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FEDERALIST No. 31

The Same Subject Continued
(Concerning the General Power of Taxation)
From the New York Packet.
Tuesday, January 1, 1788.

HAMILTON

To the People of the State of New York:
IN DISQUISITIONS of every kind, there are certain primary
 truths, or first principles, upon which all subsequent reasonings
 must depend. These contain an internal evidence which, antecedent
 to all reflection or combination, commands the assent of the mind.
 Where it produces not this effect, it must proceed either from some
 defect or disorder in the organs of perception, or from the
 influence of some strong interest, or passion, or prejudice. Of
 this nature are the maxims in geometry, that ``the whole is greater
 than its part; things equal to the same are equal to one another;
 two straight lines cannot enclose a space; and all right angles
 are equal to each other.'' Of the same nature are these other
 maxims in ethics and politics, that there cannot be an effect
 without a cause; that the means ought to be proportioned to the
 end; that every power ought to be commensurate with its object;
 that there ought to be no limitation of a power destined to effect
 a purpose which is itself incapable of limitation. And there are
 other truths in the two latter sciences which, if they cannot
 pretend to rank in the class of axioms, are yet such direct
 inferences from them, and so obvious in themselves, and so agreeable
 to the natural and unsophisticated dictates of common-sense, that
 they challenge the assent of a sound and unbiased mind, with a
 degree of force and conviction almost equally irresistible.
The objects of geometrical inquiry are so entirely abstracted
 from those pursuits which stir up and put in motion the unruly
 passions of the human heart, that mankind, without difficulty, adopt
 not only the more simple theorems of the science, but even those
 abstruse paradoxes which, however they may appear susceptible of
 demonstration, are at variance with the natural conceptions which
 the mind, without the aid of philosophy, would be led to entertain
 upon the subject. The INFINITE DIVISIBILITY of matter, or, in other
 words, the INFINITE divisibility of a FINITE thing, extending even
 to the minutest atom, is a point agreed among geometricians, though
 not less incomprehensible to common-sense than any of those
 mysteries in religion, against which the batteries of infidelity
 have been so industriously leveled.
But in the sciences of morals and politics, men are found far
 less tractable. To a certain degree, it is right and useful that
 this should be the case. Caution and investigation are a necessary
 armor against error and imposition. But this untractableness may be
 carried too far, and may degenerate into obstinacy, perverseness, or
 disingenuity. Though it cannot be pretended that the principles of
 moral and political knowledge have, in general, the same degree of
 certainty with those of the mathematics, yet they have much better
 claims in this respect than, to judge from the conduct of men in
 particular situations, we should be disposed to allow them. The
 obscurity is much oftener in the passions and prejudices of the
 reasoner than in the subject. Men, upon too many occasions, do not
 give their own understandings fair play; but, yielding to some
 untoward bias, they entangle themselves in words and confound
 themselves in subtleties.
How else could it happen (if we admit the objectors to be
 sincere in their opposition), that positions so clear as those which
 manifest the necessity of a general power of taxation in the
 government of the Union, should have to encounter any adversaries
 among men of discernment? Though these positions have been
 elsewhere fully stated, they will perhaps not be improperly
 recapitulated in this place, as introductory to an examination of
 what may have been offered by way of objection to them. They are in
 substance as follows:
A government ought to contain in itself every power requisite to
 the full accomplishment of the objects committed to its care, and to
 the complete execution of the trusts for which it is responsible,
 free from every other control but a regard to the public good and to
 the sense of the people.
As the duties of superintending the national defense and of
 securing the public peace against foreign or domestic violence
 involve a provision for casualties and dangers to which no possible
 limits can be assigned, the power of making that provision ought to
 know no other bounds than the exigencies of the nation and the
 resources of the community.
As revenue is the essential engine by which the means of
 answering the national exigencies must be procured, the power of
 procuring that article in its full extent must necessarily be
 comprehended in that of providing for those exigencies.
As theory and practice conspire to prove that the power of
 procuring revenue is unavailing when exercised over the States in
 their collective capacities, the federal government must of
 necessity be invested with an unqualified power of taxation in the
 ordinary modes.
Did not experience evince the contrary, it would be natural to
 conclude that the propriety of a general power of taxation in the
 national government might safely be permitted to rest on the
 evidence of these propositions, unassisted by any additional
 arguments or illustrations. But we find, in fact, that the
 antagonists of the proposed Constitution, so far from acquiescing in
 their justness or truth, seem to make their principal and most
 zealous effort against this part of the plan. It may therefore be
 satisfactory to analyze the arguments with which they combat it.
Those of them which have been most labored with that view, seem
 in substance to amount to this: ``It is not true, because the
 exigencies of the Union may not be susceptible of limitation, that
 its power of laying taxes ought to be unconfined. Revenue is as
 requisite to the purposes of the local administrations as to those
 of the Union; and the former are at least of equal importance with
 the latter to the happiness of the people. It is, therefore, as
 necessary that the State governments should be able to command the
 means of supplying their wants, as that the national government
 should possess the like faculty in respect to the wants of the Union.
 But an indefinite power of taxation in the LATTER might, and
 probably would in time, deprive the FORMER of the means of providing
 for their own necessities; and would subject them entirely to the
 mercy of the national legislature. As the laws of the Union are to
 become the supreme law of the land, as it is to have power to pass
 all laws that may be NECESSARY for carrying into execution the
 authorities with which it is proposed to vest it, the national
 government might at any time abolish the taxes imposed for State
 objects upon the pretense of an interference with its own. It might
 allege a necessity of doing this in order to give efficacy to the
 national revenues. And thus all the resources of taxation might by
 degrees become the subjects of federal monopoly, to the entire
 exclusion and destruction of the State governments.''
This mode of reasoning appears sometimes to turn upon the
 supposition of usurpation in the national government; at other
 times it seems to be designed only as a deduction from the
 constitutional operation of its intended powers. It is only in the
 latter light that it can be admitted to have any pretensions to
 fairness. The moment we launch into conjectures about the
 usurpations of the federal government, we get into an unfathomable
 abyss, and fairly put ourselves out of the reach of all reasoning.
 Imagination may range at pleasure till it gets bewildered amidst
 the labyrinths of an enchanted castle, and knows not on which side
 to turn to extricate itself from the perplexities into which it has
 so rashly adventured. Whatever may be the limits or modifications
 of the powers of the Union, it is easy to imagine an endless train
 of possible dangers; and by indulging an excess of jealousy and
 timidity, we may bring ourselves to a state of absolute scepticism
 and irresolution. I repeat here what I have observed in substance
 in another place, that all observations founded upon the danger of
 usurpation ought to be referred to the composition and structure of
 the government, not to the nature or extent of its powers. The
 State governments, by their original constitutions, are invested
 with complete sovereignty. In what does our security consist
 against usurpation from that quarter? Doubtless in the manner of
 their formation, and in a due dependence of those who are to
 administer them upon the people. If the proposed construction of
 the federal government be found, upon an impartial examination of
 it, to be such as to afford, to a proper extent, the same species of
 security, all apprehensions on the score of usurpation ought to be
 discarded.
It should not be forgotten that a disposition in the State
 governments to encroach upon the rights of the Union is quite as
 probable as a disposition in the Union to encroach upon the rights
 of the State governments. What side would be likely to prevail in
 such a conflict, must depend on the means which the contending
 parties could employ toward insuring success. As in republics
 strength is always on the side of the people, and as there are
 weighty reasons to induce a belief that the State governments will
 commonly possess most influence over them, the natural conclusion is
 that such contests will be most apt to end to the disadvantage of
 the Union; and that there is greater probability of encroachments
 by the members upon the federal head, than by the federal head upon
 the members. But it is evident that all conjectures of this kind
 must be extremely vague and fallible: and that it is by far the
 safest course to lay them altogether aside, and to confine our
 attention wholly to the nature and extent of the powers as they are
 delineated in the Constitution. Every thing beyond this must be
 left to the prudence and firmness of the people; who, as they will
 hold the scales in their own hands, it is to be hoped, will always
 take care to preserve the constitutional equilibrium between the
 general and the State governments. Upon this ground, which is
 evidently the true one, it will not be difficult to obviate the
 objections which have been made to an indefinite power of taxation
 in the United States.
PUBLIUS.