Name: _______________________________
USVA History
Study Guide – Chapter 5.2 - Drafting the Constitution
1. _________________________ convinced many leaders that the national government
under the Articles of Confederation was too weak and needed to be changed.
2. The __________________________ of the United States established a government that
shared power between the national government and state governments, protected the
rights of states, and provided a system for orderly change through amendments to itself.
3. The Constitution made ________________ law the supreme law of the land when
deemed constitutional, but otherwise gave the states considerable leeway to govern
themselves.
4. ____________________________ was the president of the Constitutional Convention
even though he didn’t participate much in the debates.
5. James Madison authored the ________________________, which proposed a two house
legislature based on population figures.
6. The Great Compromise balanced power between large and small states by creating a
________________ (where each state gets two senators) and a _____________________
(with membership based on population figures).
7. The Southern states were placated by counting ________________________ of slaves as
population when determining representation in the House of Representatives.
8. James Madison was considered the “____________________________________” due to
his contributions at the Constitutional Convention.
9. Madison and his colleagues avoided a too-powerful central government by establishing
three co-equal branches – legislative, executive, and judicial – with numerous
_______________ and ________________ among them.
10. The powers belonging to the federal government were called the _______________
powers, and consisted of only those things specifically listed in the Constitution.