/
60.html
303 lines (284 loc) · 17.7 KB
/
60.html
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212
213
214
215
216
217
218
219
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244
245
246
247
248
249
250
251
252
253
254
255
256
257
258
259
260
261
262
263
264
265
266
267
268
269
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head profile="http://microformats.org/wiki/hatom#XMDP_Profile http://microformats.org/wiki/hcard-profile">
<title>Federalist № 60</title>
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0; maximum-scale=1.0;" />
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="css/federalist.css" />
<link rel="start" href="1" />
<link rel="contents" href="/" />
<link rel="prev" href="59" />
<link rel="next" href="61" />
<link rel="pingback" href="http://federali.st/pingback" />
<link rel="bookmark" href="60" />
<link rel="copyright license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/" />
<script type="text/javascript">
var gaJsHost = (("https:" == document.location.protocol) ? "https://ssl." : "http://www.");
document.write(unescape("%3Cscript src='" + gaJsHost + "google-analytics.com/ga.js' type='text/javascript'%3E%3C/script%3E"));
</script>
<script type="text/javascript">
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker("UA-648822-4");
pageTracker._initData();
pageTracker._trackPageview();
</script>
</head>
<body class="hentry">
<h1 class="entry-title"><a rel="bookmark" href="60">Federalist № 60</a></h1>
<h2 class="entry-summary">The Same Subject Continued</h2>
<h3 class="entry-summary">
Concerning the Power of Congress to Regulate the Election of
Members
</h3>
<div class="entry-content">
<p id="salutation">To the People of the State of New York:</p>
<p id="p1"><span class="initial">We have</span> seen, that an
uncontrollable power over the elections to the federal government
could not, without hazard, be committed to the State legislatures.
Let us now see, what would be the danger on the other side; that
is, from confiding the ultimate right of regulating its own
elections to the Union itself. It is not pretended, that this
right would ever be used for the exclusion of any State from its
share in the representation. The interest of all would, in this
respect at least, be the security of all. But it is alleged, that
it might be employed in such a manner as to promote the election
of some favorite class of men in exclusion of others, by confining
the places of election to particular districts, and rendering it
impracticable to the citizens at large to partake in the choice.
Of all chimerical suppositions, this seems to be the most
chimerical. On the one hand, no rational calculation of
probabilities would lead us to imagine that the disposition which
a conduct so violent and extraordinary would imply, could ever
find its way into the national councils; and on the other, it may
be concluded with certainty, that if so improper a spirit should
ever gain admittance into them, it would display itself in a form
altogether different and far more decisive. <a class="permalink"
href="#p1">¶</a></p>
<p id="p2">The improbability of the attempt may be satisfactorily
inferred from this single reflection, that it could never be made
without causing an immediate revolt of the great body of the
people, headed and directed by the State governments. It is not
difficult to conceive that this characteristic right of freedom
may, in certain turbulent and factious seasons, be violated, in
respect to a particular class of citizens, by a victorious and
overbearing majority; but that so fundamental a privilege, in a
country so situated and enlightened, should be invaded to the
prejudice of the great mass of the people, by the deliberate
policy of the government, without occasioning a popular
revolution, is altogether inconceivable and incredible. <a
class="permalink" href="#p2">¶</a></p>
<p id="p3">In addition to this general reflection, there are
considerations of a more precise nature, which forbid all
apprehension on the subject. The dissimilarity in the ingredients
which will compose the national government, and Ustill more in the
manner in which they will be brought into action in its various
branches, must form a powerful obstacle to a concert of views in
any partial scheme of elections. There is sufficient diversity in
the state of property, in the genius, manners, and habits of the
people of the different parts of the Union, to occasion a material
diversity of disposition in their representatives towards the
different ranks and conditions in society. And though an intimate
intercourse under the same government will promote a gradual
assimilation in some of these respects, yet there are causes, as
well physical as moral, which may, in a greater or less degree,
permanently nourish different propensities and inclinations in
this respect. But the circumstance which will be likely to have
the greatest influence in the matter, will be the dissimilar modes
of constituting the several component parts of the government. The
House of Representatives being to be elected immediately by the
people, the Senate by the State legislatures, the President by
electors chosen for that purpose by the people, there would be
little probability of a common interest to cement these different
branches in a predilection for any particular class of electors.
<a class="permalink" href="#p3">¶</a></p>
<p id="p4">As to the Senate, it is impossible that any <a
href="constitution#a1s4">regulation</a> of <q
cite="constitution#a1s4">time and manner,</q> which is all that is
proposed to be submitted to the national government in respect to
that body, can affect the spirit which will direct the choice of
its members. The collective sense of the State legislatures can
never be influenced by extraneous circumstances of that sort; a
consideration which alone ought to satisfy us that the
discrimination apprehended would never be attempted. For what
inducement could the Senate have to concur in a preference in
which itself would not be included? Or to what purpose would it be
established, in reference to one branch of the legislature, if it
could not be extended to the other? The composition of the one
would in this case counteract that of the other. And we can never
suppose that it would embrace the appointments to the Senate,
unless we can at the same time suppose the voluntary co-operation
of the State legislatures. If we make the latter supposition, it
then becomes immaterial where the power in question is placed
whether in their hands or in those of the Union. <a
class="permalink" href="#p4">¶</a></p>
<p id="p5">But what is to be the object of this capricious
partiality in the national councils? Is it to be exercised in a
discrimination between the different departments of industry, or
between the different kinds of property, or between the different
degrees of property? Will it lean in favor of the landed interest,
or the moneyed interest, or the mercantile interest, or the
manufacturing interest? Or, to speak in the fashionable language
of the adversaries to the Constitution, will it court the
elevation of "the wealthy and the well-born," to the exclusion and
debasement of all the rest of the society? <a class="permalink"
href="#p5">¶</a></p>
<p id="p6">If this partiality is to be exerted in favor of those
who are concerned in any particular description of industry or
property, I presume it will readily be admitted, that the
competition for it will lie between landed men and merchants. And
I scruple not to affirm, that it is infinitely less likely that
either of them should gain an ascendant in the national councils,
than that the one or the other of them should predominate in all
the local councils. The inference will be, that a conduct tending
to give an undue preference to either is much less to be dreaded
from the former than from the latter. <a class="permalink"
href="#p6">¶</a></p>
<p id="p7">The several States are in various degrees addicted to
agriculture and commerce. In most, if not all of them, agriculture
is predominant. In a few of them, however, commerce nearly divides
its empire, and in most of them has a considerable share of
influence. In proportion as either prevails, it will be conveyed
into the national representation; and for the very reason, that
this will be an emanation from a greater variety of interests, and
in much more various proportions, than are to be found in any
single State, it will be much less apt to espouse either of them
with a decided partiality, than the representation of any single
State. <a class="permalink" href="#p7">¶</a></p>
<p id="p8">In a country consisting chiefly of the cultivators of
land, where the rules of an equal representation obtain, the
landed interest must, upon the whole, preponderate in the
government. As long as this interest prevails in most of the State
legislatures, so long it must maintain a correspondent superiority
in the national Senate, which will generally be a faithful copy of
the majorities of those assemblies. It cannot therefore be
presumed, that a sacrifice of the landed to the mercantile class
will ever be a favorite object of this branch of the federal
legislature. In applying thus particularly to the Senate a general
observation suggested by the situation of the country, I am
governed by the consideration, that the credulous votaries of
State power cannot, upon their own principles, suspect, that the
State legislatures would be warped from their duty by any external
influence. But in reality the same situation must have the same
effect, in the primative composition at least of the federal House
of Representatives: an improper bias towards the mercantile class
is as little to be expected from this quarter as from the other.
<a class="permalink" href="#p8">¶</a></p>
<p id="p9">In order, perhaps, to give countenance to the objection
at any rate, it may be asked, is there not danger of an opposite
bias in the national government, which may dispose it to endeavor
to secure a monopoly of the federal administration to the landed
class? As there is little likelihood that the supposition of such
a bias will have any terrors for those who would be immediately
injured by it, a labored answer to this question will be dispensed
with. It will be sufficient to remark, first, that for the reasons
elsewhere assigned, it is less likely that any decided partiality
should prevail in the councils of the Union than in those of any
of its members. Secondly, that there would be no temptation to
violate the Constitution in favor of the landed class, because
that class would, in the natural course of things, enjoy as great
a preponderancy as itself could desire. And thirdly, that men
accustomed to investigate the sources of public prosperity upon a
large scale, must be too well convinced of the utility of
commerce, to be inclined to inflict upon it so deep a wound as
would result from the entire exclusion of those who would best
understand its interest from a share in the management of them.
The importance of commerce, in the view of revenue alone, must
effectually guard it against the enmity of a body which would be
continually importuned in its favor, by the urgent calls of public
necessity. <a class="permalink" href="#p9">¶</a></p>
<p id="p10">I the rather consult brevity in discussing the
probability of a preference founded upon a discrimination between
the different kinds of industry and property, because, as far as I
understand the meaning of the objectors, they contemplate a
discrimination of another kind. They appear to have in view, as
the objects of the preference with which they endeavor to alarm
us, those whom they designate by the description of <q>the wealthy
and the well-born.</q> These, it seems, are to be exalted to an
odious pre-eminence over the rest of their fellow-citizens. At one
time, however, their elevation is to be a necessary consequence of
the smallness of the representative body; at another time it is to
be effected by depriving the people at large of the opportunity of
exercising their right of suffrage in the choice of that body. <a
class="permalink" href="#p10">¶</a></p>
<p id="p11">But upon what principle is the discrimination of the
places of election to be made, in order to answer the purpose of
the meditated preference? Are <q>the wealthy and the
well-born,</q> as they are called, confined to particular spots in
the several States? Have they, by some miraculous instinct or
foresight, set apart in each of them a common place of residence?
Are they only to be met with in the towns or cities? Or are they,
on the contrary, scattered over the face of the country as avarice
or chance may have happened to cast their own lot or that of their
predecessors? If the latter is the case, (as every intelligent man
knows it to be,<a class="note" href="#note1">1</a>) is it not
evident that the policy of confining the places of election to
particular districts would be as subversive of its own aim as it
would be exceptionable on every other account? The truth is, that
there is no method of securing to the rich the preference
apprehended, but by prescribing qualifications of property either
for those who may elect or be elected. But this forms no part of
the power to be conferred upon the national government. Its
authority would be expressly restricted to the regulation of the
<em>times</em>, the <em>places</em>, the <em>manner</em> of
elections. The qualifications of the persons who may choose or be
chosen, as has been remarked upon other occasions, are defined and
fixed in the Constitution, and are unalterable by the legislature.
<a class="permalink" href="#p11">¶</a></p>
<p id="p12">Let it, however, be admitted, for argument sake, that
the expedient suggested might be successful; and let it at the
same time be equally taken for granted that all the scruples which
a sense of duty or an apprehension of the danger of the experiment
might inspire, were overcome in the breasts of the national
rulers, still I imagine it will hardly be pretended that they
could ever hope to carry such an enterprise into execution without
the aid of a military force sufficient to subdue the resistance of
the great body of the people. The improbability of the existence
of a force equal to that object has been discussed and
demonstrated in different parts of these papers; but that the
futility of the objection under consideration may appear in the
strongest light, it shall be conceded for a moment that such a
force might exist, and the national government shall be supposed
to be in the actual possession of it. What will be the conclusion?
With a disposition to invade the essential rights of the
community, and with the means of gratifying that disposition, is
it presumable that the persons who were actuated by it would amuse
themselves in the ridiculous task of fabricating election laws for
securing a preference to a favorite class of men? Would they not
be likely to prefer a conduct better adapted to their own
immediate aggrandizement? Would they not rather boldly resolve to
perpetuate themselves in office by one decisive act of usurpation,
than to trust to precarious expedients which, in spite of all the
precautions that might accompany them, might terminate in the
dismission, disgrace, and ruin of their authors? Would they not
fear that citizens, not less tenacious than conscious of their
rights, would flock from the remote extremes of their respective
States to the places of election, to voerthrow their tyrants, and
to substitute men who would be disposed to avenge the violated
majesty of the people? <a class="permalink" href="#p12">¶</a></p>
<address class="vcard author">
<span class="nickname">Publius</span>.
[<span class="fn">Alexander Hamilton</span>]
</address>
<ol id="notes">
<li id="note1">
Particularly in the Southern States and in this State.
</li>
</ol>
</div>
<div class="meta">
<p>
First published in the <abbr class="published updated"
title="1788-02-26">Tuesday, February 26, 1788</abbr> issue of the
<span class="publication">Independent Journal</span>.
</p>
<p class="rights">
This work is in <a rel="copyright license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/publicdomain/">the public domain</a>.
</p>
<p>
Read about this
paper <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalist_No._60">on
Wikipedia</a>, read the <a rel="prev" href="59">previous</a> or
<a rel="next" href="61">next</a> Federalist Paper, or go
<a rel="contents" href="/">back to the list of them all</a>.
</p>
</div>
</body>
</html>