How did America evolve to a Strong Federal System?

Question

During the National era, how did the American Government Evolve from a confederation to a strong federal system?

It's a question in my summer work for school, and I'm struggling with it. Any help?

Answer 1

Alexander Hamilton

He was anti-slavery of African Americans while Aaron Burr was a selfish man.

Alexander Hamilton as a lawyer would represent people that could never afford to pay for some of his services.

I will do more research about him.

Answer 2

I think you may have to define "strong Federal system." We went from a confederation to a Federal system with the ratification of the Constitution in 1789. But that Federal system was fairly weak and did not have a fraction of the power it has today.

As another person answered, the Civil War was a watershed period in US history, and the issue of state's rights was a major reason for the start of that war. However, there were very few real changes in how the Government operated due to the war. Nullification was pretty much wiped out as a legal theory, and of course, slavery was abolished, but I don't think there was much of a difference in the Federal system what existed in 1859 and what existed in 1866. (Except in the South, where Federal law was installed for a number of years after the war.)

I think the real major shift to a strong Federal system occurred under TR's Square Deal in the early 1900s (Pure food laws, Federal park system) and FDR's New Deal in the 1930's. The States were unable to cope with the Great Depression, so a series of laws were implemented to try to deal with the economic and political pressures of the time. Federal power expanded greatly: new laws were enacted dealing with labor laws (union, child labor, overtime, and minimum wage regulations - Norris-LaGuardia Act, Wagner Act-NLRA, Fair Labor Standards Act - Wage and Hour), banking (FDIC), and stock trading (SEC), for just a few examples. Once the Federal government got involved in all of these areas, and others, the size of the government grew rapidly to what we see today.

Note - I'm not implying that any of this is good or bad - it's just how I see it happening.

Answer 3

The Civil War.

That was the conflict between those who wanted a state-strong confederacy, versus the federal system we have now.