
AMONG the numerous advantages promised by a well constructed Union, none
deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and
control the violence of faction. The friend of popular governments never
finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate, as when he
contemplates their propensity to this dangerous vice. He will not fail,
therefore, to set a due value on any plan which, without violating the
principles to which he is attached, provides a proper cure for it.
The instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into the public
councils, have, in truth, been the mortal diseases under which popular
governments have everywhere perished; as they continue to be the
favorite and fruitful topics from which the adversaries to liberty
derive their most specious declamations. The valuable improvements made
by the American constitutions on the popular models, both ancient
and modern, cannot certainly be too much admired; but it would be an
unwarrantable partiality, to contend that they have as effectually
obviated the danger on this side, as was wished and expected. Complaints
are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens,
equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public and
personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that the public
good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures
are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the
rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested
and overbearing majority. However anxiously we may wish that these
complaints had no foundation, the evidence, of known facts will not
permit us to deny that they are in some degree true. It will be found,
indeed, on a candid review of our situation, that some of the distresses
under which we labor have been erroneously charged on the operation
of our governments; but it will be found, at the same time, that other
causes will not alone account for many of our heaviest misfortunes;
and, particularly, for that prevailing and increasing distrust of public
engagements, and alarm for private rights, which are echoed from one
end of the continent to the other. These must be chiefly, if not wholly,
effects of the unsteadiness and injustice with which a factious spirit
has tainted our public administrations.

By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a
majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some
common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of
other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the
community.

There are two methods of curing the mischiefs of faction: the one, by
removing its causes; the other, by controlling its effects.

There are again two methods of removing the causes of faction: the
one, by destroying the liberty which is essential to its existence; the
other, by giving to every citizen the same opinions, the same passions,
and the same interests.

It could never be more truly said than of the first remedy, that it was
worse than the disease. Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an
aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less
folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because
it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of
air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its
destructive agency.

The second expedient is as impracticable as the first would be unwise.
As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty
to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as the
connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions
and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other; and the
former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves. The
diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property
originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of
interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of
government. From the protection of different and unequal faculties of
acquiring property, the possession of different degrees and kinds of
property immediately results; and from the influence of these on the
sentiments and views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of
the society into different interests and parties.

The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man; and
we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity,
according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal for
different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many
other points, as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment to
different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or
to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting
to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties,
inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more
disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their
common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual
animosities, that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the
most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle
their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. But
the most common and durable source of factions has been the various
and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold and those who are
without property have ever formed distinct interests in society.
Those who are creditors, and those who are debtors, fall under a
like discrimination. A landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a
mercantile interest, a moneyed interest, with many lesser interests,
grow up of necessity in civilized nations, and divide them into
different classes, actuated by different sentiments and views. The
regulation of these various and interfering interests forms the
principal task of modern legislation, and involves the spirit of party
and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.

No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest
would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his
integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a body of men are unfit
to be both judges and parties at the same time; yet what are many of the
most important acts of legislation, but so many judicial determinations,
not indeed concerning the rights of single persons, but concerning the
rights of large bodies of citizens? And what are the different classes
of legislators but advocates and parties to the causes which they
determine? Is a law proposed concerning private debts? It is a question
to which the creditors are parties on one side and the debtors on the
other. Justice ought to hold the balance between them. Yet the parties
are, and must be, themselves the judges; and the most numerous party,
or, in other words, the most powerful faction must be expected to
prevail. Shall domestic manufactures be encouraged, and in what degree,
by restrictions on foreign manufactures? are questions which would be
differently decided by the landed and the manufacturing classes, and
probably by neither with a sole regard to justice and the public good.
The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is
an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is,
perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation
are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice.
Every shilling with which they overburden the inferior number, is a
shilling saved to their own pockets.

It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will be able to adjust
these clashing interests, and render them all subservient to the public
good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm. Nor, in many
cases, can such an adjustment be made at all without taking into view
indirect and remote considerations, which will rarely prevail over the
immediate interest which one party may find in disregarding the rights
of another or the good of the whole.

The inference to which we are brought is, that the CAUSES of faction
cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the means of
controlling its EFFECTS.

If a faction consists of less than a majority, relief is supplied by the
republican principle, which enables the majority to defeat its sinister
views by regular vote. It may clog the administration, it may convulse
the society; but it will be unable to execute and mask its violence
under the forms of the Constitution. When a majority is included in a
faction, the form of popular government, on the other hand, enables it
to sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good
and the rights of other citizens. To secure the public good and private
rights against the danger of such a faction, and at the same time to
preserve the spirit and the form of popular government, is then the
great object to which our inquiries are directed. Let me add that it is
the great desideratum by which this form of government can be rescued
from the opprobrium under which it has so long labored, and be
recommended to the esteem and adoption of mankind.

By what means is this object attainable? Evidently by one of two only.
Either the existence of the same passion or interest in a majority at
the same time must be prevented, or the majority, having such coexistent
passion or interest, must be rendered, by their number and local
situation, unable to concert and carry into effect schemes of
oppression. If the impulse and the opportunity be suffered to coincide,
we well know that neither moral nor religious motives can be relied on
as an adequate control. They are not found to be such on the injustice
and violence of individuals, and lose their efficacy in proportion to
the number combined together, that is, in proportion as their efficacy
becomes needful.

From this view of the subject it may be concluded that a pure democracy,
by which I mean a society consisting of a small number of citizens, who
assemble and administer the government in person, can admit of no cure
for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in
almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication
and concert result from the form of government itself; and there is
nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an
obnoxious individual. Hence it is that such democracies have ever
been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found
incompatible with personal security or the rights of property; and have
in general been as short in their lives as they have been violent in
their deaths. Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species
of government, have erroneously supposed that by reducing mankind to
a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same
time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their
opinions, and their passions.

A republic, by which I mean a government in which the scheme of
representation takes place, opens a different prospect, and promises
the cure for which we are seeking. Let us examine the points in which it
varies from pure democracy, and we shall comprehend both the nature of
the cure and the efficacy which it must derive from the Union.

The two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic
are: first, the delegation of the government, in the latter, to a small
number of citizens elected by the rest; secondly, the greater number of
citizens, and greater sphere of country, over which the latter may be
extended.

The effect of the first difference is, on the one hand, to refine and
enlarge the public views, by passing them through the medium of a chosen
body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the true interest of
their country, and whose patriotism and love of justice will be least
likely to sacrifice it to temporary or partial considerations. Under
such a regulation, it may well happen that the public voice, pronounced
by the representatives of the people, will be more consonant to the
public good than if pronounced by the people themselves, convened for
the purpose. On the other hand, the effect may be inverted. Men of
factious tempers, of local prejudices, or of sinister designs, may, by
intrigue, by corruption, or by other means, first obtain the suffrages,
and then betray the interests, of the people. The question resulting is,
whether small or extensive republics are more favorable to the election
of proper guardians of the public weal; and it is clearly decided in
favor of the latter by two obvious considerations:

In the first place, it is to be remarked that, however small the
republic may be, the representatives must be raised to a certain number,
in order to guard against the cabals of a few; and that, however large
it may be, they must be limited to a certain number, in order to
guard against the confusion of a multitude. Hence, the number of
representatives in the two cases not being in proportion to that of
the two constituents, and being proportionally greater in the small
republic, it follows that, if the proportion of fit characters be not
less in the large than in the small republic, the former will present a
greater option, and consequently a greater probability of a fit choice.

In the next place, as each representative will be chosen by a greater
number of citizens in the large than in the small republic, it will
be more difficult for unworthy candidates to practice with success the
vicious arts by which elections are too often carried; and the suffrages
of the people being more free, will be more likely to centre in men who
possess the most attractive merit and the most diffusive and established
characters.

It must be confessed that in this, as in most other cases, there is a
mean, on both sides of which inconveniences will be found to lie.
By enlarging too much the number of electors, you render the
representatives too little acquainted with all their local circumstances
and lesser interests; as by reducing it too much, you render him unduly
attached to these, and too little fit to comprehend and pursue great and
national objects. The federal Constitution forms a happy combination in
this respect; the great and aggregate interests being referred to the
national, the local and particular to the State legislatures.

The other point of difference is, the greater number of citizens
and extent of territory which may be brought within the compass of
republican than of democratic government; and it is this circumstance
principally which renders factious combinations less to be dreaded
in the former than in the latter. The smaller the society, the fewer
probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing it; the
fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently will
a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the number of
individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the compass within
which they are placed, the more easily will they concert and execute
their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater
variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a
majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights
of other citizens; or if such a common motive exists, it will be more
difficult for all who feel it to discover their own strength, and to act
in unison with each other. Besides other impediments, it may be remarked
that, where there is a consciousness of unjust or dishonorable purposes,
communication is always checked by distrust in proportion to the number
whose concurrence is necessary.

Hence, it clearly appears, that the same advantage which a republic has
over a democracy, in controlling the effects of faction, is enjoyed by
a large over a small republic,--is enjoyed by the Union over the
States composing it. Does the advantage consist in the substitution of
representatives whose enlightened views and virtuous sentiments render
them superior to local prejudices and schemes of injustice? It will not
be denied that the representation of the Union will be most likely
to possess these requisite endowments. Does it consist in the greater
security afforded by a greater variety of parties, against the event of
any one party being able to outnumber and oppress the rest? In an equal
degree does the increased variety of parties comprised within the
Union, increase this security. Does it, in fine, consist in the greater
obstacles opposed to the concert and accomplishment of the secret wishes
of an unjust and interested majority? Here, again, the extent of the
Union gives it the most palpable advantage.

The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their
particular States, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration
through the other States. A religious sect may degenerate into a
political faction in a part of the Confederacy; but the variety of sects
dispersed over the entire face of it must secure the national councils
against any danger from that source. A rage for paper money, for an
abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other
improper or wicked project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body
of the Union than a particular member of it; in the same proportion as
such a malady is more likely to taint a particular county or district,
than an entire State.

In the extent and proper structure of the Union, therefore, we behold
a republican remedy for the diseases most incident to republican
government. And according to the degree of pleasure and pride we feel
in being republicans, ought to be our zeal in cherishing the spirit and
supporting the character of Federalists.

WE HAVE seen the necessity of the Union, as our bulwark against foreign
danger, as the conservator of peace among ourselves, as the guardian
of our commerce and other common interests, as the only substitute for
those military establishments which have subverted the liberties of the
Old World, and as the proper antidote for the diseases of faction, which
have proved fatal to other popular governments, and of which alarming
symptoms have been betrayed by our own. All that remains, within this
branch of our inquiries, is to take notice of an objection that may be
drawn from the great extent of country which the Union embraces. A few
observations on this subject will be the more proper, as it is perceived
that the adversaries of the new Constitution are availing themselves
of the prevailing prejudice with regard to the practicable sphere
of republican administration, in order to supply, by imaginary
difficulties, the want of those solid objections which they endeavor in
vain to find.

The error which limits republican government to a narrow district has
been unfolded and refuted in preceding papers. I remark here only that
it seems to owe its rise and prevalence chiefly to the confounding of a
republic with a democracy, applying to the former reasonings drawn from
the nature of the latter. The true distinction between these forms was
also adverted to on a former occasion. It is, that in a democracy, the
people meet and exercise the government in person; in a republic,
they assemble and administer it by their representatives and agents. A
democracy, consequently, will be confined to a small spot. A republic
may be extended over a large region.

To this accidental source of the error may be added the artifice of some
celebrated authors, whose writings have had a great share in forming
the modern standard of political opinions. Being subjects either of
an absolute or limited monarchy, they have endeavored to heighten
the advantages, or palliate the evils of those forms, by placing in
comparison the vices and defects of the republican, and by citing as
specimens of the latter the turbulent democracies of ancient Greece and
modern Italy. Under the confusion of names, it has been an easy task to
transfer to a republic observations applicable to a democracy only; and
among others, the observation that it can never be established but among
a small number of people, living within a small compass of territory.

Such a fallacy may have been the less perceived, as most of the popular
governments of antiquity were of the democratic species; and even in
modern Europe, to which we owe the great principle of representation, no
example is seen of a government wholly popular, and founded, at the same
time, wholly on that principle. If Europe has the merit of discovering
this great mechanical power in government, by the simple agency of which
the will of the largest political body may be concentred, and its force
directed to any object which the public good requires, America can claim
the merit of making the discovery the basis of unmixed and extensive
republics. It is only to be lamented that any of her citizens should
wish to deprive her of the additional merit of displaying its full
efficacy in the establishment of the comprehensive system now under her
consideration.

As the natural limit of a democracy is that distance from the central
point which will just permit the most remote citizens to assemble as
often as their public functions demand, and will include no greater
number than can join in those functions; so the natural limit of a
republic is that distance from the centre which will barely allow
the representatives to meet as often as may be necessary for the
administration of public affairs. Can it be said that the limits of the
United States exceed this distance? It will not be said by those who
recollect that the Atlantic coast is the longest side of the Union, that
during the term of thirteen years, the representatives of the States
have been almost continually assembled, and that the members from the
most distant States are not chargeable with greater intermissions of
attendance than those from the States in the neighborhood of Congress.

That we may form a juster estimate with regard to this interesting
subject, let us resort to the actual dimensions of the Union. The
limits, as fixed by the treaty of peace, are: on the east the Atlantic,
on the south the latitude of thirty-one degrees, on the west the
Mississippi, and on the north an irregular line running in some
instances beyond the forty-fifth degree, in others falling as low as the
forty-second. The southern shore of Lake Erie lies below that latitude.
Computing the distance between the thirty-first and forty-fifth degrees,
it amounts to nine hundred and seventy-three common miles; computing it
from thirty-one to forty-two degrees, to seven hundred and sixty-four
miles and a half. Taking the mean for the distance, the amount will be
eight hundred and sixty-eight miles and three-fourths. The mean distance
from the Atlantic to the Mississippi does not probably exceed seven
hundred and fifty miles. On a comparison of this extent with that of
several countries in Europe, the practicability of rendering our system
commensurate to it appears to be demonstrable. It is not a great deal
larger than Germany, where a diet representing the whole empire is
continually assembled; or than Poland before the late dismemberment,
where another national diet was the depositary of the supreme power.
Passing by France and Spain, we find that in Great Britain, inferior as
it may be in size, the representatives of the northern extremity of the
island have as far to travel to the national council as will be required
of those of the most remote parts of the Union.

Favorable as this view of the subject may be, some observations remain
which will place it in a light still more satisfactory.

In the first place it is to be remembered that the general government is
not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws.
Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects, which concern
all the members of the republic, but which are not to be attained by
the separate provisions of any. The subordinate governments, which can
extend their care to all those other subjects which can be separately
provided for, will retain their due authority and activity. Were it
proposed by the plan of the convention to abolish the governments of
the particular States, its adversaries would have some ground for their
objection; though it would not be difficult to show that if they were
abolished the general government would be compelled, by the principle of
self-preservation, to reinstate them in their proper jurisdiction.

A second observation to be made is that the immediate object of the
federal Constitution is to secure the union of the thirteen primitive
States, which we know to be practicable; and to add to them such other
States as may arise in their own bosoms, or in their neighborhoods,
which we cannot doubt to be equally practicable. The arrangements that
may be necessary for those angles and fractions of our territory which
lie on our northwestern frontier, must be left to those whom further
discoveries and experience will render more equal to the task.

Let it be remarked, in the third place, that the intercourse throughout
the Union will be facilitated by new improvements. Roads will everywhere
be shortened, and kept in better order; accommodations for travelers
will be multiplied and meliorated; an interior navigation on our eastern
side will be opened throughout, or nearly throughout, the whole extent
of the thirteen States. The communication between the Western and
Atlantic districts, and between different parts of each, will be
rendered more and more easy by those numerous canals with which the
beneficence of nature has intersected our country, and which art finds
it so little difficult to connect and complete.

A fourth and still more important consideration is, that as almost every
State will, on one side or other, be a frontier, and will thus find, in
regard to its safety, an inducement to make some sacrifices for the
sake of the general protection; so the States which lie at the greatest
distance from the heart of the Union, and which, of course, may partake
least of the ordinary circulation of its benefits, will be at the same
time immediately contiguous to foreign nations, and will consequently
stand, on particular occasions, in greatest need of its strength and
resources. It may be inconvenient for Georgia, or the States forming our
western or northeastern borders, to send their representatives to the
seat of government; but they would find it more so to struggle alone
against an invading enemy, or even to support alone the whole expense of
those precautions which may be dictated by the neighborhood of continual
danger. If they should derive less benefit, therefore, from the Union
in some respects than the less distant States, they will derive greater
benefit from it in other respects, and thus the proper equilibrium will
be maintained throughout.

I submit to you, my fellow-citizens, these considerations, in full
confidence that the good sense which has so often marked your decisions
will allow them their due weight and effect; and that you will never
suffer difficulties, however formidable in appearance, or however
fashionable the error on which they may be founded, to drive you into
the gloomy and perilous scene into which the advocates for disunion
would conduct you. Hearken not to the unnatural voice which tells you
that the people of America, knit together as they are by so many cords
of affection, can no longer live together as members of the same family;
can no longer continue the mutual guardians of their mutual happiness;
can no longer be fellow citizens of one great, respectable, and
flourishing empire. Hearken not to the voice which petulantly tells you
that the form of government recommended for your adoption is a novelty
in the political world; that it has never yet had a place in the
theories of the wildest projectors; that it rashly attempts what it is
impossible to accomplish. No, my countrymen, shut your ears against
this unhallowed language. Shut your hearts against the poison which
it conveys; the kindred blood which flows in the veins of American
citizens, the mingled blood which they have shed in defense of their
sacred rights, consecrate their Union, and excite horror at the idea
of their becoming aliens, rivals, enemies. And if novelties are to be
shunned, believe me, the most alarming of all novelties, the most wild
of all projects, the most rash of all attempts, is that of rendering us
in pieces, in order to preserve our liberties and promote our happiness.
But why is the experiment of an extended republic to be rejected, merely
because it may comprise what is new? Is it not the glory of the people
of America, that, whilst they have paid a decent regard to the opinions
of former times and other nations, they have not suffered a blind
veneration for antiquity, for custom, or for names, to overrule
the suggestions of their own good sense, the knowledge of their own
situation, and the lessons of their own experience? To this manly
spirit, posterity will be indebted for the possession, and the world
for the example, of the numerous innovations displayed on the American
theatre, in favor of private rights and public happiness. Had no
important step been taken by the leaders of the Revolution for which a
precedent could not be discovered, no government established of which
an exact model did not present itself, the people of the United States
might, at this moment have been numbered among the melancholy victims of
misguided councils, must at best have been laboring under the weight
of some of those forms which have crushed the liberties of the rest of
mankind. Happily for America, happily, we trust, for the whole human
race, they pursued a new and more noble course. They accomplished a
revolution which has no parallel in the annals of human society. They
reared the fabrics of governments which have no model on the face of
the globe. They formed the design of a great Confederacy, which it is
incumbent on their successors to improve and perpetuate. If their works
betray imperfections, we wonder at the fewness of them. If they erred
most in the structure of the Union, this was the work most difficult to
be executed; this is the work which has been new modelled by the act of
your convention, and it is that act on which you are now to deliberate
and to decide.