New Jersey had the clearest vision
of all.
"We are of the opinion," said her Legislature, "that the sole and
exclusive power of regulating the trade of the United States with
foreign nations ought to be clearly vested in the Congress, and that the
revenue arising from all duties and customs imposed thereon ought to be
appropriated to the building, equipping, and manning a navy, for the
protection of the trade and defence of the coasts, and to such other
public and general purposes as to the Congress shall seem proper and for
the common benefit of the states."
Neither this nor any of the forty-six amendments thus proposed by the
States was adopted by the Congress. The Articles stood as first adopted
until their overthrow.
Maryland, for reasons to be given hereafter, was the last State to
consent to the Articles. On March 2, 1781, the legal government of the
Articles of Confederation took the place of the illegal revolutionary
government, which had existed by common consent since 1776. A few guns
were fired, and flags displayed, but there was nothing to show the
change. The United States Congress, as it came to be called, was the
chief evidence of the Federation.
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