The Unsorted BBS Collection/thegreatunsorted.tar/thegreatunsorted/texts/txtfiles_misc/fp1

Text File | 1991-09-30 | 12KB | 198 lines

          This is the Project Gutenberg 1.1 release of
                    The Federalist Papers

Due to an error in file transfer the 1.0 version was decapitated
of all but the first section of the five sections we received in
which the following information was contained in various mark-up
formats and various footnoting conventions.  You may note in the
middle portion that the footnotes are different, and indentation
is practically non-existent.  We hope to have this fixed in only
a week or so, as we are requesting new copies from which to work
and we are also requesting a scholarly review of this file, from
Tom Horton (one of the requestors of the file. . .Tom. . .help--
are you out there).  So, please bear in mind that while editions
from Project Gutenberg are not supposed to be authoritative, our
expectations are to provide you with documents that are at least
internally consistent.  Therefore, the next release or two would
be in hopes of clearing this up immediately.

My personal apologies to those who require them.  I have edited,
and edited, but find myself at the point of diminshing returns.

Hopefully at that is in error is that I received an inconsistent
collection of file portions and the correct file(s) will be sent
shortly.  Otherwise I have to rely on Federalist scholars to see
what I cannot see in the middle fifth of this file, and correct,
send to me, and advise on the preparation of later version.

As mentioned in the August 31 newsletter, we have several files,
each of various editions of The Federalist Papers, but this one,
such as it is, was okayed for release.  The others are still in,
shall we say, a state of limbo.

Michael S. Hart, Director, Project Gutenberg Septmeber 1, 1991
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FEDERALIST. No. 1

General Introduction
For the Independent Journal.

HAMILTON

To the People of the State of New York:
AFTER an unequivocal experience of the inefficiency of the
 subsisting federal government, you are called upon to deliberate on
 a new Constitution for the United States of America. The subject
 speaks its own importance; comprehending in its consequences
 nothing less than the existence of the UNION, the safety and welfare
 of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many
 respects the most interesting in the world. It has been frequently
 remarked that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this
 country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important
 question, whether societies of men are really capable or not of
 establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether
 they are forever destined to depend for their political
 constitutions on accident and force. If there be any truth in the
 remark, the crisis at which we are arrived may with propriety be
 regarded as the era in which that decision is to be made; and a
 wrong election of the part we shall act may, in this view, deserve
 to be considered as the general misfortune of mankind.
This idea will add the inducements of philanthropy to those of
 patriotism, to heighten the solicitude which all considerate and
 good men must feel for the event. Happy will it be if our choice
 should be directed by a judicious estimate of our true interests,
 unperplexed and unbiased by considerations not connected with the
 public good. But this is a thing more ardently to be wished than
 seriously to be expected. The plan offered to our deliberations
 affects too many particular interests, innovates upon too many local
 institutions, not to involve in its discussion a variety of objects
 foreign to its merits, and of views, passions and prejudices little
 favorable to the discovery of truth.
Among the most formidable of the obstacles which the new
 Constitution will have to encounter may readily be distinguished the
 obvious interest of a certain class of men in every State to resist
 all changes which may hazard a diminution of the power, emolument,
 and consequence of the offices they hold under the State
 establishments; and the perverted ambition of another class of men,
 who will either hope to aggrandize themselves by the confusions of
 their country, or will flatter themselves with fairer prospects of
 elevation from the subdivision of the empire into several partial
 confederacies than from its union under one government.
It is not, however, my design to dwell upon observations of this
 nature. I am well aware that it would be disingenuous to resolve
 indiscriminately the opposition of any set of men (merely because
 their situations might subject them to suspicion) into interested or
 ambitious views. Candor will oblige us to admit that even such men
 may be actuated by upright intentions; and it cannot be doubted
 that much of the opposition which has made its appearance, or may
 hereafter make its appearance, will spring from sources, blameless
 at least, if not respectable--the honest errors of minds led astray
 by preconceived jealousies and fears. So numerous indeed and so
 powerful are the causes which serve to give a false bias to the
 judgment, that we, upon many occasions, see wise and good men on the
 wrong as well as on the right side of questions of the first
 magnitude to society. This circumstance, if duly attended to, would
 furnish a lesson of moderation to those who are ever so much
 persuaded of their being in the right in any controversy. And a
 further reason for caution, in this respect, might be drawn from the
 reflection that we are not always sure that those who advocate the
 truth are influenced by purer principles than their antagonists.
 Ambition, avarice, personal animosity, party opposition, and many
 other motives not more laudable than these, are apt to operate as
 well upon those who support as those who oppose the right side of a
 question. Were there not even these inducements to moderation,
 nothing could be more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which
 has, at all times, characterized political parties. For in
 politics, as in religion, it is equally absurd to aim at making
 proselytes by fire and sword. Heresies in either can rarely be
 cured by persecution.
And yet, however just these sentiments will be allowed to be, we
 have already sufficient indications that it will happen in this as
 in all former cases of great national discussion. A torrent of
 angry and malignant passions will be let loose. To judge from the
 conduct of the opposite parties, we shall be led to conclude that
 they will mutually hope to evince the justness of their opinions,
 and to increase the number of their converts by the loudness of
 their declamations and the bitterness of their invectives. An
 enlightened zeal for the energy and efficiency of government will be
 stigmatized as the offspring of a temper fond of despotic power and
 hostile to the principles of liberty. An over-scrupulous jealousy
 of danger to the rights of the people, which is more commonly the
 fault of the head than of the heart, will be represented as mere
 pretense and artifice, the stale bait for popularity at the expense
 of the public good. It will be forgotten, on the one hand, that
 jealousy is the usual concomitant of love, and that the noble
 enthusiasm of liberty is apt to be infected with a spirit of narrow
 and illiberal distrust. On the other hand, it will be equally
 forgotten that the vigor of government is essential to the security
 of liberty; that, in the contemplation of a sound and well-informed
 judgment, their interest can never be separated; and that a
 dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal
 for the rights of the people than under the forbidden appearance of
 zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government. History will
 teach us that the former has been found a much more certain road to
 the introduction of despotism than the latter, and that of those men
 who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number
 have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people;
 commencing demagogues, and ending tyrants.
In the course of the preceding observations, I have had an eye,
 my fellow-citizens, to putting you upon your guard against all
 attempts, from whatever quarter, to influence your decision in a
 matter of the utmost moment to your welfare, by any impressions
 other than those which may result from the evidence of truth. You
 will, no doubt, at the same time, have collected from the general
 scope of them, that they proceed from a source not unfriendly to the
 new Constitution. Yes, my countrymen, I own to you that, after
 having given it an attentive consideration, I am clearly of opinion
 it is your interest to adopt it. I am convinced that this is the
 safest course for your liberty, your dignity, and your happiness. I
 affect not reserves which I do not feel. I will not amuse you with
 an appearance of deliberation when I have decided. I frankly
 acknowledge to you my convictions, and I will freely lay before you
 the reasons on which they are founded. The consciousness of good
 intentions disdains ambiguity. I shall not, however, multiply
 professions on this head. My motives must remain in the depository
 of my own breast. My arguments will be open to all, and may be
 judged of by all. They shall at least be offered in a spirit which
 will not disgrace the cause of truth.
I propose, in a series of papers, to discuss the following
 interesting particulars:
THE UTILITY OF THE UNION TO YOUR POLITICAL PROSPERITY
THE INSUFFICIENCY OF THE PRESENT CONFEDERATION
 TO PRESERVE THAT UNION  THE NECESSITY OF A GOVERNMENT AT LEAST
 EQUALLY ENERGETIC WITH THE ONE PROPOSED, TO THE ATTAINMENT OF THIS
 OBJECT  THE CONFORMITY OF THE PROPOSED CONSTITUTION TO THE TRUE
 PRINCIPLES OF REPUBLICAN GOVERNMENT
 ITS ANALOGY TO YOUR OWN STATE CONSTITUTION
 and lastly, THE ADDITIONAL SECURITY WHICH ITS
 ADOPTION WILL AFFORD TO THE PRESERVATION OF THAT SPECIES OF
 GOVERNMENT, TO LIBERTY, AND TO PROPERTY.
In the progress of this discussion I shall endeavor to give a
 satisfactory answer to all the objections which shall have made
 their appearance, that may seem to have any claim to your attention.
It may perhaps be thought superfluous to offer arguments to
 prove the utility of the UNION, a point, no doubt, deeply engraved
 on the hearts of the great body of the people in every State, and
 one, which it may be imagined, has no adversaries. But the fact is,
 that we already hear it whispered in the private circles of those
 who oppose the new Constitution, that the thirteen States are of too
 great extent for any general system, and that we must of necessity
 resort to separate confederacies of distinct portions of the
 whole.1 This doctrine will, in all probability, be gradually
 propagated, till it has votaries enough to countenance an open
 avowal of it. For nothing can be more evident, to those who are
 able to take an enlarged view of the subject, than the alternative
 of an adoption of the new Constitution or a dismemberment of the
 Union. It will therefore be of use to begin by examining the
 advantages of that Union, the certain evils, and the probable
 dangers, to which every State will be exposed from its dissolution.
 This shall accordingly constitute the subject of my next address.
 PUBLIUS.
1 The same idea, tracing the arguments to their consequences, is
 held out in several of the late publications against the new
 Constitution.