ABSTRACT
The American federal system devised in the 1780s was born out of practical necessity and did not rest on any full-blown federal theory. The practical scheme that emerged was founded, however, on basic principles of AngloAmerican constitutional thought. The first was ‘natural rights’ and the second was popular sovereignty-a republican idea promulgated by James Harrington in the seventeenth century but owing a good deal also to John Locke. The British consciously contributed nothing to federal theory but their manner of managing their empire had led to the de facto practice of allowing considerable latitude to colonial assemblies over a wide range of essentially local issues. This apparent division of powers was less real than it seemed, as was shown by the British reassertion of central authority in the 1760s, but it allowed the Americans to assume that such a division should be a part of generally accepted constitutional practice. The federal arrangement of the 1780s incorporated such a division as a central feature.
