related to lesions in Broca's area[edit]

text: Since studies carried out in the late 1970's[29] it has been understood that the relationship between Broca's area and Broca's aphasia is not as consistent as once thought.[30] Lesions to Broca's area alone don't result in a Broca's aphasia, nor do Broca's aphasic patients necessarily have lesions in Broca's area.[31] Lesions to Broca's area alone are known to produce just a transient mutism that resolves inside 3–6 weeks. This discovery suggests that Broca's area may be included in some aspect of verbalization or articulation; however, it does not address its part in sentence comprehension. Still, Broca's area frequently emerges in functional imaging studies of sentence processing.[32] However, it also becomes activated in word-level tasks.[33] This suggests that Broca’s area is not dedicated to sentence processing but supports a function common to both. In fact, Broca's area can show activation in such non-linguistic tasks as imagery of motion.[34]

text: Considering the hypothesis that Broca's area may be most involved in articulation, its activation in all of these tasks may be due to subjects' covert articulation while formulating a response. Despite this caveat, a consensus seems to be forming that whatever role Broca's area may play, it may relate to known working memory functions of the frontal areas. (There is a wide distribution of Talairach coordinates[35] reported in the functional imaging literature that are referred to as part of Broca's area.) The processing of a passive voice sentence, for example, may require working memory to assist in the temporary retention of information while other relevant parts of the sentence are being manipulated (i.e. to resolve the assignment of thematic roles to arguments). Miyake, Carpenter, and Just have proposed that sentence processing relies on such general verbal working memory mechanisms while Caplan and Waters consider Broca’s area to be involved in working memory specifically for syntactic processing. Friederici (2002) breaks Broca's area into its component regions and suggests that Brodmann's area 44 is involved in working memory for both phonological[36] and syntactic structure. This area becomes active first for phonology and later for syntax as the time course for the comprehension process unfolds. Brodmann's area 45 together with Brodmann's area 47 is viewed as being specifically involved in working memory for semantic features and thematic structure where processes of syntactic reanalysis and repair are required. These areas come online after Brodmann's area 44 has finished its processing role and where comprehension of complex sentences must rely on general memory resources. All of these theories indicate a move towards a view that syntactic comprehension problems arise from a computational rather than a conceptual deficit. Newer theories are taking a more dynamic view of how the brain integrates different linguistic and cognitive components and are examining the time course of these operations.

text: Neurocognitive studies have already implicated frontal areas adjacent to Broca's area as important for working memory in non-linguistic as well as linguistic tasks.[37] Cabeza and Nyberg's analysis of imaging studies of working memory supports the view that BA45/47 is recruited for selecting or comparing information, while BA9/46 might be more involved in the manipulation of information in working memory. Since large lesions are typically required to produce a Broca's aphasia, it is likely that these regions may also become compromised in some patients and may contribute to their comprehension deficits for complex morphosyntactic structures.

text: Broca's area: A key center in the linking phonemic sequences[edit]

text: Broca's area has been previously associated with a variety of processes, including phonological segmentation, syntactic processing, and unification, all of which involve segmenting and linking different types of linguistic information.[38][39][40] Although repeating and reading single words do not engage semantic and syntactic processing, they do require an operation linking phonemic sequences with motor gestures. Findings indicate that this linkage is coordinated by Broca's area through reciprocal interactions with temporal and frontal cortices responsible for phonemic and articulatory representations, respectively, including interactions with motor cortex before the actual act of speech. Based on these unique findings, it has been proposed[by whom?] that Broca's area is not the seat of articulation per se, but rather is a key node in manipulating and forwarding neural information across large-scale cortical networks responsible for key components of speech production.[citation needed]

text: History[edit]

text: In a study published in 2007, the preserved brains of both Leborgne and Lelong (patients of Broca) were reinspected using high-resolution volumetric MRI. The purpose of this study was to scan the brains in three dimensions and to identify the extent of both cortical and subcortical lesions in more detail. The study also sought to locate the exact site of the lesion in the frontal lobe in relation to what is now called Broca's area with the extent of subcortical involvement.[3]

text: Broca's patients[edit]

text: Louis Victor Leborgne (Tan)[edit]

text: Leborgne was a patient of Broca's. At 30 years old, he was almost completely unable to produce any words or phrases.[41] He was able to repetitively produce only the word tan. After his death, a neurosyphilitic lesion was discovered on the surface of his left frontal lobe.

text: Lelong[edit]

text: Lelong was another patient of Broca's. He also exhibited reduced productive speech. He could only say five words, 'yes', 'no', 'three', 'always', and 'lelo' (a mispronunciation of his own name). A lesion within the lateral frontal lobe was discovered during Lelong's autopsy. Broca's previous patient, Leborgne, had this lesion in the same area of his frontal lobe. These two cases led Broca to believe that speech was localized to this particular area.[3]

text: MRI findings[edit]

text: Examination of the brains of Broca's two historic patients with high-resolution MRI has produced several interesting findings. First, the MRI findings suggest that other areas besides Broca's area may also have contributed to the patients' reduced productive speech. This finding is significant because it has been found that, though lesions to Broca's area alone can possibly cause temporary speech disruption, they do not result in severe speech arrest. Therefore, there is a possibility that the aphasia denoted by Broca as an absence of productive speech also could have been influenced by the lesions in the other region.[citation needed] Another finding is that the region, which was once considered to be critical for speech by Broca, is not precisely the same region as what is now known as Broca's area. This study provides further evidence to support the claim that language and cognition are far more complicated than once thought and involve various networks of brain regions.[42]

text: Evolution of language[edit]

text: The pursuit of a satisfying theory that addresses the origin of language in humans has led to the consideration of a number of evolutionary "models". These models attempt to show how modern language might have evolved, and a common feature of many of these theories is the idea that vocal communication was initially used to complement a far more dominant mode of communication through gesture. Human language might have evolved as the "evolutionary refinement of an implicit communication system already present in lower primates, based on a set of hand/mouth goal-directed action representations."[13]

text: "Hand/mouth goal-directed action representations" is another way of saying "gestural communication", "gestural language", or "communication through body language". The recent finding that Broca's area is active when people are observing others engaged in meaningful action is evidence in support of this idea. It was hypothesized that a precursor to the modern Broca's area was involved in translating gestures into abstract ideas by interpreting the movements of others as meaningful action with an intelligent purpose. It is argued that over time the ability to predict the intended outcome and purpose of a set of movements eventually gave this area the capability to deal with truly abstract ideas, and therefore (eventually) became capable of associating sounds (words) with abstract meanings. The observation that frontal language areas are activated when people observe Hand Shadows[13] is further evidence that human language may have evolved from existing neural substrates that evolved for the purpose of gesture recognition.[43] The study, therefore, claims that Broca's area is the "motor center for speech", which assembles and decodes speech sounds in the same way it interprets body language and gestures. Consistent with this idea is that the neural substrate that regulated motor control in the common ancestor of apes and humans was most likely modified to enhance cognitive and linguistic ability.[17] Studies of speakers of American Sign Language and English suggest that the human brain recruited systems that had evolved to perform more basic functions much earlier; these various brain circuits, according to the authors, were tapped to work together in creating language.[44]

text: Another recent finding has showed significant areas of activation in subcortical and neocortical areas during the production of communicative manual gestures and vocal signals in chimpanzees.[45] Further, the data indicating that chimpanzees intentionally produce manual gestures as well as vocal signals to communicate with humans suggests that the precursors to human language are present at both the behavioral and neuronanatomical levels. More recently, the neocortical distribution of activity-dependent gene expression in marmosets provided direct evidence that the ventrolateral prefrontal cortex, which comprises Broca's area in humans and has been associated with auditory processing of species-specific vocalizations and orofacial control in macaques, is engaged during vocal output in a New World monkey.[46][47] These findings putatively set the origin of vocalization-related neocortical circuits to at least 35 million years ago, when the Old and New World monkey lineages split.

text: Additional images[edit]

text:
Broca's area (shown in red). Animation.

Approximate location of Broca's area highlighted in gray.

Arcuate fasciculus connects Broca's area and Wernicke's area.

Play media

Human brain dissection video (24 sec). Demonstrating the location of Broca's area in inferior frontal gyrus.


document_title: Articles of Confederation

question_text: under the article of confederation each states power in congress was based on

question_tokens: under the article of confederation each states power in congress was based on

root

text: Articles of Confederation

text: Background and context

text: The political push to increase cooperation among the then-loyal colonies began with the Albany Congress in 1754 and Benjamin Franklin's proposed Albany Plan, an inter-colonial collaboration to help solve mutual local problems. The Articles of Confederation would bear some resemblance to it. Over the next two decades, some of the basic concepts it addressed would strengthen and others would weaken, particularly the degree of deserved loyalty to the crown. With civil disobedience resulting in coercive, and what the colonials perceived as intolerable acts of Parliament, and armed conflict resulting in dissidents being proclaimed rebels and outside the King's protection, any loyalty remaining shifted toward independence and how to achieve it. In 1775, with events outpacing communications, the Second Continental Congress began acting as the provisional government that would run the American Revolutionary War and gain the colonies their collective independence.

tag: p

text: It was an era of constitution writing—most states were busy at the task—and leaders felt the new nation must have a written constitution, even though other nations did not. During the war, Congress exercised an unprecedented level of political, diplomatic, military and economic authority. It adopted trade restrictions, established and maintained an army, issued fiat money, created a military code and negotiated with foreign governments.[5]

text: To transform themselves from outlaws into a legitimate nation, the colonists needed international recognition for their cause and foreign allies to support it. In early 1776, Thomas Paine argued in the closing pages of the first edition of Common Sense that the "custom of nations" demanded a formal declaration of American independence if any European power were to mediate a peace between the Americans and Great Britain. The monarchies of France and Spain in particular could not be expected to aid those they considered rebels against another legitimate monarch. Foreign courts needed to have American grievances laid before them persuasively in a "manifesto" which could also reassure them that the Americans would be reliable trading partners. Without such a declaration, Paine concluded, "[t]he custom of all courts is against us, and will be so, until, by an independence, we take rank with other nations."[6]

text: Beyond improving their existing association, the records of the Second Continental Congress show that the need for a declaration of independence was intimately linked with the demands of international relations. On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee introduced a resolution before the Continental Congress declaring the colonies independent; at the same time he also urged Congress to resolve "to take the most effectual measures for forming foreign Alliances" and to prepare a plan of confederation for the newly independent states. Congress then created three overlapping committees to draft the Declaration, a Model Treaty, and the Articles of Confederation. The Declaration announced the states' entry into the international system; the model treaty was designed to establish amity and commerce with other states; and the Articles of Confederation, which established "a firm league" among the thirteen free and independent states, constituted an international agreement to set up central institutions for the conduct of vital domestic and foreign affairs.[7]

text: Drafting

text: On June 12, 1776, a day after appointing a committee to prepare a draft of the Declaration of Independence, the Second Continental Congress resolved to appoint a committee of 13 to prepare a draft of a constitution for a union of the states. The committee met repeatedly, and chairman John Dickinson presented their results to the Congress on July 12, 1776. There were long debates on such issues as sovereignty, the exact powers to be given the confederate government, whether to have a judiciary, and voting procedures.[8] The final draft of the Articles was prepared in the summer of 1777 and the Second Continental Congress approved them for ratification by the individual states on November 15, 1777, after a year of debate.[9] In practice, the Articles were in use beginning in 1777; the final draft of the Articles served as the de facto system of government used by the Congress ("the United States in Congress assembled") until it became de jure by final ratification on March 1, 1781; at which point Congress became the Congress of the Confederation. Under the Articles, the states retained sovereignty over all governmental functions not specifically relinquished to the national government. The individual articles set the rules for current and future operations of the United States government. It was made capable of making war and peace, negotiating diplomatic and commercial agreements with foreign countries, and deciding disputes between the states, including their additional and contested western territories. Article XIII stipulated that "their provisions shall be inviolably observed by every state" and "the Union shall be perpetual".

text: John Dickinson's and Benjamin Franklin's handwritten drafts of the Articles of Confederation are housed at the National Archives in Washington, DC.

text: Operation

text: The Articles were created by delegates from the states in the Second Continental Congress out of a need to have "a plan of confederacy for securing the freedom, sovereignty, and independence of the United States." After the war, nationalists, especially those who had been active in the Continental Army, complained that the Articles were too weak for an effective government. There was no president, no executive agencies, no judiciary and no tax base. The absence of a tax base meant that there was no way to pay off state and national debts from the war years except by requesting money from the states, which seldom arrived.

text: In 1788, with the approval of Congress, the Articles were replaced by the United States Constitution and the new government began operations in 1789.[10]

text: Ratification

text: Congress began to move for ratification of the Articles of Confederation in 1777:

text: Permit us, then, earnestly to recommend these articles to the immediate and dispassionate attention of the legislatures of the respective states. Let them be candidly reviewed under a sense of the difficulty of combining in one system the various sentiments and interests of a continent divided into so many sovereign and independent communities, under a conviction of the absolute necessity of uniting all our councils and all our strength, to maintain and defend our common liberties...[11]

text: The document could not become officially effective until it was ratified by all 13 states. The first state to ratify was Virginia on December 16, 1777; the thirteenth state to ratify was Maryland on February 2, 1781. A ceremonial confirmation of this thirteenth, final ratification took place in the Congress on March 1, 1781, at high noon.[12][13][14] Twelve states had ratified the Articles by February 1779, 14 months into the process. Maryland, however, refused to go along until the landed states, especially Virginia, had indicated they were prepared to cede their claims west of the Ohio River to the Union.[15] It would be two years before the Maryland legislature became satisfied that they would follow through, and voted to ratify. The various states ratified the Articles of Confederation on the following dates:[16]

text:
State
Date

13 !1
 Virginia
000000001777-12-16-0000December 16, 1777

12 !2
 South Carolina
000000001778-02-05-0000February 5, 1778

08 !3
 New York
000000001778-02-06-0000February 6, 1778

11 !4
 Rhode Island
000000001778-02-09-0000February 9, 1778

01 !5
 Connecticut
000000001778-02-12-0000February 12, 1778

03 !6
 Georgia
000000001778-02-26-0000February 26, 1778

06 !7
 New Hampshire
000000001778-03-04-0000March 4, 1778

10 !8
 Pennsylvania
000000001778-03-05-0000March 5, 1778

05 !9
 Massachusetts
000000001778-03-10-0000March 10, 1778

09 !10
 North Carolina
000000001778-04-05-0000April 5, 1778

07 !11
 New Jersey
000000001778-11-19-0000November 19, 1778

02 !12
 Delaware
000000001779-02-01-0000February 1, 1779

04 !13
 Maryland
000000001781-02-02-0000February 2, 1781

tag: table

text: Article summaries

text: The Articles of Confederation contain a preamble, thirteen articles, a conclusion, and a signatory section. The preamble declares that the states "agree to certain articles of Confederation and perpetual Union." What follows here summarizes the purpose and content of each of the thirteen articles.

text:
Establishes the name of the confederation with these words: "The stile of this confederacy shall be 'The United States of America.'"
Asserts the sovereignty of each state, except for the specific powers delegated to the confederation government: "Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated."
Declares the purpose of the confederation: "The said States hereby severally enter into a firm league of friendship with each other, for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them, or any of them, on account of religion, sovereignty, trade, or any other pretense whatever."
Elaborates upon the intent "to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different States in this union," and to establish equal treatment and freedom of movement for the free inhabitants of each state to pass unhindered between the states, excluding "paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice." All these people are entitled to equal rights established by the state into which they travel. If a crime is committed in one state and the perpetrator flees to another state, he will be extradited to and tried in the state in which the crime was committed.
Allocates one vote in the Congress of the Confederation (the "United States in Congress Assembled") to each state, which is entitled to a delegation of between two and seven members. Members of Congress are to be appointed by state legislatures. No congressman may serve more than three out of any six years.
Only the central government may declare war, or conduct foreign political or commercial relations. No state or official may accept foreign gifts or titles, and granting any title of nobility is forbidden to all. No states may form any sub-national groups. No state may tax or interfere with treaty stipulations already proposed. No state may wage war without permission of Congress, unless invaded or under imminent attack on the frontier; no state may maintain a peacetime standing army or navy, unless infested by pirates, but every State is required to keep ready, a well-trained, disciplined, and equipped militia.
Whenever an army is raised for common defense, the state legislatures shall assign military ranks of colonel and below.
Expenditures by the United States of America will be paid with funds raised by state legislatures, and apportioned to the states in proportion to the real property values of each.
Powers and functions of the United States in Congress Assembled.

Grants to the United States in Congress assembled the sole and exclusive right and power to determine peace and war; to exchange ambassadors; to enter into treaties and alliances, with some provisos; to establish rules for deciding all cases of captures or prizes on land or water; to grant letters of marque and reprisal (documents authorizing privateers) in times of peace; to appoint courts for the trial of pirates and crimes committed on the high seas; to establish courts for appeals in all cases of captures, but no member of Congress may be appointed a judge; to set weights and measures (including coins), and for Congress to serve as a final court for disputes between states.
The court will be composed of jointly appointed commissioners or Congress shall appoint them. Each commissioner is bound by oath to be impartial. The court's decision is final.
Congress shall regulate the post offices; appoint officers in the military; and regulate the armed forces.
The United States in Congress assembled may appoint a president who shall not serve longer than one year per three-year term of the Congress.
Congress may request requisitions (demands for payments or supplies) from the states in proportion with their population, or take credit.
Congress may not declare war, enter into treaties and alliances, appropriate money, or appoint a commander in chief without nine states assented. Congress shall keep a journal of proceedings and adjourn for periods not to exceed six months.

When Congress is in recess, any of the powers of Congress may be executed by "The committee of the states, or any nine of them", except for those powers of Congress which require nine states in Congress to execute.
If "Canada" (as the British-held Province of Quebec was also known) accedes to this confederation, it will be admitted.[17] No other colony could be admitted without the consent of nine states.
Reaffirms that the Confederation accepts war debt incurred by Congress before the existence of the Articles.
Declares that the Articles shall be perpetual, and may be altered only with the approval of Congress and the ratification of all the state legislatures.

tag: ol

text: While still at war with Britain, the revolution's leaders were divided between forming a national government with powers either strong and centralized (the "federalists"), or strictly limited (the "anti federalists"). The Continental Congress compromised by dividing sovereignty between the states and the central government, with a unicameral legislature that protected the liberty of the individual states. It empowered Congress to regulate military and monetary affairs, for example, but provided no mechanism to compel the States to comply with requests for either troops or funding. This left the military vulnerable to inadequate funding, supplies, or even food.[18]

text: End of the Revolutionary War

text: The Treaty of Paris (1783), which ended hostilities with Great Britain, languished in Congress for months because several state representatives failed to attend sessions of the national legislature to ratify it. Yet Congress had no power to enforce attendance. In September 1783, George Washington complained that Congress was paralyzed.[19] Many revolutionaries had gone to their respective home countries after the war, and local government and self-rule seemed quite satisfactory.

text: Function

text: The Army

text: The Articles supported the Congressional direction of the Continental Army, and allowed the states to present a unified front when dealing with the European powers. As a tool to build a centralized war-making government, they were largely a failure: Historian Bruce Chadwick wrote:

text: George Washington had been one of the very first proponents of a strong federal government. The army had nearly disbanded on several occasions during the winters of the war because of the weaknesses of the Continental Congress. ... The delegates could not draft soldiers and had to send requests for regular troops and militia to the states. Congress had the right to order the production and purchase of provisions for the soldiers, but could not force anyone to supply them, and the army nearly starved in several winters of war.[20]

text: The Continental Congress, before the Articles were approved, had promised soldiers a pension of half pay for life. However Congress had no power to compel the states to fund this obligation, and as the war wound down after the victory at Yorktown the sense of urgency to support the military was no longer a factor. No progress was made in Congress during the winter of 1783–84. General Henry Knox, who would later become the first Secretary of War under the Constitution, blamed the weaknesses of the Articles for the inability of the government to fund the army. The army had long been supportive of a strong union.[21] Knox wrote:

text: The army generally have always reprobated the idea of being thirteen armies. Their ardent desires have been to be one continental body looking up to one sovereign. ... It is a favorite toast in the army, "A hoop to the barrel" or "Cement to the Union".[22]

text: As Congress failed to act on the petitions, Knox wrote to Gouverneur Morris, four years before the Philadelphia Convention was convened, "As the present Constitution is so defective, why do not you great men call the people together and tell them so; that is, to have a convention of the States to form a better Constitution."[22]

text: Once the war had been won, the Continental Army was largely disbanded. A very small national force was maintained to man the frontier forts and to protect against Native American attacks. Meanwhile, each of the states had an army (or militia), and 11 of them had navies. The wartime promises of bounties and land grants to be paid for service were not being met. In 1783, George Washington defused the Newburgh conspiracy, but riots by unpaid Pennsylvania veterans forced Congress to leave Philadelphia temporarily.[23]

text: The Congress from time to time during the Revolutionary War requisitioned troops from the states. Any contributions were voluntary, and in the debates of 1788 the Federalists (who supported the proposed new Constitution) claimed that state politicians acted unilaterally, and contributed when the Continental army protected their state's interests. The Anti-Federalists claimed that state politicians understood their duty to the Union and contributed to advance its needs. Dougherty (2009) concludes that generally the States' behavior validated the Federalist analysis. This helps explain why the Articles of Confederation needed reforms.[24]

text: Foreign policy

text: Even after peace had been achieved in 1783, the weakness of the Confederation government frustrated the ability of the government to conduct foreign policy. In 1789, Thomas Jefferson, concerned over the failure to fund an American naval force to confront the Barbary pirates, wrote to James Monroe, "It will be said there is no money in the treasury. There never will be money in the treasury till the Confederacy shows its teeth. The states must see the rod."[25]

text: Furthermore, the Jay–Gardoqui Treaty with Spain in 1789 also showed weakness in foreign policy. In this treaty — which was never ratified due to its immense unpopularity — the United States was to give up rights to use the Mississippi River for 25 years, which would have economically strangled the settlers west of the Appalachian Mountains. Finally, due to the Confederation's military weakness, it could not compel the British army to leave frontier forts which were on American soil — forts which, in 1783, the British promised to leave, but which they delayed leaving pending U.S. implementation of other provisions such as ending action against Loyalists and allowing them to seek compensation. This incomplete British implementation of the Treaty of Paris (1783) was superseded by the implementation of Jay's Treaty in 1795 under the new U.S. Constitution.

text: Taxation and commerce

text: Under the Articles of Confederation, the central government's power was kept quite limited. The Confederation Congress could make decisions, but lacked enforcement powers. Implementation of most decisions, including modifications to the Articles, required unanimous approval of all thirteen state legislatures.[26]

text: Congress was denied any powers of taxation: it could only request money from the states. The states often failed to meet these requests in full, leaving both Congress and the Continental Army chronically short of money. As more money was printed by Congress, the continental dollars depreciated. In 1779, George Washington wrote to John Jay, who was serving as the president of the Continental Congress, "that a wagon load of money will scarcely purchase a wagon load of provisions."[27] Mr. Jay and the Congress responded in May by requesting $45 million from the States. In an appeal to the States to comply, Jay wrote that the taxes were "the price of liberty, the peace, and the safety of yourselves and posterity."[28] He argued that Americans should avoid having it said "that America had no sooner become independent than she became insolvent" or that "her infant glories and growing fame were obscured and tarnished by broken contracts and violated faith."[29] The States did not respond with any of the money requested from them.

text: Congress had also been denied the power to regulate either foreign trade or interstate commerce and, as a result, all of the States maintained control over their own trade policies. The states and the Confederation Congress both incurred large debts during the Revolutionary War, and how to repay those debts became a major issue of debate following the War. Some States paid off their war debts and others did not. Federal assumption of the states' war debts became a major issue in the deliberations of the Constitutional Convention.

text: Accomplishments of the Confederation

text: This section does not cite any sources. Please help improve this section by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (February 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

text: Nevertheless, the Confederation Congress did take two actions with long-lasting impact. The Land Ordinance of 1785 and Northwest Ordinance created territorial government, set up protocols for the admission of new states and the division of land into useful units, and set aside land in each township for public use. This system represented a sharp break from imperial colonization, as in Europe, and provided the basis for the rest of American continental expansion through the 19th Century.

text: The Land Ordinance of 1785 established both the general practices of land surveying in the west and northwest and the land ownership provisions used throughout the later westward expansion beyond the Mississippi River. Frontier lands were surveyed into the now-familiar squares of land called the township (36 square miles), the section (one square mile), and the quarter section (160 acres). This system was carried forward to most of the States west of the Mississippi (excluding areas of Texas and California that had already been surveyed and divided up by the Spanish Empire). Then, when the Homestead Act was enacted in 1867, the quarter section became the basic unit of land that was granted to new settler-farmers.

text: The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 noted the agreement of the original states to give up northwestern land claims, organized the Northwest Territory and laid the groundwork for the eventual creation of new states. While it didn't happen under the articles, the land north of the Ohio River and west of the (present) western border of Pennsylvania ceded by Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, eventually became the states of: Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Wisconsin, and the part of Minnesota east of the Mississippi River. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 also made great advances in the abolition of slavery. New states admitted to the union in this territory would never be slave states.

text: No new states were admitted to the Union under the Articles of Confederation. The Articles provided for a blanket acceptance of the Province of Quebec (referred to as "Canada" in the Articles) into the United States if it chose to do so. It did not, and the subsequent Constitution carried no such special provision of admission. Additionally, ordinances to admit Frankland (later modified to Franklin), Kentucky, and Vermont to the Union were considered, but none were approved.

text: The United States of America under the Articles

text: The peace treaty left the United States independent and at peace but with an unsettled governmental structure. The Articles envisioned a permanent confederation, but granted to the Congress—the only federal institution—little power to finance itself or to ensure that its resolutions were enforced. There was no president and no national court.[30][31] Although historians generally agree that the Articles were too weak to hold the fast-growing nation together, they do give credit to the settlement of the western issue, as the states voluntarily turned over their lands to national control.[32]

text: By 1783, with the end of the British blockade, the new nation was regaining its prosperity. However, trade opportunities were restricted by the mercantilism of the British and French empires. The ports of the British West Indies were closed to all staple products which were not carried in British ships. France and Spain established similar policies. Simultaneously, new manufacturers faced sharp competition from British products which were suddenly available again. Political unrest in several states and efforts by debtors to use popular government to erase their debts increased the anxiety of the political and economic elites which had led the Revolution. The apparent inability of the Congress to redeem the public obligations (debts) incurred during the war, or to become a forum for productive cooperation among the states to encourage commerce and economic development, only aggravated a gloomy situation. In 1786–87, Shays' Rebellion, an uprising of dissidents in western Massachusetts against the state court system, threatened the stability of state government.[33]

text: The Continental Congress printed paper money which was so depreciated that it ceased to pass as currency, spawning the expression "not worth a continental". Congress could not levy taxes and could only make requisitions upon the States. Less than a million and a half dollars came into the treasury between 1781 and 1784, although the governors had been asked for two million in 1783 alone.[34]

text: When John Adams went to London in 1785 as the first representative of the United States, he found it impossible to secure a treaty for unrestricted commerce. Demands were made for favors and there was no assurance that individual states would agree to a treaty. Adams stated it was necessary for the States to confer the power of passing navigation laws to Congress, or that the States themselves pass retaliatory acts against Great Britain. Congress had already requested and failed to get power over navigation laws. Meanwhile, each State acted individually against Great Britain to little effect. When other New England states closed their ports to British shipping, Connecticut hastened to profit by opening its ports.[35]

text: By 1787 Congress was unable to protect manufacturing and shipping. State legislatures were unable or unwilling to resist attacks upon private contracts and public credit. Land speculators expected no rise in values when the government could not defend its borders nor protect its frontier population.[36]

text: The idea of a convention to revise the Articles of Confederation grew in favor. Alexander Hamilton realized while serving as Washington's top aide that a strong central government was necessary to avoid foreign intervention and allay the frustrations due to an ineffectual Congress. Hamilton led a group of like-minded nationalists, won Washington's endorsement, and convened the Annapolis Convention in 1786 to petition Congress to call a constitutional convention to meet in Philadelphia to remedy the long-term crisis.[37]

text: Signatures

text: The Second Continental Congress approved the Articles for distribution to the states on November 15, 1777. A copy was made for each state and one was kept by the Congress. On November 28, the copies sent to the states for ratification were unsigned, and the cover letter, dated November 17, had only the signatures of Henry Laurens and Charles Thomson, who were the President and Secretary to the Congress.

text: The Articles, however, were unsigned, and the date was blank. Congress began the signing process by examining their copy of the Articles on June 27, 1778. They ordered a final copy prepared (the one in the National Archives), and that delegates should inform the secretary of their authority for ratification.

text: On July 9, 1778, the prepared copy was ready. They dated it, and began to sign. They also requested each of the remaining states to notify its delegation when ratification was completed. On that date, delegates present from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and South Carolina signed the Articles to indicate that their states had ratified. New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland could not, since their states had not ratified. North Carolina and Georgia also were unable to sign that day, since their delegations were absent.

text: After the first signing, some delegates signed at the next meeting they attended. For example, John Wentworth of New Hampshire added his name on August 8. John Penn was the first of North Carolina's delegates to arrive (on July 10), and the delegation signed the Articles on July 21, 1778.

text: The other states had to wait until they ratified the Articles and notified their Congressional delegation. Georgia signed on July 24, New Jersey on November 26, and Delaware on February 12, 1779. Maryland refused to ratify the Articles until every state had ceded its western land claims.

text: On February 2, 1781, the much-awaited decision was taken by the Maryland General Assembly in Annapolis.[38] As the last piece of business during the afternoon Session, "among engrossed Bills" was "signed and sealed by Governor Thomas Sim Lee in the Senate Chamber, in the presence of the members of both Houses... an Act to empower the delegates of this state in Congress to subscribe and ratify the articles of confederation" and perpetual union among the states. The Senate then adjourned "to the first Monday in August next." The decision of Maryland to ratify the Articles was reported to the Continental Congress on February 12. The confirmation signing of the Articles by the two Maryland delegates took place in Philadelphia at noon time on March 1, 1781, and was celebrated in the afternoon. With these events, the Articles were entered into force and the United States of America came into being as a sovereign federal state.

text: Congress had debated the Articles for over a year and a half, and the ratification process had taken nearly three and a half years. Many participants in the original debates were no longer delegates, and some of the signers had only recently arrived. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union were signed by a group of men who were never present in the Congress at the same time.

text: Signers

text: The signers and the states they represented were:

text:
Connecticut

Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
Oliver Wolcott
Titus Hosmer
Andrew Adams

Delaware

Thomas McKean
John Dickinson
Nicholas Van Dyke

Georgia

John Walton
Edward Telfair
Edward Langworthy

Maryland

John Hanson
Daniel Carroll

Massachusetts Bay

John Hancock
Samuel Adams
Elbridge Gerry
Francis Dana
James Lovell
Samuel Holten

New Hampshire

Josiah Bartlett
John Wentworth Jr.

New Jersey

John Witherspoon
Nathaniel Scudder

New York

James Duane
Francis Lewis
William Duer
Gouverneur Morris

North Carolina

John Penn
Cornelius Harnett
John Williams

Pennsylvania

Robert Morris
Daniel Roberdeau
Jonathan Bayard Smith
William Clingan
Joseph Reed

Rhode Island and Providence Plantations

William Ellery
Henry Marchant
John Collins

South Carolina

Henry Laurens
William Henry Drayton
John Mathews
Richard Hutson
Thomas Heyward Jr.

Virginia

Richard Henry Lee
John Banister
Thomas Adams
John Harvie
Francis Lightfoot Lee

text: Roger Sherman (Connecticut) was the only person to sign all four great state papers of the United States: the Continental Association, the United States Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

text: Robert Morris (Pennsylvania) signed three of the great state papers of the United States: the United States Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

text: John Dickinson (Delaware), Daniel Carroll (Maryland) and Gouverneur Morris (New York), along with Sherman and Robert Morris, were the only five people to sign both the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution (Gouverneur Morris represented Pennsylvania when signing the Constitution).

text: Presidents of the Congress

text: The following list is of those who led the Congress of the Confederation under the Articles of Confederation as the Presidents of the United States in Congress Assembled. Under the Articles, the president was the presiding officer of Congress, chaired the Committee of the States when Congress was in recess, and performed other administrative functions. He was not, however, an executive in the way the successor President of the United States is a chief executive, since all of the functions he executed were under the direct control of Congress.[39]

text:
President of Congress
Office Start
Office Exit

Samuel Huntington
March 1, 1781
July 9, 1781

Thomas McKean
July 10, 1781
November 4, 1781

John Hanson
November 5, 1781
November 3, 1782

Elias Boudinot
November 4, 1782
November 2, 1783

Thomas Mifflin
November 3, 1783
October 31, 1784

Richard Henry Lee
November 30, 1784
November 6, 1785

John Hancock
November 23, 1785
May 29, 1786

Nathaniel Gorham
June 6, 1786
November 5, 1786

Arthur St. Clair
February 2, 1787
November 4, 1787

Cyrus Griffin
January 22, 1788
November 2, 1788

text: For a full list of Presidents of the Congress Assembled and Presidents under the two Continental Congresses before the Articles, see President of the Continental Congress.

text: Gallery

text: Images of an original draft[clarification needed] of the Articles of Confederation stored at the United States National Archive.

text:
Preamble through Article V, ¶1

Article V, ¶2 through Article VI

Article VII through Article IX, ¶2

Article IX, ¶2 through ¶5

Article IX, ¶5 through Article XIII, ¶2

Article XIII, ¶2 through signatures

tag: ul

text: Revision and replacement

text: On January 21, 1786, the Virginia Legislature, following James Madison's recommendation, invited all the states to send delegates to Annapolis, Maryland to discuss ways to reduce interstate conflict. At what came to be known as the Annapolis Convention, the few state delegates in attendance endorsed a motion that called for all states to meet in Philadelphia in May 1787 to discuss ways to improve the Articles of Confederation in a "Grand Convention." Although the states' representatives to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were only authorized to amend the Articles, the representatives held secret, closed-door sessions and wrote a new constitution. The new Constitution gave much more power to the central government, but characterization of the result is disputed. The general goal of the authors was to get close to a republic as defined by the philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment, while trying to address the many difficulties of the interstate relationships. Historian Forrest McDonald, using the ideas of James Madison from Federalist 39, describes the change this way:

text: The constitutional reallocation of powers created a new form of government, unprecedented under the sun. Every previous national authority either had been centralized or else had been a confederation of sovereign states. The new American system was neither one nor the other; it was a mixture of both.[40]

text: In May 1786, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina proposed that Congress revise the Articles of Confederation. Recommended changes included granting Congress power over foreign and domestic commerce, and providing means for Congress to collect money from state treasuries. Unanimous approval was necessary to make the alterations, however, and Congress failed to reach a consensus. The weakness of the Articles in establishing an effective unifying government was underscored by the threat of internal conflict both within and between the states, especially after Shays' Rebellion threatened to topple the state government of Massachusetts.

text: Historian Ralph Ketcham comments on the opinions of Patrick Henry, George Mason, and other Anti-Federalists who were not so eager to give up the local autonomy won by the revolution:

text: Antifederalists feared what Patrick Henry termed the "consolidated government" proposed by the new Constitution. They saw in Federalist hopes for commercial growth and international prestige only the lust of ambitious men for a "splendid empire" that, in the time-honored way of empires, would oppress the people with taxes, conscription, and military campaigns. Uncertain that any government over so vast a domain as the United States could be controlled by the people, Antifederalists saw in the enlarged powers of the general government only the familiar threats to the rights and liberties of the people.[41]

text: Historians have given many reasons for the perceived need to replace the articles in 1787. Jillson and Wilson (1994) point to the financial weakness as well as the norms, rules and institutional structures of the Congress, and the propensity to divide along sectional lines.

text: Rakove (1988) identifies several factors that explain the collapse of the Confederation. The lack of compulsory direct taxation power was objectionable to those wanting a strong centralized state or expecting to benefit from such power. It could not collect customs after the war because tariffs were vetoed by Rhode Island. Rakove concludes that their failure to implement national measures "stemmed not from a heady sense of independence but rather from the enormous difficulties that all the states encountered in collecting taxes, mustering men, and gathering supplies from a war-weary populace."[42] The second group of factors Rakove identified derived from the substantive nature of the problems the Continental Congress confronted after 1783, especially the inability to create a strong foreign policy. Finally, the Confederation's lack of coercive power reduced the likelihood for profit to be made by political means, thus potential rulers were uninspired to seek power.

text: When the war ended in 1783, certain special interests had incentives to create a new "merchant state," much like the British state people had rebelled against. In particular, holders of war scrip and land speculators wanted a central government to pay off scrip at face value and to legalize western land holdings with disputed claims. Also, manufacturers wanted a high tariff as a barrier to foreign goods, but competition among states made this impossible without a central government.[43]

text: Legitimacy of closing down

text: Political scientist David C. Hendrickson writes that two prominent political leaders in the Confederation, John Jay of New York and Thomas Burke of North Carolina believed that "the authority of the congress rested on the prior acts of the several states, to which the states gave their voluntary consent, and until those obligations were fulfilled, neither nullification of the authority of congress, exercising its due powers, nor secession from the compact itself was consistent with the terms of their original pledges."[44]

text: According to Article XIII of the Confederation, any alteration had to be approved unanimously:

text: [T]he Articles of this Confederation shall be inviolably observed by every State, and the Union shall be perpetual; nor shall any alteration at any time hereafter be made in any of them; unless such alteration be agreed to in a Congress of the United States, and be afterwards confirmed by the legislatures of every State.

text: On the other hand, Article VII of the proposed Constitution stated that it would become effective after ratification by a mere nine states, without unanimity:

text: The Ratification of the Conventions of nine States, shall be sufficient for the Establishment of this Constitution between the States so ratifying the Same.

text: The apparent tension between these two provisions was addressed at the time, and remains a topic of scholarly discussion. In 1788, James Madison remarked (in Federalist No. 40) that the issue had become moot: "As this objection...has been in a manner waived by those who have criticised the powers of the convention, I dismiss it without further observation." Nevertheless, it is an interesting historical and legal question whether opponents of the Constitution could have plausibly attacked the Constitution on that ground. At the time, there were state legislators who argued that the Constitution was not an alteration of the Articles of Confederation, but rather would be a complete replacement so the unanimity rule did not apply.[45] Moreover, the Confederation had proven woefully inadequate and therefore was supposedly no longer binding.[45]

text: Modern scholars such as Francisco Forrest Martin agree that the Articles of Confederation had lost its binding force because many states had violated it, and thus "other states-parties did not have to comply with the Articles' unanimous consent rule".[46] In contrast, law professor Akhil Amar suggests that there may not have really been any conflict between the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution on this point; Article VI of the Confederation specifically allowed side deals among states, and the Constitution could be viewed as a side deal until all states ratified it.[47]

text: Final months

text: On July 3, 1788, the Congress received New Hampshire's all-important ninth ratification of the proposed Constitution, thus, according to its terms, establishing it as the new framework of governance for the ratifying states. The following day delegates considered a bill to admit Kentucky into the Union as a sovereign state. The discussion ended with Congress making the determination that, in light of this development, it would be "unadvisable" to admit Kentucky into the Union, as it could do so "under the Articles of Confederation" only, but not "under the Constitution".[48]

text: By the end of July 1788, 11 of the 13 states had ratified the new Constitution. Congress continued to convene under the Articles with a quorum until October.[49][50] On Saturday, September 13, 1788, the Confederation Congress voted the resolve to implement the new Constitution, and on Monday, September 15 published an announcement that the new Constitution had been ratified by the necessary nine states, set the first Wednesday in February 1789 for the presidential electors to meet and select a new president, and set the first Wednesday of March 1789 as the day the new government would take over and the government under the Articles of Confederation would come to an end.[51][52] On that same September 13, it determined that New York would remain the national capital.[51]


document_title: Homecoming

question_text: where did the idea of homecoming come from

text: Homecoming

text: United States[edit]

text: Homecoming (colloquially known as "hoco" or "HoCo" in some parts of the US)[which?] is an annual tradition in the United States. People, towns, high schools, and colleges come together, usually in late September or early October, to welcome back alumni and former residents. It is built around a central event, such as a banquet or dance and, most often, a game of American football, or, on occasion, basketball, ice hockey, or soccer. When celebrated by schools, the activities vary widely. However, they usually consist of a football game played on a school's home football field, activities for students and alumni, a parade featuring the school's choir, marching band, and sports teams, and the coronation of a homecoming queen (and at many schools, a homecoming king). A dance commonly follows the game or the day following the game. When attached to a football game, homecoming traditionally occurs on the team's return from the longest road trip of the season. The game itself, whether it be football or another sport, will typically feature the home team playing a considerably weaker opponent. The game is supposed to be an "easy win" and thus weaker schools will sometimes play lower division schools.

text: Origins[edit]

text: The tradition of homecoming has its origin in alumni football games held at colleges and universities since the 19th century. Many schools including Baylor, Southwestern, Illinois, and Missouri[1][2][3] have made claims that they held the first modern homecoming. The NCAA, Trivial Pursuit, Jeopardy!, and references from the American TV drama NCIS give the title to the University of Missouri's 1911 football game during which alumni were encouraged to attend. It was the first annual homecoming centered on a parade and a football game.[4]

text: In 1891, the Missouri Tigers first faced off against the Kansas Jayhawks in the first installment of the Border War, which was also the oldest college football rivalry west of the Mississippi River until the teams stopped playing each other in 2012. The intense rivalry originally took place at neutral sites, usually in Kansas City, Missouri, until a new conference regulation was announced that required intercollegiate football games to be played on collegiate campuses.  To renew excitement in the rivalry, ensure adequate attendance at the new location, and celebrate the first meeting of the two teams on the Mizzou campus in Columbia, Missouri, Mizzou Athletic Director Chester Brewer invited all alumni to "come home" for the game in 1911.  Along with the football game, the celebration included a parade and spirit rally with bonfire. The event was a success, with nearly 10,000 alumni coming home to take part in the celebration and watch the Tigers and Jayhawks play to a 3–3 tie. The Missouri annual homecoming, with its parade and spirit rally centered on a large football game is the model that has gone on to take hold at colleges and high schools across the United States.[5][6]

text: At least two collegiate homecoming celebrations predate the University of Missouri football game homecoming event: Southwestern University, in Georgetown, TX and Baylor University, in Waco, TX. By multiple historical accounts, Southwestern held the first homecoming on record on Wednesday, April 21, 1909 in San Gabriel Park. Former students raised funds, provided homes, prepared and served a barbecue supper, and decorated the town buildings. Members of the senior class waited tables.[7]

text: Northern Illinois University has one of the longest-celebrated homecoming traditions in the country. The alumni football game played on Oct. 10, 1903, began NIU's homecoming tradition.[8]

text: Baylor's homecoming history dates back to November 1909 and included a parade, reunion parties, and an afternoon football game (the final game of the 1909 season), a tradition that continued and celebrated its 100th anniversary in 2009.[9][10] There was a gap between 1910 and 1915 when there was no homecoming event, however there has been continuity since 1915.

text: The University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign first held its homecoming event in 1910, celebrating the 100th anniversary in 2010.  This event was held annually except for 1918, when it was cancelled because of the influenza epidemic.

text: Traditions[edit]

text: Homecoming Court[edit]

text: The homecoming court is a representative group of students that, in a coeducational institution, consists of a king and queen, and possibly prince(s) and princess(es). In a single-sex institution, the homecoming court will usually consist of only a king and a prince (for an all-male school) or a queen and a princess (for an all-female school), although some schools may choose to join with single-gender schools of the other gender to elect the homecoming court jointly.

text: Generally, the king and queen are students completing their final years of study at their school (also called “seniors”), while the prince and princess are underclassmen, often with a prince/princess for each grade. Recently, some high schools have chosen to add categories, such as duke and duchess, to extend the representation of students to include a category in which students with special needs are elected. In high school, 17- or 18-year-old students in their final year are represented by a king or queen; in college, students who are completing their final year of study, usually between 21 and 23 years old.

text: Local rules determine when the homecoming king and queen are crowned. Sometimes, the big announcement comes at a pep rally, school assembly, or public ceremony one or more days before the football game. Other schools crown their royalty at the homecoming football game, a dance, or other school event.

text: Often, the previous year's king and queen are invited back to crown their successors. If they are absent for whatever reason, someone else—usually, another previous king or queen, a popular teacher, or other designated person—will perform those duties. Usually, the queen is crowned first, followed by the king. The crowning method also varies by school.

text: Homecoming court members who are not crowned king or queen are often called escorts or royalty. They are often expected to participate in the week's activities as well. At some schools, a homecoming prince/princess, duke/duchess, etc. (often underclassmen nominated by their classmates) are crowned along with the king and queen; sometimes, middle school and junior high students may partake in the high school activities.

text: Classmates traditionally nominate students who have done a lot to contribute to their school, then students vote for members of the court from the nominees. Once the homecoming court candidates are announced, the entire student body votes for the queen and king. The voting is often conducted by secret ballot, but other methods may also be used by certain schools.

text: Parade[edit]

text: Many homecoming celebrations include a parade. Students often select the grand marshal based on a history of service and support to the school and community. The parade includes the school's marching band and different school organizations’ floats created by the classes and organizations and most of the sports get a chance to be in the parade. Every class prepares a float which corresponds with the homecoming theme or related theme of school spirit as assign by school administrators. In addition, the homecoming court takes part in the parade, often riding together in one or more convertibles as part of the parade. Community civic organizations and businesses, area fire departments, and alumni groups often participate as well. The parade is often part of a series of activities scheduled for that specific day, which can also include a pep rally, bonfire, snake dance, and other activities for students and alumni.

text: Tailgate[edit]

text: At most major colleges and universities, the football game and preceding tailgate party are the most widely recognized and heavily attended events of the week. Alumni gather from all around the world to return to their alma mater, reconnect with one another, and take part in the festivities. Students, alumni, businesses, and members of the community set up tents in parking lots, fields, and streets near the stadium to cook food, play games, socialize, binge drink, and even enjoy live music in many instances. These celebrations often last straight through the game for those who do not have tickets but still come to take part in the socializing and excitement of the homecoming atmosphere. Most tents even include television or radio feeds of the game for those without tickets.

text: Picnic[edit]

text: Sometimes during the school week, a picnic can occur. The picnic is very similar to the tailgate party, but it occurs after school or during the school's lunch period.

text: Dress-up days[edit]

text: Throughout the week, many schools (particularly high schools) engage in special dress-up days, sometimes called "Spirit Week", where students are allowed to wear clothing suitable to the theme (e.g., 80s day, toga day, roll out of bed day, cowboy day, nerd day, pirate day, meme day, Rat Pack Day, flannel Friday, What-not-to-wear Wednesday) leading to the homecoming. Students traditionally wear clothing with their school's name, or clothing and makeup of their school's colors on Friday.

text: Pep Rallies[edit]

text: Many schools hold a rally during homecoming week, often one or more nights before the game. The events vary, but may include skits, games, introduction of the homecoming court (and coronation of the king and queen if that is the school's tradition), and comments from the football players or coach about the upcoming game.

text: At some schools, the homecoming rally ends with a bonfire (in which old wood structures, the rival school's memorabilia and other items are burned in a controlled fire.) Many colleges and high schools no longer hold bonfires because of accidents that have occurred surrounding these events in the past. The most well known accident took place in 1999, when 12 students were killed and 27 others were injured at Texas A&M University when a 40-foot-tall (12 m) pile of logs that had been assembled for a bonfire collapsed.[11] However, this incident was not associated with homecoming—A&M is one of the few schools that does not organize a homecoming, although it has many unique traditions. The bonfire was associated with the annual rivalry game between A&M and the University of Texas.

text: Alumni Band[edit]

text: The alumni band consists of former college and university band members who return for homecoming to perform with the current marching band (usually made up from recent graduates to members who graduated years or decades before) either during halftime as a full band or a featured section, e.g. the trumpet section or the tubas and drumline squads, as well as performing with the current band during the post game concert.

text: Homecoming dance[edit]

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text: The homecoming dance—usually the culminating event of the week (for high schools)—is a formal or informal event, either at the school or an off-campus location. The venue is decorated, and either a disc jockey or band is hired to play music. In many ways, it is a fall prom. Homecoming dances could be informal as well just like standard school dances. At high schools, the homecoming dances are sometimes held in the high school gymnasium or outside in a large field. Homecoming dance attire is less formal than prom. Females generally wear knee length dresses with their hair down, and males generally wear a tucked in dress shirt with pants. At prom, females generally wear a more formal gown that goes to the ground with hair up, and males wear suits and tuxedos.

text: Since most colleges are too large to facilitate a campus-wide dance, these events are usually handled instead by student organizations such as fraternities, sororities, and residential colleges. Because football and alumni events are the focal points of collegiate homecoming, dances often take place during a different week when schedules are more permitting, or not at all.

text: Competitions[edit]

text: At the high school level, students generally compete by grade level in events such as the spirit days, parade floats, and powder puff football. The competition at the collegiate level is mainly between Greek-letter organizations and, to a lesser degree, residence halls. At most larger schools, fraternities and sororities compete on parade floats, house decorations, skits, talent competitions, and even service events such as blood drives or food drives. Sometimes on coronation night, some schools have games that they play between classes. Such events include the pyramid, the 3 legged race, the pop chug, and tug of war.

text: Smaller school homecomings[edit]

text: While most schools schedule their homecoming activities around football, smaller schools that do not field a football team may plan the annual event at another time of the year. In these instances, basketball, ice hockey or soccer serves as the "big game" for students and alumni. Often in smaller towns with smaller populations, the parade is omitted.

text: At schools without athletic programs, the centerpiece event is usually a banquet, where alumni are recognized. This format is also used for alumni events of high schools that have either closed or consolidated with other high schools; the high school classes continue to meet and celebrate their years at their now-defunct alma mater. In other cases, alumni of closed schools will participate with the consolidated school's homecoming, where special recognition is often given for alumni of the once-separate schools.

text: Courtwarming[edit]

text: In some parts of the country, high school basketball has gained a homecoming celebration of its own. Often referred to as winter homecoming, hoopcoming, coronation, snowcoming, "Colors Day," or courtwarming (the latter is especially prominent in parts of Missouri), it usually includes rallies, dress-up days, special dinners, king and queen coronations, and other winter-friendly activities typically associated with football homecoming.

text: Canada[edit]

text: Canadian homecoming weekends are often centred on a football game.

text: In Newfoundland and Labrador, communities have a "Come Home Year" where people who have moved away from their town come back from across Canada. In 2000, there was a provincial "Come Home Year", where many people came back to visit their various communities.

text: Homecomings largely only exist among high schools in eastern Canada, and are uncommon at that. Newmarket High School, London South Collegiate Institute, Banting Memorial High School and Earl Haig Secondary School are examples of known schools in Ontario to arrange homecomings. Upper Canada College also has a longstanding homecoming tradition, although the event is referred to as "A-Day" (Association Day).

text: Church homecomings[edit]

text: The term "homecoming" can also refer to the special services conducted by some religious congregations, particularly by many smaller American Protestant churches, to celebrate church heritage and welcome back former members or pastors. They are often held annually, but are sometimes held as one-time-only events, to celebrate the occasion.