This is Episode 3 of The Savvy Citizen podcast. I’m your host Kelley Keller and it is my privilege to present America’s second founding document: The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union adopted on November 15, 1777, ratified on March 1, 1781.

The Articles of Confederation served as the United States’ first constitution. It was in force from its ratification until 1789, when the present-day Constitution went into effect.

Here is some background.

On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia drafted the resolution that proposed independence for the American colonies. The proposal had three parts:

• A declaration of Independence
• A call to form foreign allegiances through treaties
• A plan for confederation

On June 11, 1776, the Second Continental Congress appointed three committees, one to address each issue.

The committee to draft a constitution for confederation of the states consisted of one member from each of the soon to be independent 13 states. John Dickinson of Pennsylvania (and for whom Dickinson College in my hometown of Carlisle, PA is named) chaired the confederation committee. After 6 drafts, the committee presented the Dickinson Draft of the Articles of Confederation to the Congress on July 12, 1776, just eight days after signing the Declaration of Independence. This first draft named the confederation "the United States of America." After considerable debate and revision, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Articles of Confederation on November 15, 1777.

This "first constitution of the United States" established a "league of friendship" so to speak for newly sovereign and independent states. All powers, except those explicitly delegated to the federal government, which were few and far between, belonged to the states. The Articles also provided for a unicameral legislature, or Congress, with each state having one vote, regardless of population size, something that would change with the new Constitution was proposed.

It took 15 months to ratify the Articles, which required an up vote from all 13 states. The new constitution came into force on March 1, 1781. It would remain in force until the new, and current, constitution replaced it on March 4, 1789.

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