As it became increasingly apparent that the Confederation was insufficient to govern the new

country, nationalists advocated for and led the Philadelphia Convention of 1787 in writing the United

States Constitution to replace it, ratified in state conventions in 1788. Going into force in 1789, this
constitution reorganized the government into a federation administered by three equal
branches (executive, judicial and legislative), on the principle of creating salutary checks and
balances. George Washington, who had led the Continental Army to victory and then willingly
relinquished power, was the first president elected under the new constitution. The Bill of Rights,
forbidding federal restriction of personal freedoms and guaranteeing a range of legal protections,
was adopted in 1791.[91] Tensions with Britain remained, however, leading to the War of 1812, which
was fought to a draw.[92]
Although the federal government outlawed American participation in the Atlantic slave trade in 1807,
after 1820, cultivation of the highly profitable cotton crop exploded in the Deep South, and along with
it, the use of slave labor.[93][94][95] The Second Great Awakening, especially in the period 1800–1840,
converted millions to evangelical Protestantism. In the North, it energized multiple social reform
movements, including abolitionism;[96] in the South, Methodists and Baptists proselytized among
slave populations