2 A government of limited powers
It will be our task to explore the building blocks that go to make up this
complex pattern, to try to bring out the rich variety of American political life,
and to assess the direction in which it is moving.
The challenge of American history
The history of what was to become the United States of America illustrates
the diversity of the origins of the country, and also explains the structure of
its institutions. In the sixteenth century the European powers, Spain, France
and England, began to settle on the mainland of North America. Spain made
repeated efforts to colonise Florida, establishing the city of St Augustine in
1565, then pushing northwards and establishing missions. Florida became
British in 1763, reverting to Spain after the War of Independence. Spain also
settled California, but not until the eighteenth century, establishing a mis-
sion at San Diego in 1769. California became part of the newly independent
Mexico in 1821, and was ceded to the United States in 1848 along with New
Mexico, Texas having been annexed in 1844. France, in addition to its colo-
nisation of Canada, expanded into the Mississippi Valley and founded the
city of New Orleans in 1718. By the middle of the eighteenth century France
laid claim to a huge tract of land stretching from the Gulf of Mexico to Hud-
son’s Bay. The defeat of the French by the British in Canada in 1759 and the
purchase of Louisiana by the United States in 1803 ended French colonial
power in North America. The Dutch established New Amsterdam, renamed
New York when captured by the British in 1664. Alaska was part of the Rus-
sian Empire until purchased by the United States in 1867. The Kingdom of
Hawaii was annexed by the United States in 1898 and became the fiftieth
state in 1959.
The English, in contrast to the Spaniards and the French, developed
their American colonies largely through commercial expansion, the Crown
granting huge tracts of land to companies to develop trade. Starting with the
Royal Charter of the Virginia Company in 1606 a series of expeditions were
mounted which by the 1770s had resulted in the establishment of thirteen
colonies poised on the east coast of the continent. Each colony had its distinct
social composition and religious affiliations, and its own economic interests.
Each colony had its own constitutional structure; attempts were made to
establish a system of government reaching across the colonies, but they
did not succeed, and therefore until the Revolution the colonies’ political
links were with London. Thus when independence came in 1776 the colonies
transformed themselves into independent states, each state establishing its
own constitution, and only loosely affiliating with other states through the
Articles of Confederation in order to conduct the war against Britain.
When the Convention of the representatives of the states met in Philadel-
phia in 1787 to recommend a new form of government for the United States
of America they had two main concerns. First, they wished to create a system
of government that would be strong enough to defend their territory against