Legitimacy of the U.S. Constitution

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Was the adoption of the Constitution at all legal under the Articles of Confederation or was it essentially a coup?

[bedstuy]

Pretty much, except that the Articles required unanimous consent for alterations and the Constitution only required 9 out of 13 states to ratify it.  For whatever reason, nobody really cared at the time and all 13 states ratified the Constitution ultimately.

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

Yeah. It wasn't entirely aboveboard by the Articles' own terms until May 29, 1790 when Rhode Island ratified it, but it's hard to argue that it hasn't been since then. I've known certain very committed and doctrinaire libertarians to attempt to so argue anyway.

[mb123]

     Patrick Henry said that it was illegitimate because they were sent to alter the articles and came back with a new consitution (which was like a coup). I used the line to derail a poli sci class debate about ratifying the consitution but the professor pointed out that the entire country had just had a rebellion against their monarch and coup-to-insititute-representative-govt was something everyone had recently participated in anyways.

 But like the previous posters said once all 13 colonies/states had ratified it was legitimate.

[zorkpolitics]

The articles were a compact among sovereign states, equivalent to a treaty.  In ratifying the Constitution the states formed a new country and gave up most of their soverenty to this new country, which superseded  the compact, making the Constituion fully legal

[Del Tachi]

Pretty much, except that the Articles required unanimous consent for alterations and the Constitution only required 9 out of 13 states to ratify it.  For whatever reason, nobody really cared at the time and all 13 states ratified the Constitution ultimately.

Even if only 9 states had ratified the Constitution, it still would have gone into effect - but only in those 9 states.  Short of 9 it would not have gone into effect in any state.