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Engaging with American Democracy » Week #6: The Federalist Papers

Week #6: The Federalist Papers

Announcements

  • Study Abroad “Mapping Place and Person in Mexico City”
  • Readings on AI-Job Exposure
    • Vigliarolo, Brandon. “Compsci Grads Facing Recession-Like Job Prospects Thanks to AI.” The Register, 18 Sept 2026.
    • Porter, Rob. “Is Computer Science Still a Good Major in the Age of AI?” Vault, 28 April 2026.
      • He believes it still is a good major
      • Pair it with a double major or minor
    • Orr, Cody, Tucker, Lee C., and Warren Lawrence. “Graduating into Disruption: Labor Market Outcomes for AI-Exposed College Majors,” U.S. Census Bureau, 2026, Sept.
      • Vigliarolo reviews this 70+-page working page for his article above.
      • Conclusion: “the evidence shows that highly exposed graduates have borne substantial costs in the initial adjustment to generative AI. Understanding whether these workers ultimately recover, and how the technology reshapes entry level career paths and human capital accumulation, will be central to assessing the longer-run distributional consequences of AI”
        (p. 49–last  two sentences)

Plan for the Day

Potential cold openning: Juice Newton “Angel Of The Morning”

James Madison, Federalist Paper #10

There’s quite a bit to unpack in Federalist Paper #10, and there are many ways to approach this text. Think back to the discussion on discourse communities–a group of people adhering to intersubjective epistemology, a “faction,” right? If we were in a History or Political Science class, we might think through the historical developments leading to this document and/or the ways in which it influences both the US Constitution and also our contemporary assumptions about the meaning of the Constitution, especially the elusive nature of “framers intent.”

Although he doesn’t have a musical (overrated or not), James Madison was an important founder of the United States, specifically for his role in creating and supporting the Constitution and Bill of Rights. His background is relevant to specific parts of the Constitution (he was a life-long slave owner and collegiate debater), but, remember, our approach to texts is for rhetorical and American cultural analysis. One can learn an awful lot about a culture by reviewing the texts of that culture. I’ve selected several passages that are indicative of American culture:

  • para. 1: “The instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into the public councils, have, in truth, been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have everywhere perished…”
  • para. 1: “Complaints are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public and personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties, and that measures are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority.”
    • My take on this is that it explains the problem of the tyranny of the majority.
    • For this class, think about this as prevailing social norms making us conform (as opposed to the legal letter of this statement).
      • Where else does the value of stability come up in American culture?
      • Why do you think that is the case?
      • What’s the opposite of stability?
  • para 2: “By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.”
    • I think this refers to special interests.
  • para 3-4: “…two methods of curing the mischiefs of faction…”
    • 1) Remove causes
      • destroy liberty
      • indoctrinate citizens to “the same opinions, the same passions, and the same interests.”
    • 2) Remove effects
  • para 5: “Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.”
    • The English professor in me has to pause on the analogies presented above: Liberty is to faction as air is to fire. Liberty : Faction :: Air : Fire Liberty is to political life as air is to animal life. Liberty : Political Life :: Air : Animal Life
    • So we’re free to engage in political parties, but what does that say about engaging with democracy?
  • para. 6: As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other; and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves.
    • the former: opinions
      the latter: passions
      therefore, one’s passions “attach themselves” to one’s opinions.
    • We have freedom to create narratives, but nothing compels us to be infallible. Our emotions (or self-interests–mistaken or not) influence our opinions, which are our interpretations of events, observations, reality.
    • What did we discuss about how opinions are formed? If you don’t remember, I’m sure you can reflect on how opinions form.
  • para. 6: The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government.
    • In other words…
      • I believe Madison is using faculty in the first definition entry: “ability”
      • Property rights originate from the “diversity” of abilities.
      • Such a “fact” cannot be overcome and creates differences in interests (e.g., people with more property have interests different from those with no property).
      • Protecting the [fruits of these] abilities is the government’s MAIN priority.
      • This protection leads to different levels of property acquisition, which divides “society into different interests and parties.”
  • para. 7: The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man
    • A zeal for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government, and many other points, as well of speculation as of practice; an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities.”
    • Madison is claiming something about human nature. Is he correct? Seems pessimistic…
  • para. 7: “But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property.”
    • “A landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a mercantile interest, a moneyed interest, with many lesser interests, grow up of necessity in civilized nations, and divide them into different classes, actuated by different sentiments and views.”
      • Does this mean people with money think differently from those without money?
    • “The regulation of these various and interfering interests forms the principal task of modern legislation, and involves the spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of the government.“
  • para. 8: “No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably, corrupt his integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a body of men are unfit to be both judges and parties at the same time…”
    • “…questions which would be differently decided by the landed and the manufacturing classes, and probably by neither with a sole regard to justice and the public good.”
    • “The apportionment of taxes on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps, no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice.”
      • Compare this to Federalist Paper #51: “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary.”
      • Real Life asks, “Send Me an Angel”
      • The Scorpions’ song “Send Me an Angel” is quite different.
  • para. 9: “It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will be able to adjust these clashing interests, and render them all subservient to the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm.“
  • para. 10: “…the CAUSES of faction cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its EFFECTS.”
  • Can’t avoid them, but (maybe) we can reduce the bad stuff they produce.
  • para. 11: “When a majority is included in a faction, the form of popular government, on the other hand, enables it to sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good and the rights of other citizens.”
    • The government must “secure the public good and private rights against the danger of such a faction, and at the same time to preserve the spirit and the form of popular government.”
  • para. 12: Must thwart factions from “carry[ing] into effect schemes of oppression.”
    • Prevent a majority from having the interests or passions.
    • “…neither moral nor religious motives can be relied on as an adequate control.”
  • para. 13: Thoughts on pure democracy and common interests and passions.
    • “A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole…”
    • Madison defines a “pure democracy” in the ancient concept where all citizens of a small governing body vote on every piece of legislation–not really a representative democracy.
    • Ancient Athens (460 BCE to 320 BCE) had a large assembly that would vote on matters; the “president” was mainly a vote counter serving only for the government’s business.
  • para. 14: “A republic…opens a different prospect, and promises the cure for which we are seeking.”
  • para. 18: In the next place, as each representative will be chosen by a greater number of citizens in the large than in the small republic, it will be more difficult for unworthy candidates to practice with success the vicious arts by which elections are too often carried; and the suffrages of the people being more free, will be more likely to centre in men who possess the most attractive merit and the most diffusive and established characters.
    • I’m not sure how this relates to this class, but I couldn’t resist pulling this out. To me, it means our elected officials from larger pools (governors, Senators, and Presidents) will have the most merit.
    • This leaves open the assumption that local elections that fewer voters contribute to could have people of lesser character.
  • para. 20: “The other point of difference is, the greater number of citizens and extent of territory which may be brought within the compass of republican than of democratic government…”
    • Madison argues that factions will be less of an issue to cause problems in a republic.
    • Smaller societies have larger majorities that could “more easily…concert and execute their plans of oppression.”
    • “Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens…”
    • “communication is always checked by distrust in proportion to the number whose concurrence is necessary.”
      • This means that large populations will have groups not trusting each other, which hinders consensus and, therefore, establishing powerful factions.
  • para. 22: A rage for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division of property, or for any other improper or wicked project, will be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular member of it; in the same proportion as such a malady is more likely to taint a particular county or district, than an entire State.
    • For this class, the warning about the particular maladies possible in small-scale vs large-scale situations is very relevant.
    • Notice the economic issues Madison is warning about. What do you think a contemporary example might be?

Hamilton or Madison, Federalist #51

These essays were written anonymously as were the Anti-Federalist Papers. This essay’s title is “The Structure of the Government Must Furnish the Proper Checks and Balances Between the Different Departments,” so, obviously, it’s going to explain checks and balances. Questions:

  • Why are “checks and balances” a staple of American Democracy?
  • Why do you think it was important that they use the pseudonym “Publius” (translated from Latin as “the people”)?

This essay, besides that cumbersome language of the grand style, has no paragraphs! That isn’t proper essay format, but here are some quotations for us to consider:

  • “…separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government…essential to the preservation of liberty…”
  • “…each department should have a will of its own; and consequently should be so constituted that the members of each should have as little agency as possible in the appointment of the members of the others.”
  • “…all the appointments for the supreme executive, legislative, and judiciary magistracies should be drawn from the same fountain of authority, the people, through channels having no communication whatever with one another.”
  • “…the judiciary department…
    • “first, because peculiar qualifications being essential in the members, the primary consideration ought to be to select that mode of choice which best secures these qualifications;
    • secondly, because the permanent tenure by which the appointments are held in that department, must soon destroy all sense of dependence on the authority conferring them.”
    • In plain language, what does this mean?
    • What do nearly all current Supreme Court Justices have in common?
  • “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.”
  • “If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.”
  • “A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions. This policy of supplying, by opposite and rival interests, the defect of better motives, might be traced through the whole system of human affairs, private as well as public.”
  • “…the constant aim is to divide and arrange the several offices in such a manner as that each may be a check on the other that the private interest of every individual may be a sentinel over the public rights.”
  • Why should the legislative branch have the most authority?
    • “In republican government, the legislative authority necessarily predominates. The remedy for this inconveniency is to divide the legislature into different branches; and to render them, by different modes of election and different principles of action, as little connected with each other as the nature of their common functions and their common dependence on the society will admit.”
  • “There are, moreover, two considerations particularly applicable to the federal system of America, which place that system in a very interesting point of view.
    • First. In a single republic, all the power surrendered by the people is submitted to the administration of a single government; and the usurpations are guarded against by a division of the government into distinct and separate departments.
      • In the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is first divided between two distinct governments, and then the portion allotted to each subdivided among distinct and separate departments.
      • Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people.”
      • What do you think about the phrasing “surrendered by the people”?
    • “Second. It is of great importance in a republic not only to guard the society against the oppression of its rulers, but to guard one part of the society against the injustice of the other part.
      • Different interests necessarily exist in different classes of citizens. If a majority be united by a common interest, the rights of the minority will be insecure.”
  • “Justice is the end of government. It is the end of civil society. It ever has been and ever will be pursued until it be obtained, or until liberty be lost in the pursuit.
    • In a society under the forms of which the stronger faction can readily unite and oppress the weaker, anarchy may as truly be said to reign as in a state of nature, where the weaker individual is not secured against the violence of the stronger;
    • and as, in the latter state, even the stronger individuals are prompted, by the uncertainty of their condition, to submit to a government which may protect the weak as well as themselves; so, in the former state, will the more powerful factions or parties be gradually induced, by a like motive, to wish for a government which will protect all parties, the weaker as well as the more powerful.
  • “In the extended republic of the United States, and among the great variety of interests, parties, and sects which it embraces, a coalition of a majority of the whole society could seldom take place on any other principles than those of justice and the general good;”
    • This word salad basically means citizen interests are based on justice and promoting the general welfare.
  • “…the larger the society, provided it lie within a practical sphere, the more duly capable it will be of self-government. And happily for the REPUBLICAN CAUSE, the practicable sphere may be carried to a very great extent, by a judicious modification and mixture of the FEDERAL PRINCIPLE.”

Federalist Paper #78

Because this will most likely be on Thursday, 9/24, I created a new page for the notes.

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