FReeper Book Club: The Debate over the Constitution, Melancton Smith #2

FReeper Book Club: The Debate over the Constitution, Melancton Smith #2
A Publius/Billthedrill Essay | 3 February 2011 | Publius & Billthedrill

Posted on 02/03/2011 7:57:43 AM PST by Publius

Melancton Smith Tackles the Issues of Size and Class

On 21 June 1788, New Hampshire ratified the Constitution. This would have been a red letter day for Madison and Hamilton had the primitive state of communications made it possible for the two men to know they had won – up to a point. Melancton Smith, however, would have been dismayed. Nine states had ratified, and the Constitution was now in effect for those states.

Four states remained outside the Constitution, and two of them were the biggest and most important. Virginia was only days away from a ratification vote, and the debate in New York was vigorous, with Melancton Smith and Alexander Hamilton exchanging rhetorical blows on the convention floor in Poughkeepsie.

Second Speech to the New York Ratifying Convention
Melancton Smith, 21 June 1788

¹ I had the honor yesterday of submitting an amendment to the clause under consideration with some observations in support of it.

² I hope I shall be indulged in making some additional remarks in reply to what has been offered by the honorable gentleman from New York [Hamilton].

***

³ He has taken up much time in endeavoring to prove that the great defect in the old Confederation was that it operated upon states instead of individuals.

⁴ It is needless to dispute concerning points on which we do not disagree.

⁵ It is admitted that the powers of the general government ought to operate upon individuals to a certain degree.

⁶ How far the powers should extend, and in what cases to individuals, is the question.

***

⁷ As the different parts of the system will come into view in the course of our investigation, an opportunity will be afforded to consider this question.

⁸ I wish at present to confine myself to the subject immediately under the consideration of the committee.

⁹ I shall make no reply to the arguments offered by the honorable gentleman to justify the rule of apportionment fixed by this clause, for though I am confident they might be easily refuted, yet I am persuaded we must yield this point in accommodation to the Southern states.

¹⁰ The amendment therefore proposes no alteration to the clause in this respect.

***

¹¹ The honorable gentleman says that the clause by obvious construction fixes the representation.

¹² I wish not to torture words or sentences.

¹³ I perceive no such obvious construction.

***

¹⁴ I see clearly that on one hand the representatives cannot exceed one for 30,000 inhabitants, and on the other that whatever larger number of inhabitants may be taken for the rule of apportionment, each state shall be entitled to send one representative.

¹⁵ Everything else appears to me in the discretion of the Legislature.

¹⁶ If there be any other limitation, it is certainly implied.

¹⁷ Matters of moment should not be left to doubtful construction.

¹⁸ It is urged that the number of representatives will be fixed at one for 30,000 because it will be the interest of the larger states to do it.

¹⁹ I cannot discern the force of this argument.

²⁰ To me it appears clear that the relative weight of influence of the different states will be the same, with the number of representatives at 65 as at 600, and that of the individual members greater, for each member's share of power will decrease as the number of the House of Representatives increases.

²¹ If, therefore, this maxim be true, that men are unwilling to relinquish powers which they once possess, we are not to expect the House of Representatives will be inclined to enlarge the numbers.

²² The same motive will operate to influence the President and Senate to oppose the increase of the number of representatives, for in proportion as the House of Representatives is augmented, they will feel their own power diminished.

²³ It is, therefore, of the highest importance that a suitable number of representatives should be established by the Constitution.

***

²⁴ It has been observed by an honorable member that the Eastern states insisted upon a small representation on the principles of economy.

²⁵ This argument must have no weight in the mind of a considerate person.

²⁶ The difference of expense between supporting a House of Representatives sufficiently numerous, and the present proposed one, would be twenty or thirty thousand dollars per annum.

²⁷ The man who would seriously object to this expense to secure his liberties does not deserve to enjoy them.

²⁸ Besides, by increasing the number of representatives, we open a door for the admission of the substantial yeomanry of our country, who being possessed of the habits of economy, will be cautious of imprudent expenditures by which means a greater saving will be made of public money than is sufficient to support them.

²⁹ A reduction of the numbers of the state legislatures might also be made, by which means there might be a saving of expense much more than sufficient for the purpose of supporting the General Legislature, for as under this system all the powers of legislation relating to our general concerns are vested in the general government, the powers of the state legislatures will be so curtailed as to render it less necessary to have them so numerous as they now are.

***

³⁰ But an honorable gentleman has observed that it is a problem that cannot be solved, what the proper number is which ought to compose the House of Representatives, and calls upon me to fix the number.

³¹ I admit that this is a question that will not admit of a solution with mathematical certainty; few political questions will, yet we may determine with certainty that certain numbers are too small or too large.

³² We may be sure that ten is too small and a thousand too large a number.

³³ Everyone will allow that the first number is too small to possess the sentiments be influenced by the interests of the people or secure against corruption; a thousand would be too numerous to be capable of deliberating.

***

³⁴ To determine whether the number of representatives proposed by this Constitution is sufficient, it is proper to examine the qualifications which this House ought to possess in order to exercise their power discreetly for the happiness of the people.

³⁵ The idea that naturally suggests itself to our minds, when we speak of representatives, is that they resemble those they represent.

³⁶ They should be a true picture of the people, possess a knowledge of their circumstances and their wants, sympathize in all their distresses, and be disposed to seek their true interests.

³⁷ The knowledge necessary for the representative of a free people not only comprehends extensive political and commercial information, such as is acquired by men of refined education who have leisure to attain to high degrees of improvement, but it should also comprehend that kind of acquaintance with the common concerns and occupations of the people, which men of the middling class of life are in general more competent to than those of a superior class.

³⁸ To understand the true commercial interests of a country not only requires just ideas of the general commerce of the world, but also and principally a knowledge of the productions of your own country and their value, what your soil is capable of producing, the nature of your manufactures, and the capacity of the country to increase both.

³⁹ To exercise the power of laying taxes, duties and excises with discretion requires something more than an acquaintance with the abstruse parts of the system of finance.

⁴⁰ It calls for a knowledge of the circumstances and ability of the people in general, a discernment how the burdens imposed will bear upon the different classes.

***

⁴¹ From these observations results this conclusion: that the number of representatives should be so large as that while it embraces the men of the first class, it should admit those of the middling class of life.

⁴² I am convinced that this government is so constituted that the representatives will generally be composed of the first class in the community, which I shall distinguish by the name of the natural aristocracy of the country.

⁴³ I do not mean to give offence by using this term.

⁴⁴ I am sensible this idea is treated by many gentlemen as chimerical.

⁴⁵ I shall be asked what is meant by the natural aristocracy and told that no such distinction of classes of men exists among us.

⁴⁶ It is true it is our singular felicity that we have no legal or hereditary distinctions of this kind, but still there are real differences.

⁴⁷ Every society naturally divides itself into classes.

⁴⁸ The Author of nature has bestowed on some greater capacities than others; birth, education, talents and wealth create distinctions among men as visible and of as much influence as titles, stars and garters.

⁴⁹ In every society, men of this class will command a superior degree of respect, and if the government is so constituted as to admit but few to exercise the powers of it, it will, according to the natural course of things, be in their hands.

⁵⁰ Men in the middling class who are qualified as representatives will not be so anxious to be chosen as those of the first.

⁵¹ When the number is so small, the office will be highly elevated and distinguished; the style in which the members live will probably be high; circumstances of this kind will render the place of a representative not a desirable one to sensible, substantial men who have been used to walk in the plain and frugal paths of life.

***

⁵² Besides, the influence of the great will generally enable them to succeed in elections.

⁵³ It will be difficult to combine a district of country containing thirty or forty thousand inhabitants – frame your election laws as you please – in any other character unless it be in one of conspicuous military, popular, civil, or legal talents.

⁵⁴ The great easily form associations; the poor and middling class form them with difficulty.

⁵⁵ If the elections be by plurality, as probably will be the case in this state, it is almost certain none but the great will be chosen, for they easily unite their interests; the common people will divide, and their divisions will be promoted by the others.

⁵⁶ There will be scarcely a chance of their uniting in any other but some great man, unless in some popular demagogue who will probably be destitute of principle.

⁵⁷ A substantial yeoman of sense and discernment will hardly ever be chosen.

⁵⁸ From these remarks, it appears that the government will fall into the hands of the few and the great.

⁵⁹ This will be a government of oppression.

⁶⁰ I do not mean to declaim against the great and charge them indiscriminately with want of principle and honesty.

⁶¹ The same passions and prejudices govern all men.

⁶² The circumstances in which men are placed in a great measure give a cast to the human character.

⁶³ Those in middling circumstances have less temptation; they are inclined by habit and the company with whom they associate to set bounds to their passions and appetites.

⁶⁴ If this is not sufficient, the want of means to gratify them will be a restraint; they are obliged to employ their time in their respective callings, hence the substantial yeomanry of the country are more temperate, of better morals and less ambition than the great.

⁶⁵ The latter do not feel for the poor and middling class; the reasons are obvious: they are not obliged to use the same pains and labor to procure property as the other.

⁶⁶ They feel not the inconveniences arising from the payment of small sums.

⁶⁷ The great consider themselves above the common people, entitled to more respect, do not associate with them; they fancy themselves to have a right of preeminence in everything.

⁶⁸ In short, they possess the same feelings and are under the influence of the same motives as an hereditary nobility.

⁶⁹ I know the idea that such a distinction exists in this country is ridiculed by some, but I am not the less apprehensive of danger from their influence on this account.

⁷⁰ Such distinctions exist all the world over, have been taken notice of by all writers on free government, and are founded in the nature of things.

⁷¹ It has been the principal care of free governments to guard against the encroachments of the great.

⁷² Common observation and experience prove the existence of such distinctions.

⁷³ Will anyone say that there does not exist in this country the pride of family, of wealth, of talents, and that they do not command influence and respect among the common people?

⁷⁴ Congress, in their address to the inhabitants of the province of Quebec in 1775, state this distinction in the following forcible words, quoted from the Marquis Beccaria: “In every human society there is an essay continually tending to confer on one part the height of power and happiness, and to reduce the other to the extreme of weakness and misery. The intent of good laws is to oppose this effort, and to diffuse their influence universally and equally.”

⁷⁵ We ought to guard against the government being placed in the hands of this class.

⁷⁶ They cannot have that sympathy with their constituents which is necessary to connect them closely to their interests.

⁷⁷ Being in the habit of profuse living, they will be profuse in the public expenses.

⁷⁸ They find no difficulty in paying their taxes and therefore do not feel public burdens.

⁷⁹ Besides, if they govern, they will enjoy the emoluments of the government.

⁸⁰ The middling class, from their frugal habits and feeling themselves the public burdens, will be careful how they increase them.

***

⁸¹ But I may be asked: Would you exclude the first class in the community from any share in legislation?

⁸² I answer: By no means.

⁸³ They would be factious, discontented and constantly disturbing the government.

⁸⁴ It would also be unjust.

⁸⁵ They have their liberties to protect, as well as others, and the largest share of property.

⁸⁶ But my idea is that the Constitution should be so framed as to admit this class, together with a sufficient number of the middling class to control them.

⁸⁷ You will then combine the abilities and honesty of the community, a proper degree of information, and a disposition to pursue the public good.

⁸⁸ A representative body, composed principally of respectable yeomanry, is the best possible security to liberty.

⁸⁹ When the interest of this part of the community is pursued, the public good is pursued because the body of every nation consists of this class, and because the interest of both the rich and the poor are involved in that of the middling class.

⁹⁰ No burden can be laid on the poor but what will sensibly affect the middling class.

⁹¹ Any law rendering property insecure would be injurious to them.

⁹² When, therefore, this class in society pursue their own interest, they promote that of the public, for it is involved in it.

***

⁹³ In so small a number of representatives, there is great danger from corruption and combination.

⁹⁴ A great politician has said that every man has his price.

⁹⁵ I hope this is not true in all its extent, but I ask the gentleman to inform me what government there is in which it has not been practiced.

⁹⁶ Notwithstanding all that has been said of the defects in the constitution of the ancient confederacies in the Grecian republics, their destruction is to be imputed more to this cause than to any imperfection in their forms of government.

⁹⁷ This was the deadly poison that effected their dissolution.

⁹⁸ This is an extensive country, increasing in population and growing in consequence.

⁹⁹ Very many lucrative offices will be in the grant of the government which will be objects of avarice and ambition.

¹⁰⁰ How easy will it be to gain over a sufficient number in the bestowment of offices to promote the views and the purposes of those who grant them!

¹⁰¹ Foreign corruption is also to be guarded against.

¹⁰² A system of corruption is known to be the system of government in Europe.

¹⁰³ It is practiced without blushing, and we may lay it to our account it will be attempted amongst us.

¹⁰⁴ The most effectual, as well as natural, security against this is a strong democratic branch in the Legislature, frequently chosen, including in it a number of the substantial, sensible yeomanry of the country.

¹⁰⁵ Does the House of Representatives answer this description?

¹⁰⁶ I confess, to me they hardly wear the complexion of a democratic branch; they appear the mere shadow of representation.

¹⁰⁷ The whole number in both Houses amounts to 91; of these 46 make a quorum, and 24 of those, being secured, may carry any point.

¹⁰⁸ Can the liberties of three millions of people be securely trusted in the hands of 24 men?

¹⁰⁹ Is it prudent to commit to so small a number the decision of the great questions which will come before them?

¹¹⁰ Reason revolts at the idea.

***

¹¹¹ The honorable gentleman from New York has said that 65 members in the House of Representatives are sufficient for the present situation of the country, and taking it for granted that they will increase as one for 30,000, in 25 years they will amount to 200.

¹¹² It is admitted by this observation that the number fixed in the Constitution is not sufficient without it is augmented.

¹¹³ It is not declared that an increase shall be made, but is left at the discretion of the Legislature by the gentleman's own concession; therefore the Constitution is imperfect.

¹¹⁴ We certainly ought to fix in the Constitution those things which are essential to liberty.

¹¹⁵ If any thing falls under this description, it is the number of the Legislature.

¹¹⁶ To say, as this gentleman does, that our security is to depend upon the spirit of the people, who will be watchful of their liberties and not suffer them to be infringed, is absurd.

¹¹⁷ It would equally prove that we might adopt any form of government.

¹¹⁸ I believe, were we to create a despot, he would not immediately dare to act the tyrant, but it would not be long before he would destroy the spirit of the people, or the people would destroy him.

¹¹⁹ If our people have a high sense of liberty, the government should be congenial to this spirit, calculated to cherish the love of liberty, while yet it had sufficient force to restrain licentiousness.

¹²⁰ Government operates upon the spirit of the people, as well as the spirit of the people operates upon it, and if they are not conformable to each other, the one or the other will prevail.

¹²¹ In a less time than 25 years, the government will receive its tone.

¹²² What the spirit of the country may be at the end of that period, it is impossible to foretell.

¹²³ Our duty is to frame a government friendly to liberty and the rights of mankind, which will tend to cherish and cultivate a love of liberty among our citizens.

¹²⁴ If this government becomes oppressive, it will be by degrees: it will aim at its end by disseminating sentiments of government opposite to republicanism and proceed from step to step in depriving the people of a share in the government.

¹²⁵ A recollection of the change that has taken place in the minds of many in this country in the course of a few years ought to put us on our guard.

¹²⁶ Many who are ardent advocates for the new system reprobate republican principles as chimerical and such as ought to be expelled from society.

¹²⁷ Who would have thought ten years ago that the very men who risked their lives and fortunes in support of republican principles would now treat them as the fictions of fancy?

¹²⁸ A few years ago, we fought for liberty, we framed a general government on free principles, we placed the state legislatures, in whom the people have a full and a fair representation, between Congress and the people.

¹²⁹ We were then, it is true, too cautious and too much restricted the powers of the general government.

¹³⁰ But now it is proposed to go into the contrary and a more dangerous extreme: to remove all barriers, to give the new government free access to our pockets and ample command of our persons, and that without providing for a genuine and fair representation of the people.

¹³¹ No one can say what the progress of the change of sentiment may be in 25 years.

¹³² The same men who now cry up the necessity of an energetic government to induce a compliance with this system may in much less time reprobate this in as severe terms as they now do the Confederation, and may as strongly urge the necessity of going as far beyond this as this is beyond the Confederation.

¹³³ Men of this class are increasing; they have influence, talents and industry.

¹³⁴ It is time to form a barrier against them.

¹³⁵ And while we are willing to establish a government adequate to the purposes of the Union, let us be careful to establish it on the broad basis of equal liberty.

The New York Ratifying Convention

The ratification of the Constitution became official on 21 June even as Melancton Smith rose to speak, but the delegates at Poughkeepsie were not to hear of the news for another three days. In the meantime the controversy raged both there and at the ratifying convention in Virginia, where the two largest and most influential states would either grant or deny their prestige to the adoption of the Constitution.

The men on both sides in Virginia have been noted: Madison, Marshall and Randolph; versus Henry, Mason and Monroe. In New York the names would be equally familiar: Hamilton, of course, and Morris; versus Governor George Clinton and Hamilton’s rival Lansing, as well as Melancton Smith.

There was, as well, an additional name in favor of ratification: Hamilton’s co-author of the Federalist Papers, John Jay. Jay had been denied a seat on the New York delegation to the Philadelphia Convention due to a general feeling on the part of the anti-Federalist Clinton faction that his well-known sympathy toward consolidation under a strong federal government made him an inappropriate choice. Possibly to their later regret, Hamilton was chosen and found himself in the company of Robert Yates, who would probably write anti-Federalist papers under the name of Brutus, and John Lansing, Jr., who now faced him on the debating floor.

A certain rancor was understandable. Lansing and Yates had abandoned the Philadelphia Convention when it became apparent to them that the intention there was to design a new government instead of alter the old one, leaving Hamilton fuming and powerless to vote for New York. Now it was Hamilton’s turn for revenge, and the resulting oratorical feud that played out between the two men was a source of considerable amusement to both sides.

The serious work, however, was nearly at an end. The shrewder of the anti-Federalists could see the handwriting on the wall in the form of eight states of the necessary nine having already ratified the Constitution, and they would soon find themselves playing for the best compromise they could find that fit their principles: the inclusion of a bill of rights. Their original strategy had been to hope for a quick negative vote, trusting on what they felt was a reasonably safe majority should certain centrists not be talked around or convinced by outside events, as in fact they soon would be.

The strategist for the Federalist side at the New York ratifying convention was John Jay, in close correspondence with the looming figure of George Washington, physically absent from the convention but present in every other sense. He had been president of the Philadelphia Convention, and to no one’s doubt he was the President of the United States in waiting. It was Jay and Washington who decided that the best Federalist strategy would be to demand the clause-by-clause debate in which the two sides were now locked.

On this very day, Jay wrote to his wife Sarah, “The opposition to the proposed Constitution appears formidable, the more so from numbers than other considerations.” Clearly Jay felt his side superior in talent, as he had earlier written to Washington. In that same letter he said the “Proceedings and Debates have been temperate, and inoffensive to either Party…” With the relatively mild exceptions of Hamilton and Lansing, they would remain, personified by the grace and composure of Melancton Smith.

Smith’s Critique

What Smith conceded in his speech was little more than what was obvious at this point, some nine months into the national debate; what he reserved would only carry the greater weight because of it.

⁴ It is needless to dispute concerning points on which we do not disagree.

There is a reference to the ability of Congress to impose taxation on individual citizens instead of requisitions to states, an issue that Smith would expand into an examination of the very government itself.

⁵ It is admitted that the powers of the general government ought to operate upon individuals to a certain degree.

⁶ How far the powers should extend, and in what cases to individuals, is the question.

Smith had proposed an amendment – by the convention’s end, there would be several – along the lines of this inquiry. He repeats his reluctant acceptance of the Three-Fifths Compromise as necessary to bring the Southern states into the Union (9) and returns to a consideration of the numerical construction of the House of Representatives. Hamilton has suggested that it is in the interest of the larger states to support the figure of one representative per 30,000, a claim that Smith dismisses with the note that it is to the advantage of neither large nor small states, and possibly to the disadvantage of the people (20).

He also repeats his suspicion that neither Congress nor the Executive will be “inclined to enlarge the numbers” inasmuch as it will correspondingly dilute their present members’ power (21, 22); a larger number will not necessarily be uneconomical (26). Here Smith takes a new direction: a larger membership will open the door to participation by members of the middle class, the “yeomanry” of the nation (28). It is not the first time social class has come up in the debate – Brutus, in his #4, stated essentially the same argument that Smith would now take up.

^{Brutus #4-43} The number will be so small that but a very few of the most sensible and respectable yeomanry of the country can ever have any knowledge of them; being so far removed from the people, their station will be elevated and important, and they will be considered as ambitious and designing.

^{Brutus #4-44} They will not be viewed by the people as part of themselves, but as a body distinct from them and having separate interests to pursue…

Smith states this in strikingly similar terms.

⁵¹ When the number is so small, the office will be highly elevated and distinguished; the style in which the members live will probably be high…

Madison, in Federalist #57, played down the possibility of an oligarchy, and Hamilton, in Federalist #36, contended that class membership was not so important so long as the representatives voted in the interest of the classes they represented, an argument that Smith finds entirely unsatisfactory.

³⁵ The idea that naturally suggests itself to our minds, when we speak of representatives, is that they resemble those they represent.

³⁷ The knowledge necessary for the representative of a free people…should also comprehend that kind of acquaintance with the common concerns and occupations of the people, which men of the middling class of life are in general more competent to than those of a superior class.

⁵⁸ From these remarks, it appears that the government will fall into the hands of the few and the great.

⁵⁹ This will be a government of oppression.

But this is no inchoate hatred of the wealthy as will be found sixty years later in Marx on precisely the same topic. Smith recognizes that virtue is as common in the “great” as elsewhere (60, 61), but even with the best of intentions they do not “feel for” the lower classes because they “are not obliged to use the same pains and labor to procure property…” (65). Significantly for those who will possess the power of direct taxation of the individual citizen:

⁶⁶ They feel not the inconveniences arising from the payment of small sums.

⁷⁸ They find no difficulty in paying their taxes and therefore do not feel public burdens.

⁷⁹ Besides, if they govern, they will enjoy the emoluments of the government.

The last was a prediction that would take some time to materialize: not until 1855 were congressmen given annual salaries. But materialize it did. The current annual salary for Congress is no less than $174,000 per annum, and the yeomanry are notable for their absence in the Capitol except in the role of tourists.

Does Smith, then, anticipate Marx in advocating the exclusion of the wealthy from the government in favor of some dictatorship of the proletariat?

⁸² I answer: By no means…

⁸⁴ It would also be unjust.

They also are citizens, says Smith, they also have their liberty to protect.

⁸⁶ But my idea is that the Constitution should be so framed as to admit this class, together with a sufficient number of the middling class to control them.

⁸⁸ A representative body, composed principally of respectable yeomanry, is the best possible security to liberty.

In order to accomplish this, Congress must be large enough in number: not the thirteen House members of the anti-Federalists’ paranoid suspicions, nor the 65 that would compose the initial House, a configuration that might result in a majority of a quorum of both Houses to consist of a mere 24 men (107). Smith admits it is a temporary situation, but it is one from which the country must move on with all dispatch.

¹¹¹ The honorable gentleman from New York [Hamilton] has said that 65 members in the House of Representatives are sufficient for the present situation of the country, and taking it for granted that they will increase as one for 30,000, in 25 years they will amount to 200.

Smith insists this is not at the whim of Congress. It is to be specified from the beginning in the Constitution itself. But Hamilton has already called Smith’s and the other anti-Federalists’ bluff. How much is to be specified, then? Earlier in the speech Smith admits he has no answer.

³² We may be sure that ten is too small and a thousand too large a number.

One might imagine Hamilton’s unspoken retort that the number 200 falls neatly between those two extremes and that it is, after all, a rather wide envelope, quite as uncertain as leaving the matter in the hands of Congress. It is not one of Smith’s stronger rhetorical points, but it is one of his more candid. Much better is his next reply to Hamilton’s easy assurance that the ultimate guardians of liberty will be the people themselves.

¹¹⁶ To say, as this gentleman does, that our security is to depend upon the spirit of the people, who will be watchful of their liberties and not suffer them to be infringed, is absurd.

¹¹⁷ It would equally prove that we might adopt any form of government.

A point to Hamilton; a point to Smith. Whatever it may lack in florid bombast, this is debate of a very high order. Smith comes to the climax of this particular speech with a reminder that the Constitution must be as perfect as humanly possible because it must be a certain plan for an uncertain future.

¹²¹ In a less time than 25 years, the government will receive its tone.

¹²³ Our duty is to frame a government friendly to liberty and the rights of mankind, which will tend to cherish and cultivate a love of liberty among our citizens.

In 25 years the country itself would be doubled in size through the Louisiana Purchase, the House consist of 182 members, and the number of states 18. It would also be once again at war with Great Britain.

Smith recalls the events of the previous years in a summation of how they arrived at the pass they were now contemplating. In one of his rare accusations, he categorizes the Federalists as men who once “risked their lives and fortunes in support of republican principles” (127) and who were now acting against those very principles.

¹²⁹ We were then, it is true, too cautious and too much restricted the powers of the general government.

¹³⁰ But now it is proposed to go into the contrary and a more dangerous extreme: to remove all barriers…

The same Federalists who now are supporting an expansion of government may find themselves continuing to do so when the imperfections of the Constitution show up as vividly as those of the Articles of Confederation. It is time, declares Smith, to stop these men now lest the direction of the future lead to tyranny.

¹³³ Men of this class are increasing; they have influence, talents and industry.

¹³⁴ It is time to form a barrier against them.

As he sat down, Smith considered that barrier to consist of another plan of government, less in line with consolidation, more in line with a confederated republic. Some had suggested a second constitutional convention to follow ratification; some such as Henry, a hopeful participation in the Union without ratification altogether. After the events of the day in New Hampshire, that emphasis would change, and Smith would find himself arguing that the best such barrier still possible would be a bill of rights.

Discussion Topics

Smith raises the specter of class distinctions, pointing out that middle class representatives will have less of a tendency to spend than richer representatives. Likewise he argues that men of the middle class are of greater moral fiber than the rich. He argues that government by the rich will lead to oppression, while government by the middle class will not. None of this has not been borne out by history. Why?
Smith points out the endemic corruption of European governments, believing that America can offer an alternative to this. Yet corruption was endemic in the colonial and state legislatures and in the Confederation Congress. Why did Smith get this one wrong?
Contradicting Hamilton, Smith believes that the people are not capable of preventing the infringement of their liberties; instead there should be written guarantees in the Constitution. Was he right, and why?
Smith understands that despotism cannot happen overnight, but must proceed incrementally. He views the Constitution as a tool in this process. Was he right, and why?

TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Free Republic
KEYWORDS: federalistpapers; freeperbookclub

1 posted on 02/03/2011 7:57:49 AM PST by Publius

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To: 14themunny; 21stCenturion; 300magnum; A Strict Constructionist; abigail2; AdvisorB; Aggie Mama; ...

Ping! The thread has been posted.

Earlier threads:

2 posted on 02/03/2011 7:59:57 AM PST by Publius

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To: Publius

I think the Tea Party movement is in part an awakening to what Smith tells us, which is that the Federal Government as constituted is the government by the “natural aristocracy,”with little check by the middling classes. The Tea party movements is a movement of this class. Which is why it is opposed by both parties, in lesser or greater degrees. Sarah Palin—who is the very embodiment of the middling classes and who so clearly articulates their opinion—arouses such violent opposition because she is a living rebuke to the claims of the “Ruling class” to rule by “natural right,” so to speak. At the same time, it points to the weakness of her position, because this ruling class rejects the claims of the middling classes, however numerous, to have a meaningful share in power except through of their own who serves as their virtual representative.

3 posted on 02/03/2011 10:16:30 AM PST by RobbyS (Pray with the suffering souls.)

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To: Publius

Contradicting Hamilton, Smith believes that the people are not capable of preventing the infringement of their liberties; instead there should be written guarantees in the Constitution. Was he right, and why?

As history has proven, the "people" are very capable of infringing upon their own liberties. Smith was caught up in the spirit of the times instead of the eventual spirit of the party.

Perhaps some more guarantees in the Constitution would have been beneficial, perhaps with clarifications and penalties attached, but we now see that the current guarantees (invasion - republican form of government) mean nothing; possibly because no soul is held accountable.

4 posted on 02/03/2011 1:01:09 PM PST by Loud Mime (If you don't believe in God, you will believe in government. Choose your "G")

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To: Publius

A BTT for the evening crowd. We’re almost to the end of the project now. A mere half-dozen more pieces and both Federalist and anti-Federalist will sit back and contemplate the government they have just given to the nation. Then the real work will commence.

5 posted on 02/03/2011 6:05:37 PM PST by Billthedrill

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To: Publius

So when was this anti-Federalist written, last summer? ;)

Discussion Topics

Smith raises the specter of class distinctions, pointing out that middle class representatives will have less of a tendency to spend than richer representatives. Likewise he argues that men of the middle class are of greater moral fiber than the rich. He argues that government by the rich will lead to oppression, while government by the middle class will not. None of this has not been borne out by history. Why?

Well he hits all the right points. People who are good with people tend to get rich. More opportunities come their way and they have a better understanding of how to work them. Why hasn’t this lead to oppression? Having a good understanding of people, the rich understand that those who work with them work better when they are involved in the planning and execution. It’s human nature such that even the most narrowly focused person wants to know what they are doing is the best thing to do. People don’t work well when they are exploited. Where this hasn’t proven to be true is when people get stuck in a certain place i.e. small towns. immigrants, slaves, people in the hills of Appalachia. As long as the "Middling" class is able to move, they can find a better situation, have some control over their lives and provide a check on those who would use their superior social skills to take advantage of them.

Smith points out the endemic corruption of European governments, believing that America can offer an alternative to this. Yet corruption was endemic in the colonial and state legislatures and in the Confederation Congress. Why did Smith get this one wrong?

Don’t know. Maybe he believed in his countrymen.

Contradicting Hamilton, Smith believes that the people are not capable of preventing the infringement of their liberties; instead there should be written guarantees in the Constitution. Was he right, and why?

Nope. Disagree. All the words in the word, strung together in just the right way can’t save a people willing to be oppressed. We have to depend on ourselves.

Smith understands that despotism cannot happen overnight, but must proceed incrementally. He views the Constitution as a tool in this process. Was he right, and why?

Oh yes certainly. I think he correctly pointed out the many of the flaws of the constitution, especially when it comes to how it intersected with the flaws of human character. What he failed to foresee was the extent we would become ruled by lawyers. A majority of Senators are lawyers and more than a third in the house. They all believe in the goodness of laws and process. We’ve become saturated with little laws everywhere, especially in our tax code. Where the law is vague, they’ve set up a legal process that can decide most anything. Thinking about it, I probably have to deal with more laws at work than when I pay my taxes. It’s a drain. Then, since these lawyers don’t have the expertise to understand environmental, financial, etc. issues, they turn over their law making responsibility to the bureaucracy only defining the process by which more newer laws are made. I have to think that Smith was right, that our House does not have the skills of the common people and uses the one skill all the rich share, social skill, to guide it’s effort.

The constitution has created a framework for more laws. Moreover since it is a national constitution, we can't move away from it and still stay in America like the "Middling" class could before the constitution was ratified.

6 posted on 02/03/2011 8:03:52 PM PST by MontaniSemperLiberi (Moutaineers are Always Free)

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To: MontaniSemperLiberi

So when was this anti-Federalist written, last summer?

LOL! Yeah. Transport these guys 220 years into the future and they'd be asking, "Well, how did it all turn out?" and you'd have to answer, "We're still fighting about the same things!" I want to think they'd be amused by that.

We are heirs of greatness, I believe, and our challenge is to be worthy heirs. Considering the greatness, that's quite a challenge.

7 posted on 02/03/2011 9:34:37 PM PST by Billthedrill

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To: Billthedrill

We are heirs of greatness, I believe, and our challenge is to be worthy heirs. Considering the greatness, that's quite a challenge.

Well said! I couldn't agree more!

8 posted on 02/04/2011 8:55:37 AM PST by Bigun ("It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere." Voltaire)

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To: Publius

Under discussion point 3, pointing out Smith's belief that "the People" might not be capable of preventing infringements on their rights, his concern was valid, and that is why the Framers written Constitution enumerated, separated, balanced, checked and confined the valid ability to amend that Constitution to the written Constitution's own provision.

Additionally, the Founders understood that what they called "virtue among the people" was essential, so that the written, as well as the "unwritten" constitution in the hearts of the people would agree.

That would require what they called "an enlightened people." In a Bicentennial of the Constitution book entitled, "Our Ageless Constitution," there appears the following essay, reprinted with permission:

An Enlightened, Committed People Who Understand The Principles Of Our Constitution

- The Most Effective Means Of Preserving Liberty

"Although all men are born free, slavery has been the general lot of the human race. Ignorant - they have been cheated; asleep - they have been surprised; divided - the yoke has been forced upon them. But what is the lesson? ...the people ought to be enlightened, to be awakened, to be united, that after establishing a government they should watch over it.... It is universally admitted that a well-instructed people alone can be permanently free." James Madison

America's Constitution is the means by which knowledgeable and free people, capable of self-government, can bind and control their elected representatives in government. In order to remain free, the Founders said, the people themselves must clearly understand the ideas and principles upon which their Constitutional government is based. Through such understanding, they will be able to prevent those in power from eroding their Constitutional protections.

The Founders established schools and seminaries for the distinct purpose of instilling in youth the lessons of history and the ideas of liberty. And, in their day, they were successful. Tocqueville, eminent French jurist, traveled America and in his 1830's work, DEMOCRACY IN AMERICA, wrote:

". . . every citizen ... is taught . . . the doctrines and the evidences of his religion, the history of his country, and the leading features of its Constitution ... it is extremely rare to find a man imperfectly acquainted with all these things, and a person wholly ignorant of them is a sort of phenomenon."

On the frontier, he noted that "...no sort of comparison can be drawn between the pioneer and the dwelling that shelters him.... He wears the dress and speaks the language of the cities; he is acquainted with the past, curious about the future, and ready for argument about the present.... I do not think that so much intellectual activity exists in the most enlightened and populous districts of France' " He continued, "It cannot be doubted that in the United States the instruction of the people powerfully contributes to the support of the democratic republic; and such must always be the case...where the instruction which enlightens the understanding is not separated from the moral education.."

Possessing a clear understanding of the failure of previous civilizations to achieve and sustain freedom for individuals, our forefathers discovered some timeless truths about human nature, the struggle for individual liberty, the human tendency toward abuse of power, and the means for curbing that tendency through Constitutional self-government. Jefferson's Bill For The More General Diffusion Of Knowledge For Virginia declared:

"...experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms (of government), those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny; and it is believed that the most effectual means of preventing this would be, to illuminate...the minds of the people...to give them knowledge of those facts, which history exhibiteth. History, by apprizing them of the past, will enable them to judge of the future...it will qualify them judges of the actions and designs of men; it will enable them to know ambition under every disguise it may assume; and knowing it, to defeat its views.."

Education was not perceived by the Founders to be a mere process for teaching basic skills. It was much, much more. Education included the very process by which the people of America would understand and be able to preserve their liberty and secure their Creator-endowed rights. Understanding the nature and origin of their rights and the means of preserving them, the people would be capable of self government, for they would recognize any threats to liberty and "nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud." (Adams)

9 posted on 02/06/2011 10:05:21 AM PST by loveliberty2

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To: loveliberty2

Here is the one I can't get out of my head!

It is for us, fellow citizens, to watch over the sacred legacy of our venerated Fathers, and, when necessary, ‘to provide other guards for the future security’ of ourselves and our posterity. To restore, when impaired, our free institutions to their original strength and purity, and to guard them in future against the open or covert assaults of their enemies. To preserve those institutions pure and uncontaminated, amidst the dangerous and corrupting influences of those who, guided not by the spirit of virtue and patriotism, seek only their own personal interests and personal aggrandizement is a sacred and solemn duty which we own to ourselves, and to those who are destined to walk after us.

Nathan Smith

10 posted on 02/06/2011 10:37:22 AM PST by Bigun ("The most fearsome words in the English language are I'm from the government and I'm here to help!")

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To: loveliberty2

Education was not perceived by the Founders to be a mere process for teaching basic skills. It was much, much more. Education included the very process by which the people of America would understand and be able to preserve their liberty and secure their Creator-endowed rights. Understanding the nature and origin of their rights and the means of preserving them, the people would be capable of self government, for they would recognize any threats to liberty and "nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud." (Adams)

That bears repeating so I did that!

11 posted on 02/06/2011 10:42:39 AM PST by Bigun ("The most fearsome words in the English language are I'm from the government and I'm here to help!")

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To: Publius; Jacquerie; Bigun; EternalVigilance; All

The Egyptian people today are much in need of copies of America's Declaration of Independence, the U. S. Constitution, and THE FEDERALIST (the 85 essays which explain its principles).

If, as America's Founders believed, "an enlightened people alone can be a free people," then the Egyptians desire for freedom cannot and will not be successful unless they develop an understanding of the ideas essential to liberty.

What better contribution to their effort could be made than to share those documents and this forum with citizens in their nation?

12 posted on 02/11/2011 12:38:24 PM PST by loveliberty2

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To: loveliberty2

Maybe, but I doubt a people steeped in Allah and millennia of autocratic government will be much disposed to emulate anything approaching our form of government. Make that form of government as in 1787, not 2011.

Just as our Constitution was designed to secure the rights granted to us by God, I expect the new Egyptian form of government to reflect Allah.

As Christians, we have free will. Islamists are free only to obey Allah. When one’s relationship to Allah is that of slave to master, it follows that one will be prone to accept totalitarian government here on earth.

13 posted on 02/11/2011 1:16:15 PM PST by Jacquerie (The 112th Congress will be a proxy fight for the American soul.)

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To: Jacquerie

Your points are well taken; yet, in the Founders' view, the ideas of the Declaration were "self-evident" truths.

Is it possible that the inner urge, or push, for freedom being felt and expressed by the folks speaking to reporters in the square today might not be reflections of some "self-evident" truth which had penetrated through even their previous concepts of a Supreme Being?

Even in Christianity, there have been those who held to the slave/master idea, living out their lives in submission to church leaders, rather than exercising free will and enjoying "the blessings of liberty."

My point was that America's Founders articulated ideas which were abstract and revolutionary, and those ideas changed the world of that day. Inasmuch as the principles were enduring and, as Lincoln said, "applicable to all men and all times," perhaps the same Divine Providence which operated on this little spot on the globe in 1776 might open the minds of individuals in other lands in 2011 to bring liberty and light to dark places.

Just an idea! Peace!!

14 posted on 02/11/2011 1:57:45 PM PST by loveliberty2

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