The geography of the Fertile Crescent affected the growth of Mesopotamian civilizations by A. helping civilizations grow lots of food. B. stopping any civilization from creating an empire. C. making trade between civilizations impossible. D. forcing all civilizations to set up city-states.

for this case we have the following equation:

we apply distributive property to the terms within parentheses.

subtracting 2 on both sides of the equation:

it was certainly a debatable decision, mainly because it was based primarily on political - and not on legal or social - views. since the congress at that time was led by members of the republican party, and the territory that the tribes wanted to turn into an exclusively indian state was predominantly democratic, the proposal (as expressed in the constitution) did not succeed, but the constitution itself proved to be of crucial importance in the creation of the state of oklahoma, and, most importantly, it guaranteed the involvement of representatives of the indian tribes in the government of the future joint state.  

as a member of congress, i would have voted to ratify the constitution, or at least to have it tabled. ignoring it was an interested and partial decision.