The Articles of Confederation are often remembered as a failure. But their limits on taxing and commercial power offered greater protection for economic freedom than the Constitution that replaced them.

Even though the Fourth of July is officially in the rearview mirror now, the country is still basking in the glow of Two-Hundred-And-Fifty. The United States declared independence 250 years ago. Britain recognized that independence eight years later, 242 years ago. Our current governing document, the US Constitution, was ratified 238 years ago. All three could be called our “founding,” but July 4 has stood in for all three. Good enough, as it were, for government work. 

The Declaration of Independence enumerates twenty-seven grievances against the British Crown, reasons for seeking independence. Many were political, juridical, even economic, concerns. 

Whatever the reasons, “a ragtag volunteer army in need of a shower somehow defeats a global superpower.” Ask your average fellow American, and I imagine their constructed timeline runs something like this:

Declare Independence → Defeat the British → George Washington becomes president.

This, of course, glosses over the Articles of Confederation, which was adopted by the Continental Congress in 1777 and governed America from March 1, 1781 until the Constitution replaced them on March 4, 1789.

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