French hospital medicine came to be based on three pillars, none entirely new, but which together constituted a new way of looking at disease. The three pillars were physical diagnosis, pathologico-clinical correlation, and the use of large numbers of cases to elucidate diagnostic categories and to evaluate therapy

It soon became apparent that, while they protected the sovereignty of the states, the Articles had created a central government too weak to function effectively.

The central government had authority to act in only a few areas, such as national defense, in which the states were assumed to have a common interest (and would, indeed, have to supply militias). This arrangement was meant to prevent the national government from becoming too powerful or abusing the rights of individual citizens. In the careful balance between power for the national government and liberty for the states, the Articles of Confederation favored the states.

Fearful of replacing one oppressive national government with another, however, the framers of the Articles of Confederation created an alliance of sovereign states held together by a weak central government.