and particularly, had the local sovereigns possessed the affections of
the people, the great kingdoms in Europe would at this time consist of
as many independent princes as there were formerly feudatory barons.
The State government will have the advantage of the Federal government,
whether we compare them in respect to the immediate dependence of the
one on the other; to the weight of personal influence which each side
will possess; to the powers respectively vested in them; to the
predilection and probable support of the people; to the disposition and
faculty of resisting and frustrating the measures of each other. The
State governments may be regarded as constituent and essential parts of
the federal government; whilst the latter is nowise essential to the
operation or organization of the former. Without the intervention of
the State legislatures, the President of the United States cannot be
elected at all. They must in all cases have a great share in his
appointment, and will, perhaps, in most cases, of themselves determine
it. The Senate will be elected absolutely and exclusively by the State
legislatures. Even the House of Representatives, though drawn
immediately from the people, will be chosen very much under the
influence of that class of men, whose influence over the people obtains
for themselves an election into the State legislatures. Thus, each of
the principal branches of the federal government will owe its existence
more or less to the favor of the State governments, and must
consequently feel a dependence, which is much more likely to beget a
disposition too obsequious than too overbearing towards them. On the
other side, the component parts of the State governments will in no
instance be indebted for their appointment to the direct agency of the
federal government, and very little, if at all, to the local influence
of its members. The number of individuals employed under the
Constitution of the United States will be much smaller than the number
employed under the particular States.
There will consequently be less of personal influence on the side of
the former than of the latter. The members of the legislative,
executive, and judiciary departments of thirteen and more States, the
justices of peace, officers of militia, ministerial officers of
justice, with all the county, corporation, and town officers, for three
millions and more of people, intermixed, and having particular
acquaintance with every class and circle of people, must exceed, beyond
all proportion, both in number and influence, those of every
description who will be employed in the administration of the federal
system. Compare the members of the three great departments of the
thirteen States, excluding from the judiciary department the justices
of peace, with the members of the corresponding departments of the
single government of the Union; compare the militia officers of three
millions of people with the military and marine officers of any
establishment which is within the compass of probability, or, I may
add, of possibility, and in this view alone, we may pronounce the
advantage of the States to be decisive. If the federal government is to
have collectors of revenue, the State governments will have theirs
also. And as those of the former will be principally on the seacoast,
and not very numerous, whilst those of the latter will be spread over
the face of the country, and will be very numerous, the advantage in
this view also lies on the same side. I
t is true, that the Confederacy is to possess, and may exercise, the
power of collecting internal as well as external taxes throughout the
States; but it is probable that this power will not be resorted to,
except for supplemental purposes of revenue; that an option will then
be given to the States to supply their quotas by previous collections
of their own; and that the eventual collection, under the immediate
authority of the Union, will generally be made by the officers, and
according to the rules, appointed by the several States. Indeed it is
extremely probable, that in other instances, particularly in the
organization of the judicial power, the officers of the States will be
clothed with the correspondent authority of the Union.
Should it happen, however, that separate collectors of internal revenue
should be appointed under the federal government, the influence of the
whole number would not bear a comparison with that of the multitude of
State officers in the opposite scale.
Within every district to which a federal collector would be allotted,
there would not be less than thirty or forty, or even more, officers of
different descriptions, and many of them persons of character and
weight, whose influence would lie on the side of the State. The powers
delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are
few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are
numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on
external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce;
with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be
connected. The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all
the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the
lives, liberties, and properties of the people, and the internal order,
improvement, and prosperity of the State. The operations of the federal
government will be most extensive and important in times of war and
danger; those of the State governments, in times of peace and security.
As the former periods will probably bear a small proportion to the
latter, the State governments will here enjoy another advantage over
the federal government. The more adequate, indeed, the federal powers
may be rendered to the national defense, the less frequent will be
those scenes of danger which might favor their ascendancy over the
governments of the particular States. If the new Constitution be
examined with accuracy and candor, it will be found that the change
which it proposes consists much less in the addition of NEW POWERS to
the Union, than in the invigoration of its ORIGINAL POWERS. The
regulation of commerce, it is true, is a new power; but that seems to
be an addition which few oppose, and from which no apprehensions are
entertained. The powers relating to war and peace, armies and fleets,
treaties and finance, with the other more considerable powers, are all
vested in the existing Congress by the articles of Confederation. The
proposed change does not enlarge these powers; it only substitutes a
more effectual mode of administering them. The change relating to
taxation may be regarded as the most important; and yet the present
Congress have as complete authority to REQUIRE of the States indefinite
supplies of money for the common defense and general welfare, as the
future Congress will have to require them of individual citizens; and
the latter will be no more bound than the States themselves have been,
to pay the quotas respectively taxed on them. Had the States complied
punctually with the articles of Confederation, or could their
compliance have been enforced by as peaceable means as may be used with
success towards single persons, our past experience is very far from
countenancing an opinion, that the State governments would have lost
their constitutional powers, and have gradually undergone an entire
consolidation. To maintain that such an event would have ensued, would
be to say at once, that the existence of the State governments is
incompatible with any system whatever that accomplishes the essential
purposes of the Union.
PUBLIUS.
THE FEDERALIST.
No. XLVI.
The Influence of the State and Federal Governments Compared
From the New York Packet. Tuesday, January 29, 1788.
MADISON
To the People of the State of New York:
Resuming the subject of the last paper, I proceed to inquire whether
the federal government or the State governments will have the advantage
with regard to the predilection and support of the people.
Notwithstanding the different modes in which they are appointed, we
must consider both of them as substantially dependent on the great body
of the citizens of the United States.
I assume this position here as it respects the first, reserving the
proofs for another place. The federal and State governments are in fact
but different agents and trustees of the people, constituted with
different powers, and designed for different purposes. The adversaries
of the Constitution seem to have lost sight of the people altogether in
their reasonings on this subject; and to have viewed these different
establishments, not only as mutual rivals and enemies, but as
uncontrolled by any common superior in their efforts to usurp the
authorities of each other. These gentlemen must here be reminded of
their error. They must be told that the ultimate authority, wherever
the derivative may be found, resides in the people alone, and that it
will not depend merely on the comparative ambition or address of the
different governments, whether either, or which of them, will be able
to enlarge its sphere of jurisdiction at the expense of the other.
Truth, no less than decency, requires that the event in every case
should be supposed to depend on the sentiments and sanction of their
common constituents. Many considerations, besides those suggested on a
former occasion, seem to place it beyond doubt that the first and most
natural attachment of the people will be to the governments of their
respective States.
Into the administration of these a greater number of individuals will
expect to rise. From the gift of these a greater number of offices and
emoluments will flow. By the superintending care of these, all the more
domestic and personal interests of the people will be regulated and
provided for. With the affairs of these, the people will be more
familiarly and minutely conversant. And with the members of these, will
a greater proportion of the people have the ties of personal
acquaintance and friendship, and of family and party attachments; on
the side of these, therefore, the popular bias may well be expected
most strongly to incline. Experience speaks the same language in this
case. The federal administration, though hitherto very defective in
comparison with what may be hoped under a better system, had, during
the war, and particularly whilst the independent fund of paper
emissions was in credit, an activity and importance as great as it can
well have in any future circumstances whatever.
It was engaged, too, in a course of measures which had for their object
the protection of everything that was dear, and the acquisition of
everything that could be desirable to the people at large. It was,
nevertheless, invariably found, after the transient enthusiasm for the
early Congresses was over, that the attention and attachment of the
people were turned anew to their own particular governments; that the
federal council was at no time the idol of popular favor; and that
opposition to proposed enlargements of its powers and importance was
the side usually taken by the men who wished to build their political
consequence on the prepossessions of their fellow-citizens. If,
therefore, as has been elsewhere remarked, the people should in future
become more partial to the federal than to the State governments, the
change can only result from such manifest and irresistible proofs of a
better administration, as will overcome all their antecedent
propensities. And in that case, the people ought not surely to be
precluded from giving most of their confidence where they may discover
it to be most due; but even in that case the State governments could
have little to apprehend, because it is only within a certain sphere
that the federal power can, in the nature of things, be advantageously
administered. The remaining points on which I propose to compare the
federal and State governments, are the disposition and the faculty they
may respectively possess, to resist and frustrate the measures of each
other. It has been already proved that the members of the federal will
be more dependent on the members of the State governments, than the
latter will be on the former. It has appeared also, that the
prepossessions of the people, on whom both will depend, will be more on
the side of the State governments, than of the federal government. So
far as the disposition of each towards the other may be influenced by
these causes, the State governments must clearly have the advantage.
But in a distinct and very important point of view, the advantage will
lie on the same side. The prepossessions, which the members themselves
will carry into the federal government, will generally be favorable to
the States; whilst it will rarely happen, that the members of the State
governments will carry into the public councils a bias in favor of the
general government. A local spirit will infallibly prevail much more in
the members of Congress, than a national spirit will prevail in the
legislatures of the particular States. Every one knows that a great
proportion of the errors committed by the State legislatures proceeds
from the disposition of the members to sacrifice the comprehensive and
permanent interest of the State, to the particular and separate views
of the counties or districts in which they reside. And if they do not
sufficiently enlarge their policy to embrace the collective welfare of
their particular State, how can it be imagined that they will make the
aggregate prosperity of the Union, and the dignity and respectability
of its government, the objects of their affections and consultations?
For the same reason that the members of the State legislatures will be
unlikely to attach themselves sufficiently to national objects, the
members of the federal legislature will be likely to attach themselves
too much to local objects. The States will be to the latter what
counties and towns are to the former. Measures will too often be
decided according to their probable effect, not on the national
prosperity and happiness, but on the prejudices, interests, and
pursuits of the governments and people of the individual States. What
is the spirit that has in general characterized the proceedings of
Congress? A perusal of their journals, as well as the candid
acknowledgments of such as have had a seat in that assembly, will
inform us, that the members have but too frequently displayed the
character, rather of partisans of their respective States, than of
impartial guardians of a common interest; that where on one occasion
improper sacrifices have been made of local considerations, to the
aggrandizement of the federal government, the great interests of the
nation have suffered on a hundred, from an undue attention to the local
prejudices, interests, and views of the particular States. I mean not
by these reflections to insinuate, that the new federal government will
not embrace a more enlarged plan of policy than the existing government
may have pursued; much less, that its views will be as confined as
those of the State legislatures; but only that it will partake
sufficiently of the spirit of both, to be disinclined to invade the
rights of the individual States, or the preorgatives of their
governments. The motives on the part of the State governments, to
augment their prerogatives by defalcations from the federal government,
will be overruled by no reciprocal predispositions in the members. Were
it admitted, however, that the Federal government may feel an equal
disposition with the State governments to extend its power beyond the
due limits, the latter would still have the advantage in the means of
defeating such encroachments. If an act of a particular State, though
unfriendly to the national government, be generally popular in that
State and should not too grossly violate the oaths of the State
officers, it is executed immediately and, of course, by means on the
spot and depending on the State alone. The opposition of the federal
government, or the interposition of federal officers, would but inflame
the zeal of all parties on the side of the State, and the evil could
not be prevented or repaired, if at all, without the employment of
means which must always be resorted to with reluctance and difficulty.
On the other hand, should an unwarrantable measure of the federal
government be unpopular in particular States, which would seldom fail
to be the case, or even a warrantable measure be so, which may
sometimes be the case, the means of opposition to it are powerful and
at hand. The disquietude of the people; their repugnance and, perhaps,
refusal to co-operate with the officers of the Union; the frowns of the
executive magistracy of the State; the embarrassments created by
legislative devices, which would often be added on such occasions,
would oppose, in any State, difficulties not to be despised; would
form, in a large State, very serious impediments; and where the
sentiments of several adjoining States happened to be in unison, would
present obstructions which the federal government would hardly be
willing to encounter. But ambitious encroachments of the federal
government, on the authority of the State governments, would not excite
the opposition of a single State, or of a few States only. They would
be signals of general alarm. Every government would espouse the common
cause. A correspondence would be opened. Plans of resistance would be
concerted. One spirit would animate and conduct the whole. The same
combinations, in short, would result from an apprehension of the
federal, as was produced by the dread of a foreign, yoke; and unless
the projected innovations should be voluntarily renounced, the same
appeal to a trial of force would be made in the one case as was made in
the other. But what degree of madness could ever drive the federal
government to such an extremity. In the contest with Great Britain, one
part of the empire was employed against the other.
The more numerous part invaded the rights of the less numerous part.
The attempt was unjust and unwise; but it was not in speculation
absolutely chimerical. But what would be the contest in the case we are
supposing? Who would be the parties? A few representatives of the
people would be opposed to the people themselves; or rather one set of
representatives would be contending against thirteen sets of
representatives, with the whole body of their common constituents on
the side of the latter. The only refuge left for those who prophesy the
downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the
federal government may previously accumulate a military force for the
projects of ambition. The reasonings contained in these papers must
have been employed to little purpose indeed, if it could be necessary
now to disprove the reality of this danger. That the people and the
States should, for a sufficient period of time, elect an uninterrupted
succession of men ready to betray both; that the traitors should,
throughout this period, uniformly and systematically pursue some fixed
plan for the extension of the military establishment; that the
governments and the people of the States should silently and patiently
behold the gathering storm, and continue to supply the materials, until
it should be prepared to burst on their own heads, must appear to every
one more like the incoherent dreams of a delirious jealousy, or the
misjudged exaggerations of a counterfeit zeal, than like the sober
apprehensions of genuine patriotism.
Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a
regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed;
and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government; still
it would not be going too far to say, that the State governments, with
the people on their side, would be able to repel the danger. The
highest number to which, according to the best computation, a standing
army can be carried in any country, does not exceed one hundredth part
of the whole number of souls; or one twenty-fifth part of the number
able to bear arms. This proportion would not yield, in the United
States, an army of more than twenty-five or thirty thousand men. To
these would be opposed a militia amounting to near half a million of
citizens with arms in their hands, officered by men chosen from among
themselves, fighting for their common liberties, and united and
conducted by governments possessing their affections and confidence. It
may well be doubted, whether a militia thus circumstanced could ever be
conquered by such a proportion of regular troops. Those who are best
acquainted with the last successful resistance of this country against
the British arms, will be most inclined to deny the possibility of it.
Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over
the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate
governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia
officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of
ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any
form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the
several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public
resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people
with arms. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would
not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess
the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves,
who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and
of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and
attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the
greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be
speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it. Let us
not insult the free and gallant citizens of America with the suspicion,
that they would be less able to defend the rights of which they would
be in actual possession, than the debased subjects of arbitrary power
would be to rescue theirs from the hands of their oppressors. Let us
rather no longer insult them with the supposition that they can ever
reduce themselves to the necessity of making the experiment, by a blind
and tame submission to the long train of insidious measures which must
precede and produce it. The argument under the present head may be put
into a very concise form, which appears altogether conclusive. Either
the mode in which the federal government is to be constructed will
render it sufficiently dependent on the people, or it will not. On the
first supposition, it will be restrained by that dependence from
forming schemes obnoxious to their constituents. On the other
supposition, it will not possess the confidence of the people, and its
schemes of usurpation will be easily defeated by the State governments,
who will be supported by the people. On summing up the considerations
stated in this and the last paper, they seem to amount to the most
convincing evidence, that the powers proposed to be lodged in the
federal government are as little formidable to those reserved to the
individual States, as they are indispensably necessary to accomplish
the purposes of the Union; and that all those alarms which have been
sounded, of a meditated and consequential annihilation of the State
governments, must, on the most favorable interpretation, be ascribed to
the chimerical fears of the authors of them.
PUBLIUS.
THE FEDERALIST.
No. XLVII.
The Particular Structure of the New Government and the Distribution of
Power Among Its Different Parts
From the New York Packet. Friday, February 1, 1788.
MADISON
To the People of the State of New York:
Having reviewed the general form of the proposed government and the
general mass of power allotted to it, I proceed to examine the
particular structure of this government, and the distribution of this
mass of power among its constituent parts. One of the principal
objections inculcated by the more respectable adversaries to the
Constitution, is its supposed violation of the political maxim, that
the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments ought to be
separate and distinct. In the structure of the federal government, no
regard, it is said, seems to have been paid to this essential
precaution in favor of liberty. The several departments of power are
distributed and blended in such a manner as at once to destroy all
symmetry and beauty of form, and to expose some of the essential parts
of the edifice to the danger of being crushed by the disproportionate
weight of other parts. No political truth is certainly of greater
intrinsic value, or is stamped with the authority of more enlightened
patrons of liberty, than that on which the objection is founded.