The New Jersey Plan was a reaction to the fear that the Virginia Plan would give too much power to populous states.

The New Jersey Plan was a reaction to the fear that the Virginia Plan would give too much power to populous states.

• A. True
• B. It would grant even more power to large states.
• C. It proposed abolishing the central government.
• D. False

Answer: (A)

The key idea here is how the framers battled over how states would be represented in Congress. The Virginia Plan pushed for representation based on population, which would give larger states more influence and potentially overwhelm smaller states. In response, smaller states supported the New Jersey Plan, which called for equal representation for each state regardless of size, aiming to prevent dominance by populous states. This plan also proposed a stronger central government than the Articles of Confederation, but not one that would be scaled to population. So the New Jersey Plan was indeed a reaction to fears that the Virginia Plan would concentrate too much power in the hands of larger states. That tension set up the later Connecticut Compromise, which blended the approaches with a House of Representatives based on population and a Senate with equal state representation.

The key idea here is how the framers battled over how states would be represented in Congress. The Virginia Plan pushed for representation based on population, which would give larger states more influence and potentially overwhelm smaller states. In response, smaller states supported the New Jersey Plan, which called for equal representation for each state regardless of size, aiming to prevent dominance by populous states. This plan also proposed a stronger central government than the Articles of Confederation, but not one that would be scaled to population. So the New Jersey Plan was indeed a reaction to fears that the Virginia Plan would concentrate too much power in the hands of larger states. That tension set up the later Connecticut Compromise, which blended the approaches with a House of Representatives based on population and a Senate with equal state representation.