http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa10.htm
The Federalist No. 10
The Utility of the Union as a Safeguard
Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection (continued)
Daily Advertiser
Thursday, November 22, 1787
[James Madison]
To the People of the State of New York:
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.
PUBLIUS
"there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual"
Uh huh. Remember what Democracy has wrought: Psychiatry's mental disorders are Democratically voted into and out of existence.
