Federalist 10: Governments Are Formed to Protect Property Rights; a Republic Is Far Superior to a Democracy
Federalist 10: Governments Are Formed to Protect Property Rights; a Republic Is Far Superior to a Democracy
ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT ADVANTAGES promised by a well-constructed Constitution is its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. By “faction,” I mean a minority or majority of citizens who are united and motivated by some common impulse of passion or interest adverse either to the rights of other citizens or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.
Lessening the Instability, Injustice and Confusion Caused by Factions
Popular governments have perished everywhere from the mortal diseases of instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into their public councils by factions. Even with the valuable improvements made by State constitutions on ancient and modern models, we still hear complaints that issues related to the public good are decided by the superior force of an interested and overbearing majority rather than the rules of justice and the rights of the minor party. These complaints – in some degree true – are chiefly the effects of the unsteadiness and injustice with which a factious spirit has tainted our public administrations.
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Popular governments have perished everywhere from the mortal diseases of instability, injustice, and confusion introduced into their public councils by factions.
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Different Human Aptitudes and Abilities Result in the Unequal Ownership of Property, which Leads to Factions
The creation or acquisition of property results from the diversity of human abilities and aptitudes sown into the nature of mankind. The first object of government is to protect those differing faculties and skills.
Once a sovereign power extends physical protection to the different and unequal faculties of creating and acquiring property, the possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately results.
History has shown the most common and durable source of faction is the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who hold and those who are without property have ever formed distinct interests in society. Those who are creditors and those who are debtors fall under a like discrimination. A landed interest, a manufacturing interest, a mercantile interest, a moneyed interest – with many lesser interests – necessarily arise in civilized nations, and divide them into different classes, motivated by different sentiments and views.
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Mankind’s propensity to fall into mutual animosities is so strong that the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have sufficed to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts.
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The influence of property ownership on the sentiments and views of their proprietors ensure a division of society into different interests and parties, which can become factions.
The regulation of these various and interfering interests is the principal task of modern legislation, and necessarily involves the spirit of party and faction in the ordinary operations of the government.
The Diversity of Human Interests Is Visible Everywhere
We see the expression of these differing interests everywhere, from the variety of opinions concerning government, religion and the like, to attachments to different leaders who ambitiously contend for preeminence and power, and to persons whose fortunes have interested human passions. Mankind’s propensity to fall into mutual animosities is so strong that the most frivolous and fanciful distinctions have sufficed to kindle their unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. These interests have divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual animosity, and rendered them more disposed to vex and oppress each other than to cooperate for the common good.
Factions Test Republics, and Can Control Governments
It is an ancient rule that no man shall be judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment, and probably corrupt his integrity. Neither should a body of individuals be both judges and interested parties at the same time. Yet what are legislative acts but so many judicial determinations concerning the rights of persons and large bodies of citizens? Are not the different classes of legislators simply advocates and parties to the causes they determine?
If a law is proposed concerning private debts, the creditors are parties on one side and the debtors on the other. Justice ought to hold the balance between them, yet the parties are – and must be – themselves the judges. The most numerous party – the most powerful faction – must be expected to prevail.
Even legislative acts which seem to require the most exact impartiality – such as the apportionment of taxes on property – can tempt the predominant party to trample the rules of justice. Every penny by which they overburden the inferior number is a penny saved to their own pockets.
In cases where a faction consists of less than a majority, the republican principle of majority vote will defeat its sinister views by regular vote. On the other hand, when the faction is in the majority, both the public good and the rights of other citizens will be sacrificed to the majority passion or interest. The ultimate question is how to secure the public good and private rights against such a faction, while at the same time preserving the spirit and form of popular government.
Do Not Expect the Enlightened to Save the Day
It is vain to hope enlightened statesmen will adjust these clashing interests and render them all subservient to the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm. Moreover, their equitable arguments rarely will prevail over the immediate interest one party may find in disregarding the rights of another or the good of the whole.
Democracies Have Never Possessed the Cure for Faction
A pure democracy – a society consisting of a small number of citizens who assemble and administer the government in person – can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. In almost every case, a common passion or interest will be felt by a majority of the whole. The form of government itself leads to a communication of the passion and the resulting concert of action. There is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual. Democracies can devolve into rule by mob.
Democracies are incompatible with personal security or the rights of property. They have forever been spectacles of turbulence and contention – usually as short in their lives as violent in their deaths. Their histories prove wrong those theorists who suppose that reducing mankind to a perfect equality in political rights would perfectly equalize them in possessions, opinions, and passions.
The Only Cures for Factions Are Worse than the Disease
To remedy the mischiefs of faction, we must either remove its causes or control its effects. As I will show, the causes cannot be removed, only the effects lessened.
It is impossible to eradicate factions without also destroying the liberty that allows them to exist, or requiring every citizen to share the same passions and interests. Destroying liberty is as unwise as forcing everyone to think alike is impractical.
In scientific terms, the idea that liberty should be extinguished in order to prevent the creation of factions is as foolish as annihilating the air we breathe because it imparts to fire a destructive agency.
As for uniformity of opinion, so long as the reason of man continues to prove fallible – and he is at liberty to exercise it – different opinions will be formed.
As for uniformity of interests, the natural and acquired abilities of humans – from property rights originate – erect an impenetrable barrier to its attainment. Human interests will never be uniform, nor will ownership of property.
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It is impossible to eradicate factions without also destroying the liberty that allows them to exist, or requiring every citizen to share the same passions and interests. Destroying liberty is as unwise as forcing everyone to think alike is impractical.
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The Only Relief from Faction Is to Limit its Effects Through Representative Government
There are two ways to manage factions, but only one will succeed. The first is to prevent the same passion or interest from ever forming a majority. The second is to prevent the majority from executing its schemes of oppression.
To those who think the second option might suffice – blocking the execution of an oppressive scheme – it is well known that neither morals nor religion can reliably control the injustice and violence of individuals – let alone groups – should the impulse to passion and the opportunity to execute it be suffered to coincide.
That leaves the first option – preventing the same passion or interest from forming a majority – which is best accomplished through a republic in which the scheme of representation occurs. Compared to the passion of a democracy, the first great difference is that the citizens of a republic delegate control of the government to a small number of citizens elected by the rest. The second is that a republic may be extended over a far greater sphere of country and citizens than a democracy.
Representation Positively Refines and Enlarges the Viewpoints of the Representative and Represented Alike
The election of representatives refine and enlarges the People’s views by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens. The collective wisdom of the representatives is best able discern the true interests of the country. Their patriotism and love of justice should render them the least likely to sacrifice those ideals based on temporary conditions or a predisposition to favor one interest over another.
So regulated, the public voice will be more consonant to the public good than if pronounced by the People themselves, should they be convened to decide a particular question.
The Proper Size of a Representative Body Lies Between Extremes
Representative government creates the risk that individuals of factious tempers, local prejudices, or sinister designs might first obtain the votes of the citizens through intrigue, corruption or other means, and then betray those electors.
Consequently, no matter how small a republic may be, its representatives must be raised to a certain number in order to guard against the cabals of a few. Conversely, no matter how large its size, the representatives must be limited to a certain number in order to guard against the confusion of a multitude.
Deciding on the correct number of representatives does present obstacles. If the number of electors for an office is too large, the representatives will be too little acquainted with all their local circumstances and lesser interests. If the number of electors is too small, representatives will be unduly attached to local circumstances and interests.
The Constitution is a happy compromise of these extremes: the great and aggregate interests are referred to the Federal legislature, and the local and particular interests to the State legislatures.
The Larger the Republic, the Larger the Number of Suitable Candidates Available to the Electors
The number of potential suitable representatives should be greater in a large republic, thereby increasing the probability of a fit choice for office. This circumstance will make it more difficult for unworthy candidates to practice successfully the vicious arts by which elections are too often carried. The votes of the People – being less influenced by such arts – will more likely center on the individuals who possess the most attractive merit and the most diffusive and established characters.
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A large republic with more citizens and territory renders factious combinations less likely than in a democracy.
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A Large Republic Provides a Better Guard Against Factions than a Small Republic, or a Democracy of Any Size
A large republic with more citizens and territory renders factious combinations less likely than in a democracy. A small society is more likely composed of fewer distinct parties and interests. The fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently the majority will be of the same party. The representatives – being fewer in number – can more easily work in concert to execute their plans of oppression.
By contrast, a large republic – having a greater geographical sphere and larger number of citizens – will likely include a greater variety of parties and interests. This will reduce the probability that a majority of the electors will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens. And if such a common motive did exist, those who felt its strength would have difficulty communicating it to and acting in unison with others, since the communication of a consciously unjust or dishonorable purpose is always checked by distrust in proportion to the number whose concurrence is necessary.
The advantage a republic has over a democracy in controlling the effects of faction is the same as one enjoyed by a large over a small republic. Another advantage of a republic consists in the substitution of representatives whose enlightened views and virtuous sentiments should render them superior to local prejudices and schemes of injustice. Yet another advantage will be the increased number of parties, which afford security against the event of any one party being able to outnumber and oppress the rest. Finally, a republic will erect greater obstacles to the execution of the secret wishes of an unjust and interested majority.
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Democracies are incompatible with personal security or the rights of property. They have forever been spectacles of turbulence and contention – usually as short in their lives as violent in their deaths. Their histories prove wrong those theorists who suppose that reducing mankind to a perfect equality in political rights would perfectly equalize them in possessions, opinions, and passions.
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Factions Originate Locally, and Republican Government Is Best-Suited to Prevent their Spread Nationally
While factious leaders may from time to time kindle a flame within their particular States, they will be unable to spread a general conflagration through the other States. A religious sect may degenerate into a political faction in one part of the United States, but the variety of sects dispersed over the entire face of it will secure the Federal government against any danger from that source.
A rage for paper money, an abolition of debts, an unequal division of property – or any other improper or wicked project – will be less apt to pervade the whole body of States than a particular member of it, in the same way such maladies are more likely to infect a particular county or district than an entire State.
Thus in size and proper structure of the United States do we behold a republican remedy for the diseases most incident to republican government.
Madisonoriginal Federalist 10