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42 Constitution of the United States and Bill of Rights

Introduction to Primary Source: After finding problems with the Articles of Confederation, a call was made in 1786 to gather in Philadelphia to see if the Articles could be strengthened.  In May of 1787 55 delegates from 12 of the States met in secret to draft the document that became the Constitution of the United States.  Before the Constitutional Convention was concluded an agreement was made that once the new government was up and running the new Congress would add a Bill of Rights to protect the individual from a strong central government.  

Constitution of the United States

Bill of Rights

 

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U.S. History Copyright © by John M. Lund; P. Scott Corbett; Volker Janssen; Sylvie Waskiewicz; Todd Pfannestiel; and Paul Vickery is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.