Main currents in American thought An interpretation of American literature from the beginnings to 1920
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.... 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.... 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 strength, and act in unison with each other.[311]
In such argument Madison was adapting to his purpose the views of
Milton and other seventeenth-century republicans, to whom in the
dangerous days when the Puritan Commonwealth was breaking up, the
“noise and shouting of the rude multitude,” the drunken ribaldry of the
London rabble, was prophetic of “new injunctions to manacle the native
libertie of mankinde.” But it has long since become a commonplace of
political observation that the minority and not the majority is the
more dangerous to the common well-being, for it is the minority that
most frequently uses government to its own ends.
The contrast in temper and argument between _The Federalist_ and
Richard Henry Lee’s _Letters from the Federal Farmer_,[312] is
striking. The calmness and fair-mindedness of the work persuade one
that it ill deserves the name partisan; it comes near to being a frank
and disinterested examination of the proposed instrument of government.
Its sharpest strictures are tempered by ready acknowledgment of
excellent features. The burden of Lee’s accusation is that the
instrument is undemocratic; that it must result in placing the majority
under control of the minority; and that it in no wise reflects the
sober judgment of the body of the people. He is more restrained than
Elbridge Gerry, who asserted that it was the outcome of a conspiracy
hatched in secret, a work of “such motley mixture, that its enemies
cannot trace a feature of Democratic or Republican extract.” But the
Farmer’s restraint adds weight to the serious charges which he brings
against the instrument, and the unseemly haste of its advocates in
urging its speedy adoption. It was not to destroy the work of the
Convention that he pleaded for delay; but that it should receive full
and fair consideration, and be disposed of as its merits or defects
should warrant.
His first concern is that the Constitution should not be adopted with
the inconsiderate haste for which _The Federalist_ was pressing.
“The first principal question that occurs, is, Whether, considering
our situation, we ought to precipitate the adoption of the proposed
Constitution?” Hamilton had made much of the desperate state of affairs
that admitted of no delay; Lee replied by denying, with Franklin and
other competent observers, that the present state was desperate.
Matters were improving daily, peace was restoring the ravages of war.
I know uneasy men, who with very much to precipitate, do not admit
all these facts; but they are facts well known to all men who
are thoroughly informed in the affairs of this country. It must,
however, be admitted, that our federal system is defective, and
that some of the state governments are not well administered;
but ... we impute to the defects in our governments many evils
and embarrassments which are most clearly the result of the late
war.... When we want a man to change his condition, we describe
it as wretched, miserable, and despised; and we draw a pleasing
picture of that which we would have him assume.... It is too often
the case in political concerns that men state facts not as they
are, but as they wish them to be.... Men who feel easy in their
circumstances, and such as are not sanguine in their expectations
relative to the consequences of the proposed change, will remain
quiet under the existing governments. Many commercial and monied
men, who are uneasy, not without just cause, ought to be respected;
and by no means, unreasonably disappointed in their expectations
and hopes.... It is natural for men, who wish to hasten the
adoption of a measure, to tell us, now is the crisis--now is the
critical moment which must be seized or all will be lost; and to
shut the door against free enquiry, whenever conscious the thing
presented has defects in it, which time and investigation will
probably discover.... If it is true, what has been so often said,
that the people of this country cannot change their constitution
for the worse, I presume it still behoves them to endeavor
deliberately to change it for the better.
Granted that experience has demonstrated the need of revising the
Articles of Confederation in certain essential points, Lee maintains
that the enemies of democracy have been making undue capital out of
the shortcomings of an emergency government, in the hope of subverting
the democratic state governments and substituting a more aristocratic
form.
The confederation was formed when great confidence was placed in
the voluntary exertions of individuals, and of the respective
states; and the framers of it, to guard against usurpation, so
limited, and checked the powers, that, in many respects, they
are inadequate to the exigencies of the union.... During the
war, the general confusion, and the introduction of paper money,
infused in the minds of people vague ideas respecting government
and credit. We expected too much from the return of peace, and of
course we have been disappointed. Our governments have been new and
unsettled; and several legislatures, by making tender, suspension,
and paper money laws, have given just cause of uneasiness to
creditors. By these and other causes, several orders of men in
the community have been prepared by degrees, for a change of
government; and this very abuse of power in the legislatures,
which in some cases has been charged upon the democratic part of
the community, has furnished aristocratical men with those very
weapons, and those very means, with which, in great measure, they
are rapidly effecting their favourite object.
The methods by which the convention was brought together at a time when
the “idea of destroying ultimately, the state government, and forming
one consolidated system, could not have been admitted,” is traced
briefly with penetrating comment, and the unfortunate decision of some
excellent republicans to take no part in the work is regretted:
Here the favorable moment for changing the government was
evidently discerned by a few men, who seized it with address....
Tho’ they chose men principally connected with commerce and the
judicial departments, yet they appointed many good republican
characters--had they all attended we should see, I am persuaded, a
better system presented. The non-attendance of eight or nine men,
who were appointed members of the convention, I shall ever consider
as a very unfortunate event to the United States.--Had they
attended, I am pretty clear that the results ... would not have
had that strong tendency to aristocracy now discernible in every
part of the plan ... the young visionary men, and the consolidating
aristocracy, would have been more restrained than they have been.
Lee frankly concedes that the instrument possesses many excellent
features, but he considers it greatly vitiated by the “want of that one
important factor in a free government, a representation of the people.”
“Because we have sometimes abused democracy, I am not among those who
think a democratic branch a nuisance.” “Every man of reflection must
see, that the change now proposed, is a transfer of power from the many
to the few.” The present agitation may be traced to its source in “two
very unprincipled parties,” between whom stand the great mass of honest
and substantial people:
One party is composed of little insurgents, men in debt, who want
no law, and who want a share of the property of others; these are
called levellers, Shaysites, &c. The other party is composed of a
few, but more dangerous men, with their servile dependents; these
avariciously grasp at all power and property; you may discover
in all the actions of these men, an evident dislike to free and
equal government, and they go systematically to work to change,
essentially, the forms of government in this country; these are
called aristocrats, m--ites, &c. Between these two parties is
the weight of the community: the men of middling property, men
not in debt on the one hand, and men, on the other, content with
republican governments, and not aiming at immense fortunes, offices
and power. In 1786, the little insurgents, the levellers, came
forth, invaded the rights of others, and attempted to establish
governments according to their wills. Their movements evidently
gave encouragement to the other party, which, in 1787, has taken
the political field, and with its fashionable dependents, and the
tongue and the pen, is endeavouring to establish in a great haste,
a politer kind of government. These two parties ... are really
insignificant, compared with the solid, free, and independent part
of the community.
Calm voices such as Lee’s were few in those strident days, and the
Federalists fairly overwhelmed the silent majority with clamorous
argument. Polite culture and professional learning joined forces to
write down the agrarians. The Hartford Wits dedicated smart couplets
to the cause; Francis Hopkinson made merry over their ways; Noah
Webster confuted them with his economic interpretation of politics;
lawyer-scholars like James Wilson and John Dickinson exposed their
heresies; solid business men like Peletiah Webster contributed after
the measure of their intelligence. In their ardor the Federalists
went further. “What can be the views of those gentlemen in Boston.”
asked Lee pertinently, “who countenanced the printers in shutting up
the press against a fair and free investigation?” From the strident
debate emerged not only the Constitution, but political parties, no
longer to be spoken of as factions, but eventually to be accepted as
necessary agencies in republican government; and to understand their
rival policies we must turn to examine the political philosophies of
the outstanding leaders.
Footnotes
[298] These English liberals have been often regarded as democrats.
Thus Merriam says of Locke, “He was the most famous of seventeenth
century democratic thinkers.” _American Political Theories_, p. 90.
[299] See Laski, _Political Thought from Locke to Bentham_, p. 188.
[300] _Elliot’s Debates_, Vol. I, p. 386.
[301] _Ibid._, Vol. I, pp. 449-450.
[302] _The Federalist_, Introduction, p. viii.
[303] Quoted in Harding, _The Federal Constitution in Massachusetts_.
[304] Carson, _History of the Supreme Court_, quoted by Ford, _The
Federalist_, p. xxix.
[305] Wendell, _Literary History of America_, p. 118.
[306] Number 15.
[307] _Ibid._
[308] Number 10.
[309] Number 49.
[310] Beard, _The Economic Basis of Politics_, pp. 29-32.
[311] Number 10.
[312] The full title is: _Observations leading to a fair examination
of the system of government, proposed by the late Convention; and to
several essential and necessary alterations in it. In a number of
Letters from the Federal Farmer to the Republican._ Reprinted in Ford’s
pamphlets.