After the citizens of the United States of America won their independence in 1776, they created a document that laid out the role of the government entitled the Articles of Confederation. This document had a very weak federal government, and left most of the decision making to the states, and was eventually exchanged for the constitution that we still have today, which provided the strength needed for a strong federal government to unify all of the states. Although the constitution had changed, many still clung to the ideas established in the Articles of Confederation, yearning for the idea of "states rights" and not trusting a federal government to pass laws which they had to abide by. This led to civil turmoil in the years that followed, and a major difference in opinion that eventually split the nation apart.