Shays' Rebellion

<h1>Text Preview</h1> <p>The Economic difficulties that continued to plague Americans throughout the 1780s were the source of growing social unrest. All through the summer of 1786, popular conventions and informal gatherings in several states demanded reform of the state administrations. That same summer, an uprising known as Shays’s Rebellion took place in western Massachusetts. The leaders of Massachusetts were rigidly conservative, and rather than print currency to pay off the state’s debts, they increased taxes that fell most heavily on farmers and the poor. Several Massachusetts farmers, many of them war veterans, were losing their farms through mortgage foreclosures and tax delinquencies.<BR></p> <p>When the Massachusetts legislature adjourned in 1786 without providing the citizens with relief from high tax rates and debt, the western counties revolted. An armed mob began to stop foreclosures by forcibly preventing the courts from holding their sessions. Under the leadership of Daniel Shays, a farmer and former army captain, a group of nearly 1,200 disgruntled farmers marched to the federal arsenal at Springfield, Massachusetts. Shays’s followers sought a more flexible money policy, suspension of property confiscations, and the right to postpone paying taxes until the depression lifted. <BR></p> <p>The Massachusetts authorities summoned troops and quickly put an end to the uprising. Daniel Shays was condemned to death, but was later pardoned. When the next legislature came into session, the majority sympathized with the rebels and met some of their demands for debt relief.<BR></p> <p>Thomas Jefferson commented from Paris, where he was serving as minister to France, that this was just a small uprising and that it was good for the health of the government. However, most did not agree with Jefferson’s position and instead were of the same mind as the usually unexcitable George Washington, who felt that the country was on the verge of anarchy.<BR></p> <p>The conditions of the new nation, including diplomatic problems, a strong concern for property rights, economic depression, lack of commercial control, and Shays's Rebellion, were troubling and led to discussions about the need for a stronger central government. Advocates of a stronger central government began to demand a convention to revise the Articles of Confederation. <BR></p> <p>The first steps toward reform were taken when a dispute between Maryland and Virginia over navigation on the Potomac River, and thus control of commerce, occurred. The argument led to a conference of representatives at Annapolis, Maryland, in 1786. However, since the Annapolis Convention represented only five of the thirteen states, Alexander Hamilton convinced his colleagues to call all the states to appoint representatives for a meeting to discuss general commercial problems. The meeting was to be held the following spring in Philadelphia. <BR></p> <p>The Annapolis group approved Hamilton’s recommendation for a conference to discuss governmental reform and trade between the states. The Continental Congress reluctantly endorsed the meeting when they found out that Virginia had elected George Washington as their delegate. On May 25, 1787, what came to be called the Constitutional Convention opened its proceedings at the state house in Philadelphia, unanimously electing George Washington as its president.<BR></p> <p id="TextCopyright">Copyright 2006 The Regents of the University of California and Monterey Institute for Technology and Education</p>