confederalist/federalist groups, including the one led by Father Mier. Only seven centralist deputies opposed the measure. Then Congress examined the section of Article 6 which declared that the states were sovereign. The coalition divided on this issue: Father Mier and his supporters joined the centralists in voting against the measure. Nevertheless, the proponents of states' rights and those who believed in shared sovereignty possessed enough strength to pass the measure by a margin of 41 to 28 votes. The states did not just share sovereignty with the national government; they obtained the financial means to enforce their authority. They gained considerable taxing power at the expense of the federal government, which lost approximately half the revenue formerly collected by the viceregal administration. To compensate for that loss, the states were to pay the national government a contingente assessed for each state according to its means. As a result, the nation would have to depend upon the goodwill of the states to finance or fulfil its responsibilities. Weak executive branch The constituent congress's decision to share sovereignty, moreover, did not settle the question of the division of power within the national government. Although all agreed on the traditional concept of separation of powers among the legislative, executive, and judicial branches, most congressmen believed that the legislature should be dominant. Recent Hispanic and Mexican experience had fostered a distrust of executive power. Therefore, the earlier Mexican Cortes had established a plural executive, the Supreme Executive Power. Since that body was perceived as subservient to the legislature, neither the provinces nor the Second Constituent Congress bothered to appoint a new executive. The authors of the Acta Constitutiva, however, proposed in Article 16 that executive power be conferred "on an individual with the title of president of the Mexican Federation, who must be a citizen by birth of said federation and have attained at least thirty-five years of age". The proposal led to a heated debate that transcended the former division between states’ righters and strong nationalist coalitions. While Cañedo supported Ramos Arizpe in favouring a single executive, others, including Rejón and Guridi y Alcocer, insisted on the need to weaken executive power by establishing a plural executive. Ramos Arizpe proposed that the president govern with the aid of a council of government. But that was not sufficient to mollify the opposition, which had the majority in congress. The opponents of a single executive