ALEXANDER HAMILTON: 27 pg201 - PG.202 - Various reasons have been suggested in the course of those papers to induce a probability that the general government will be better administered than the particular governments:the principal of which are that the extension of the spheres of election will present a greater option, or latitude of choice, to the people; that through the medium of the State legislatures -- who are select bodies of men and who are to appoint the members of the national Senate -- there is reason to expect that this branch will generally be composed with peculiar care and judgment; that these circumstances promise greater knowledge and more comprehensive information in the national councils.¥ And that on account of the extent of the country from which those, to whose direction they will be committed, will be drawn, they will be less apt to be tainted by the spirit of faction, and more out of the reach of those occasional ill humors, or temporary prejudices and propensities, which in smaller societies frequently contaminate the public deliberations, beget injustice and oppression of a part of the community, and engender schemes which, though they gratify a momentary inclination or desire, terminate in general distress, dissatisfaction, and disgust. Several additional reasons of considerable force to fortify that probability will occur when we come to survey with a more critical eye the interior structure of the edifice which we are invited to erect. It will be sufficient here to remark that until satisfactory reasons can be assigned to justify an opinion that the federal government is likely to be administered in such a manner as to render it odious or contemptible to the people, there can be no reasonable foundation for the supposition that the laws of the Union will meet with any greater obstruction from them, or will stand in need of any other methods to enforce their execution, than the laws of the particular members.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON: 27 pg202 - The hope of impunity is a strong incitement to sedition; the dread of punishment, a proportionately strong discouragement to it. Will not the government of the Union, which, if possessed of a due degree of power, can call to its aid the collective resources of the whole Confederacy, be more likely to repress the former sentiment and to inspire the latter, than that of a single State, which can only command the resources within itself? A turbulent faction in a State may easily suppose itself able to contend with the friends to the government in that State; but it can hardly be so infatuated as to imagine itself a match for the combined efforts of the Union. If this reflection be just, there is less danger of resistance from irregular combinations of individuals to the authority of the Confederacy than to that of a single member.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON: 27 pg202 - PG.203 - I will, in this place, hazard an observation which will not be the less just because to some it may appear new; which is, that the more the operations of the national authority are intermingled in the ordinary exercise of government, the more the citizens are accustomed to meet with it in the common occurrences of their political life, the more it is familiarized to their sight and to their feelings, the further it enters into those objects which touch the most sensible chords and put in motion the most active springs of the human heart, the greater will be the probability that it will conciliate the respect and attachment of the community. Man is very much a creature of habit. A thing that rarely strikes his senses will generally have but a transient influence upon his mind. A government continually at a distance and out of sight can hardly be expected to interest the sensations of the people. The inference is that the authority of the Union and the affections of the citizens towards it will be strengthened, rather than weakened, by its extension to what are called matters of internal concern; and that it will have less occasion to recur to force, in proportion to the familiarity and comprehensiveness of its agency. The more it circulates through those channels and currents in which the passions of mankind naturally flow, the less it will require the aid of the violent and perilous expedients of compulsion.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON: 27 pg203 - One thing at all events must be evident, that a government like that proposed would bid much fairer to avoid the necessity of using force than the species of league contended for by most of its opponents; the authority of which should only operate upon the States in their political or collective capacities. It has been shown that in such a Confederacy there can be no sanction for the laws but force; that frequent delinquencies in the members are the natural offspring of the very frame of the government; and that as often as these happen, they can only be redressed, if at all, by war and violence.
ALEXANDER HAMILTON:
27 pg203 - PG.204 - The plan reported by the convention, by extending the
authority of the federal head to the individual citizens of the several
States, will enable the government to employ the ordinary magistracy of
each in the execution of its laws. It is easy to perceive that this will
tend to destroy, in the common apprehension, all distinction between the
sources from which they might proceed; and will give the federal government
the same advantage for securing a due obedience to its authority which
is enjoyed by the government of each State, in addition to the influence
on public opinion which will result from the important consideration of
its having power to call to its assistance and support the resources of
the whole Union. It merits particular attention in this place, that the
laws of the Confederacy as to the enumerated and legitimate objects of
its jurisdiction will become the SUPREME LAW of the land; to the observance
of which all officers, legislative, executive, and judicial in each State
will be bound by the sanctity of an oath. Thus the legislatures, courts,
and magistrates, of the respective members will be incorporated into the
operations of the national government as far as its just and constitutional
authority extends; and will be rendered auxiliary to the enforcement of
its laws.¥ Any man who will pursue by his own reflections the consequences
of this situation will perceive that there is good ground to calculate
upon a regular and peaceable execution of the laws of the Union, if its
powers are administered with a common share of prudence. If we will arbitrarily
suppose the contrary, we may deduce any inferences we please from the supposition;
for it is certainly possible, by an injudicious exercise of the authorities
of the best government that ever was, or ever can be instituted, to provoke
and precipitate the people into the wildest excesses. But though the adversaries
of the proposed Constitution should presume that the national rulers would
be insensible to the motives of public good, or to the obligations of duty,
I would still ask them how the interests of ambition, or the views of encroachment,
can be promoted by such conduct?