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FEDERALIST. No. 63

The Senate Continued
For the Independent Journal.

HAMILTON OR MADISON

To the People of the State of New York:
A FIFTH desideratum, illustrating the utility of a senate, is
 the want of a due sense of national character. Without a select and
 stable member of the government, the esteem of foreign powers will
 not only be forfeited by an unenlightened and variable policy,
 proceeding from the causes already mentioned, but the national
 councils will not possess that sensibility to the opinion of the
 world, which is perhaps not less necessary in order to merit, than
 it is to obtain, its respect and confidence.
An attention to the judgment of other nations is important to
 every government for two reasons: the one is, that, independently
 of the merits of any particular plan or measure, it is desirable, on
 various accounts, that it should appear to other nations as the
 offspring of a wise and honorable policy; the second is, that in
 doubtful cases, particularly where the national councils may be
 warped by some strong passion or momentary interest, the presumed or
 known opinion of the impartial world may be the best guide that can
 be followed. What has not America lost by her want of character
 with foreign nations; and how many errors and follies would she not
 have avoided, if the justice and propriety of her measures had, in
 every instance, been previously tried by the light in which they
 would probably appear to the unbiased part of mankind?
Yet however requisite a sense of national character may be, it
 is evident that it can never be sufficiently possessed by a numerous
 and changeable body. It can only be found in a number so small that
 a sensible degree of the praise and blame of public measures may be
 the portion of each individual; or in an assembly so durably
 invested with public trust, that the pride and consequence of its
 members may be sensibly incorporated with the reputation and
 prosperity of the community. The half-yearly representatives of
 Rhode Island would probably have been little affected in their
 deliberations on the iniquitous measures of that State, by arguments
 drawn from the light in which such measures would be viewed by
 foreign nations, or even by the sister States; whilst it can
 scarcely be doubted that if the concurrence of a select and stable
 body had been necessary, a regard to national character alone would
 have prevented the calamities under which that misguided people is
 now laboring.
I add, as a SIXTH defect the want, in some important cases, of a
 due responsibility in the government to the people, arising from
 that frequency of elections which in other cases produces this
 responsibility. This remark will, perhaps, appear not only new, but
 paradoxical. It must nevertheless be acknowledged, when explained,
 to be as undeniable as it is important.
Responsibility, in order to be reasonable, must be limited to
 objects within the power of the responsible party, and in order to
 be effectual, must relate to operations of that power, of which a
 ready and proper judgment can be formed by the constituents. The
 objects of government may be divided into two general classes: the
 one depending on measures which have singly an immediate and
 sensible operation; the other depending on a succession of
 well-chosen and well-connected measures, which have a gradual and
 perhaps unobserved operation. The importance of the latter
 description to the collective and permanent welfare of every
 country, needs no explanation. And yet it is evident that an
 assembly elected for so short a term as to be unable to provide more
 than one or two links in a chain of measures, on which the general
 welfare may essentially depend, ought not to be answerable for the
 final result, any more than a steward or tenant, engaged for one
 year, could be justly made to answer for places or improvements
 which could not be accomplished in less than half a dozen years.
 Nor is it possible for the people to estimate the SHARE of
 influence which their annual assemblies may respectively have on
 events resulting from the mixed transactions of several years. It
 is sufficiently difficult to preserve a personal responsibility in
 the members of a NUMEROUS body, for such acts of the body as have an
 immediate, detached, and palpable operation on its constituents.
The proper remedy for this defect must be an additional body in
 the legislative department, which, having sufficient permanency to
 provide for such objects as require a continued attention, and a
 train of measures, may be justly and effectually answerable for the
 attainment of those objects.
Thus far I have considered the circumstances which point out the
 necessity of a well-constructed Senate only as they relate to the
 representatives of the people. To a people as little blinded by
 prejudice or corrupted by flattery as those whom I address, I shall
 not scruple to add, that such an institution may be sometimes
 necessary as a defense to the people against their own temporary
 errors and delusions. As the cool and deliberate sense of the
 community ought, in all governments, and actually will, in all free
 governments, ultimately prevail over the views of its rulers; so
 there are particular moments in public affairs when the people,
 stimulated by some irregular passion, or some illicit advantage, or
 misled by the artful misrepresentations of interested men, may call
 for measures which they themselves will afterwards be the most ready
 to lament and condemn. In these critical moments, how salutary will
 be the interference of some temperate and respectable body of
 citizens, in order to check the misguided career, and to suspend the
 blow meditated by the people against themselves, until reason,
 justice, and truth can regain their authority over the public mind?
 What bitter anguish would not the people of Athens have often
 escaped if their government had contained so provident a safeguard
 against the tyranny of their own passions? Popular liberty might
 then have escaped the indelible reproach of decreeing to the same
 citizens the hemlock on one day and statues on the next.
It may be suggested, that a people spread over an extensive
 region cannot, like the crowded inhabitants of a small district, be
 subject to the infection of violent passions, or to the danger of
 combining in pursuit of unjust measures. I am far from denying that
 this is a distinction of peculiar importance. I have, on the
 contrary, endeavored in a former paper to show, that it is one of
 the principal recommendations of a confederated republic. At the
 same time, this advantage ought not to be considered as superseding
 the use of auxiliary precautions. It may even be remarked, that the
 same extended situation, which will exempt the people of America
 from some of the dangers incident to lesser republics, will expose
 them to the inconveniency of remaining for a longer time under the
 influence of those misrepresentations which the combined industry of
 interested men may succeed in distributing among them.
It adds no small weight to all these considerations, to
 recollect that history informs us of no long-lived republic which
 had not a senate. Sparta, Rome, and Carthage are, in fact, the only
 states to whom that character can be applied. In each of the two
 first there was a senate for life. The constitution of the senate
 in the last is less known. Circumstantial evidence makes it
 probable that it was not different in this particular from the two
 others. It is at least certain, that it had some quality or other
 which rendered it an anchor against popular fluctuations; and that
 a smaller council, drawn out of the senate, was appointed not only
 for life, but filled up vacancies itself. These examples, though as
 unfit for the imitation, as they are repugnant to the genius, of
 America, are, notwithstanding, when compared with the fugitive and
 turbulent existence of other ancient republics, very instructive
 proofs of the necessity of some institution that will blend
 stability with liberty. I am not unaware of the circumstances which
 distinguish the American from other popular governments, as well
 ancient as modern; and which render extreme circumspection
 necessary, in reasoning from the one case to the other. But after
 allowing due weight to this consideration, it may still be
 maintained, that there are many points of similitude which render
 these examples not unworthy of our attention. Many of the defects,
 as we have seen, which can only be supplied by a senatorial
 institution, are common to a numerous assembly frequently elected by
 the people, and to the people themselves. There are others peculiar
 to the former, which require the control of such an institution.
 The people can never wilfully betray their own interests; but they
 may possibly be betrayed by the representatives of the people; and
 the danger will be evidently greater where the whole legislative
 trust is lodged in the hands of one body of men, than where the
 concurrence of separate and dissimilar bodies is required in every
 public act.
The difference most relied on, between the American and other
 republics, consists in the principle of representation; which is
 the pivot on which the former move, and which is supposed to have
 been unknown to the latter, or at least to the ancient part of them.
 The use which has been made of this difference, in reasonings
 contained in former papers, will have shown that I am disposed
 neither to deny its existence nor to undervalue its importance. I
 feel the less restraint, therefore, in observing, that the position
 concerning the ignorance of the ancient governments on the subject
 of representation, is by no means precisely true in the latitude
 commonly given to it. Without entering into a disquisition which
 here would be misplaced, I will refer to a few known facts, in
 support of what I advance.
In the most pure democracies of Greece, many of the executive
 functions were performed, not by the people themselves, but by
 officers elected by the people, and REPRESENTING the people in their
 EXECUTIVE capacity.
Prior to the reform of Solon, Athens was governed by nine
 Archons, annually ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE AT LARGE. The degree of
 power delegated to them seems to be left in great obscurity.
 Subsequent to that period, we find an assembly, first of four, and
 afterwards of six hundred members, annually ELECTED BY THE PEOPLE;
 and PARTIALLY representing them in their LEGISLATIVE capacity,
 since they were not only associated with the people in the function
 of making laws, but had the exclusive right of originating
 legislative propositions to the people. The senate of Carthage,
 also, whatever might be its power, or the duration of its
 appointment, appears to have been ELECTIVE by the suffrages of the
 people. Similar instances might be traced in most, if not all the
 popular governments of antiquity.
Lastly, in Sparta we meet with the Ephori, and in Rome with the
 Tribunes; two bodies, small indeed in numbers, but annually ELECTED
 BY THE WHOLE BODY OF THE PEOPLE, and considered as the
 REPRESENTATIVES of the people, almost in their PLENIPOTENTIARY
 capacity. The Cosmi of Crete were also annually ELECTED BY THE
 PEOPLE, and have been considered by some authors as an institution
 analogous to those of Sparta and Rome, with this difference only,
 that in the election of that representative body the right of
 suffrage was communicated to a part only of the people.
From these facts, to which many others might be added, it is
 clear that the principle of representation was neither unknown to
 the ancients nor wholly overlooked in their political constitutions.
 The true distinction between these and the American governments,
 lies IN THE TOTAL EXCLUSION OF THE PEOPLE, IN THEIR COLLECTIVE
 CAPACITY, from any share in the LATTER, and not in the TOTAL
 EXCLUSION OF THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE PEOPLE from the
 administration of the FORMER. The distinction, however, thus
 qualified, must be admitted to leave a most advantageous superiority
 in favor of the United States. But to insure to this advantage its
 full effect, we must be careful not to separate it from the other
 advantage, of an extensive territory. For it cannot be believed,
 that any form of representative government could have succeeded
 within the narrow limits occupied by the democracies of Greece.
In answer to all these arguments, suggested by reason,
 illustrated by examples, and enforced by our own experience, the
 jealous adversary of the Constitution will probably content himself
 with repeating, that a senate appointed not immediately by the
 people, and for the term of six years, must gradually acquire a
 dangerous pre-eminence in the government, and finally transform it
 into a tyrannical aristocracy.
To this general answer, the general reply ought to be
 sufficient, that liberty may be endangered by the abuses of liberty
 as well as by the abuses of power; that there are numerous
 instances of the former as well as of the latter; and that the
 former, rather than the latter, are apparently most to be
 apprehended by the United States. But a more particular reply may
 be given.
Before such a revolution can be effected, the Senate, it is to
 be observed, must in the first place corrupt itself; must next
 corrupt the State legislatures; must then corrupt the House of
 Representatives; and must finally corrupt the people at large. It
 is evident that the Senate must be first corrupted before it can
 attempt an establishment of tyranny. Without corrupting the State
 legislatures, it cannot prosecute the attempt, because the
 periodical change of members would otherwise regenerate the whole
 body. Without exerting the means of corruption with equal success
 on the House of Representatives, the opposition of that coequal
 branch of the government would inevitably defeat the attempt; and
 without corrupting the people themselves, a succession of new
 representatives would speedily restore all things to their pristine
 order. Is there any man who can seriously persuade himself that the
 proposed Senate can, by any possible means within the compass of
 human address, arrive at the object of a lawless ambition, through
 all these obstructions?
If reason condemns the suspicion, the same sentence is
 pronounced by experience. The constitution of Maryland furnishes
 the most apposite example. The Senate of that State is elected, as
 the federal Senate will be, indirectly by the people, and for a term
 less by one year only than the federal Senate. It is distinguished,
 also, by the remarkable prerogative of filling up its own vacancies
 within the term of its appointment, and, at the same time, is not
 under the control of any such rotation as is provided for the
 federal Senate. There are some other lesser distinctions, which
 would expose the former to colorable objections, that do not lie
 against the latter. If the federal Senate, therefore, really
 contained the danger which has been so loudly proclaimed, some
 symptoms at least of a like danger ought by this time to have been
 betrayed by the Senate of Maryland, but no such symptoms have
 appeared. On the contrary, the jealousies at first entertained by
 men of the same description with those who view with terror the
 correspondent part of the federal Constitution, have been gradually
 extinguished by the progress of the experiment; and the Maryland
 constitution is daily deriving, from the salutary operation of this
 part of it, a reputation in which it will probably not be rivalled
 by that of any State in the Union.
But if any thing could silence the jealousies on this subject,
 it ought to be the British example. The Senate there instead of
 being elected for a term of six years, and of being unconfined to
 particular families or fortunes, is an hereditary assembly of
 opulent nobles. The House of Representatives, instead of being
 elected for two years, and by the whole body of the people, is
 elected for seven years, and, in very great proportion, by a very
 small proportion of the people. Here, unquestionably, ought to be
 seen in full display the aristocratic usurpations and tyranny which
 are at some future period to be exemplified in the United States.
 Unfortunately, however, for the anti-federal argument, the British
 history informs us that this hereditary assembly has not been able
 to defend itself against the continual encroachments of the House of
 Representatives; and that it no sooner lost the support of the
 monarch, than it was actually crushed by the weight of the popular
 branch.
As far as antiquity can instruct us on this subject, its
 examples support the reasoning which we have employed. In Sparta,
 the Ephori, the annual representatives of the people, were found an
 overmatch for the senate for life, continually gained on its
 authority and finally drew all power into their own hands. The
 Tribunes of Rome, who were the representatives of the people,
 prevailed, it is well known, in almost every contest with the senate
 for life, and in the end gained the most complete triumph over it.
 The fact is the more remarkable, as unanimity was required in every
 act of the Tribunes, even after their number was augmented to ten.
 It proves the irresistible force possessed by that branch of a free
 government, which has the people on its side. To these examples
 might be added that of Carthage, whose senate, according to the
 testimony of Polybius, instead of drawing all power into its vortex,
 had, at the commencement of the second Punic War, lost almost the
 whole of its original portion.
Besides the conclusive evidence resulting from this assemblage
 of facts, that the federal Senate will never be able to transform
 itself, by gradual usurpations, into an independent and aristocratic
 body, we are warranted in believing, that if such a revolution
 should ever happen from causes which the foresight of man cannot
 guard against, the House of Representatives, with the people on
 their side, will at all times be able to bring back the Constitution
 to its primitive form and principles. Against the force of the
 immediate representatives of the people, nothing will be able to
 maintain even the constitutional authority of the Senate, but such a
 display of enlightened policy, and attachment to the public good, as
 will divide with that branch of the legislature the affections and
 support of the entire body of the people themselves.
PUBLIUS.