FEDERALIST No. 60

The Same Subject Continued

(Concerning the Power of Congress to Regulate the Election of

Members)

From the New York Packet.

Tuesday, February 26, 1788.

To the People of the State of New York:

WE HAVE seen, that an uncontrollable power over the elections to

the federal government could not, without hazard, be committed to

the State legislatures. Let us now see, what would be the danger on

the other side; that is, from confiding the ultimate right of

regulating its own elections to the Union itself. It is not

pretended, that this right would ever be used for the exclusion of

any State from its share in the representation. The interest of all

would, in this respect at least, be the security of all. But it is

alleged, that it might be employed in such a manner as to promote

the election of some favorite class of men in exclusion of others,

by confining the places of election to particular districts, and

rendering it impracticable to the citizens at large to partake in

the choice. Of all chimerical suppositions, this seems to be the

most chimerical. On the one hand, no rational calculation of

probabilities would lead us to imagine that the disposition which a

conduct so violent and extraordinary would imply, could ever find

its way into the national councils; and on the other, it may be

concluded with certainty, that if so improper a spirit should ever

gain admittance into them, it would display itself in a form

altogether different and far more decisive.

The improbability of the attempt may be satisfactorily inferred

from this single reflection, that it could never be made without

causing an immediate revolt of the great body of the people, headed

and directed by the State governments. It is not difficult to

conceive that this characteristic right of freedom may, in certain

turbulent and factious seasons, be violated, in respect to a

particular class of citizens, by a victorious and overbearing

majority; but that so fundamental a privilege, in a country so

situated and enlightened, should be invaded to the prejudice of the

great mass of the people, by the deliberate policy of the

government, without occasioning a popular revolution, is altogether

inconceivable and incredible.

In addition to this general reflection, there are considerations

of a more precise nature, which forbid all apprehension on the

subject. The dissimilarity in the ingredients which will compose

the national government, and Ustill more in the manner in which they

will be brought into action in its various branches, must form a

powerful obstacle to a concert of views in any partial scheme of

elections. There is sufficient diversity in the state of property,

in the genius, manners, and habits of the people of the different

parts of the Union, to occasion a material diversity of disposition

in their representatives towards the different ranks and conditions

in society. And though an intimate intercourse under the same

government will promote a gradual assimilation in some of these

respects, yet there are causes, as well physical as moral, which

may, in a greater or less degree, permanently nourish different

propensities and inclinations in this respect. But the circumstance

which will be likely to have the greatest influence in the matter,

will be the dissimilar modes of constituting the several component

parts of the government. The House of Representatives being to be

elected immediately by the people, the Senate by the State

legislatures, the President by electors chosen for that purpose by

the people, there would be little probability of a common interest

to cement these different branches in a predilection for any

particular class of electors.

As to the Senate, it is impossible that any regulation of ``time

and manner,'' which is all that is proposed to be submitted to the

national government in respect to that body, can affect the spirit

which will direct the choice of its members. The collective sense

of the State legislatures can never be influenced by extraneous

circumstances of that sort; a consideration which alone ought to

satisfy us that the discrimination apprehended would never be

attempted. For what inducement could the Senate have to concur in a

preference in which itself would not be included? Or to what

purpose would it be established, in reference to one branch of the

legislature, if it could not be extended to the other? The

composition of the one would in this case counteract that of the

other. And we can never suppose that it would embrace the

appointments to the Senate, unless we can at the same time suppose

the voluntary co-operation of the State legislatures. If we make

the latter supposition, it then becomes immaterial where the power

in question is placedgwhether in their hands or in those of the

Union.

But what is to be the object of this capricious partiality in

the national councils? Is it to be exercised in a discrimination

between the different departments of industry, or between the

different kinds of property, or between the different degrees of

property? Will it lean in favor of the landed interest, or the

moneyed interest, or the mercantile interest, or the manufacturing

interest? Or, to speak in the fashionable language of the

adversaries to the Constitution, will it court the elevation of

``the wealthy and the well-born,'' to the exclusion and debasement

of all the rest of the society?

If this partiality is to be exerted in favor of those who are

concerned in any particular description of industry or property, I

presume it will readily be admitted, that the competition for it

will lie between landed men and merchants. And I scruple not to

affirm, that it is infinitely less likely that either of them should

gain an ascendant in the national councils, than that the one or the

other of them should predominate in all the local councils. The

inference will be, that a conduct tending to give an undue

preference to either is much less to be dreaded from the former than

from the latter.

The several States are in various degrees addicted to

agriculture and commerce. In most, if not all of them, agriculture

is predominant. In a few of them, however, commerce nearly divides

its empire, and in most of them has a considerable share of

influence. In proportion as either prevails, it will be conveyed

into the national representation; and for the very reason, that

this will be an emanation from a greater variety of interests, and

in much more various proportions, than are to be found in any single

State, it will be much less apt to espouse either of them with a

decided partiality, than the representation of any single State.

In a country consisting chiefly of the cultivators of land,

where the rules of an equal representation obtain, the landed

interest must, upon the whole, preponderate in the government. As

long as this interest prevails in most of the State legislatures, so

long it must maintain a correspondent superiority in the national

Senate, which will generally be a faithful copy of the majorities of

those assemblies. It cannot therefore be presumed, that a sacrifice

of the landed to the mercantile class will ever be a favorite object

of this branch of the federal legislature. In applying thus

particularly to the Senate a general observation suggested by the

situation of the country, I am governed by the consideration, that

the credulous votaries of State power cannot, upon their own

principles, suspect, that the State legislatures would be warped

from their duty by any external influence. But in reality the same

situation must have the same effect, in the primative composition at

least of the federal House of Representatives: an improper bias

towards the mercantile class is as little to be expected from this

quarter as from the other.

In order, perhaps, to give countenance to the objection at any

rate, it may be asked, is there not danger of an opposite bias in

the national government, which may dispose it to endeavor to secure

a monopoly of the federal administration to the landed class? As

there is little likelihood that the supposition of such a bias will

have any terrors for those who would be immediately injured by it, a

labored answer to this question will be dispensed with. It will be

sufficient to remark, first, that for the reasons elsewhere

assigned, it is less likely that any decided partiality should

prevail in the councils of the Union than in those of any of its

members. Secondly, that there would be no temptation to violate the

Constitution in favor of the landed class, because that class would,

in the natural course of things, enjoy as great a preponderancy as

itself could desire. And thirdly, that men accustomed to

investigate the sources of public prosperity upon a large scale,

must be too well convinced of the utility of commerce, to be

inclined to inflict upon it so deep a wound as would result from the

entire exclusion of those who would best understand its interest

from a share in the management of them. The importance of commerce,

in the view of revenue alone, must effectually guard it against the

enmity of a body which would be continually importuned in its favor,

by the urgent calls of public necessity.

I the rather consult brevity in discussing the probability of a

preference founded upon a discrimination between the different kinds

of industry and property, because, as far as I understand the

meaning of the objectors, they contemplate a discrimination of

another kind. They appear to have in view, as the objects of the

preference with which they endeavor to alarm us, those whom they

designate by the description of ``the wealthy and the well-born.''

These, it seems, are to be exalted to an odious pre-eminence over

the rest of their fellow-citizens. At one time, however, their

elevation is to be a necessary consequence of the smallness of the

representative body; at another time it is to be effected by

depriving the people at large of the opportunity of exercising their

right of suffrage in the choice of that body.

But upon what principle is the discrimination of the places of

election to be made, in order to answer the purpose of the meditated

preference? Are ``the wealthy and the well-born,'' as they are

called, confined to particular spots in the several States? Have

they, by some miraculous instinct or foresight, set apart in each of

them a common place of residence? Are they only to be met with in

the towns or cities? Or are they, on the contrary, scattered over

the face of the country as avarice or chance may have happened to

cast their own lot or that of their predecessors? If the latter is

the case, (as every intelligent man knows it to be,1) is it not

evident that the policy of confining the places of election to

particular districts would be as subversive of its own aim as it

would be exceptionable on every other account? The truth is, that

there is no method of securing to the rich the preference

apprehended, but by prescribing qualifications of property either

for those who may elect or be elected. But this forms no part of

the power to be conferred upon the national government. Its

authority would be expressly restricted to the regulation of the

TIMES, the PLACES, the MANNER of elections. The qualifications of

the persons who may choose or be chosen, as has been remarked upon

other occasions, are defined and fixed in the Constitution, and are

unalterable by the legislature.

Let it, however, be admitted, for argument sake, that the

expedient suggested might be successful; and let it at the same

time be equally taken for granted that all the scruples which a

sense of duty or an apprehension of the danger of the experiment

might inspire, were overcome in the breasts of the national rulers,

still I imagine it will hardly be pretended that they could ever

hope to carry such an enterprise into execution without the aid of a

military force sufficient to subdue the resistance of the great body

of the people. The improbability of the existence of a force equal

to that object has been discussed and demonstrated in different

parts of these papers; but that the futility of the objection under

consideration may appear in the strongest light, it shall be

conceded for a moment that such a force might exist, and the

national government shall be supposed to be in the actual possession

of it. What will be the conclusion? With a disposition to invade

the essential rights of the community, and with the means of

gratifying that disposition, is it presumable that the persons who

were actuated by it would amuse themselves in the ridiculous task of

fabricating election laws for securing a preference to a favorite

class of men? Would they not be likely to prefer a conduct better

adapted to their own immediate aggrandizement? Would they not

rather boldly resolve to perpetuate themselves in office by one

decisive act of usurpation, than to trust to precarious expedients

which, in spite of all the precautions that might accompany them,

might terminate in the dismission, disgrace, and ruin of their

authors? Would they not fear that citizens, not less tenacious than

conscious of their rights, would flock from the remote extremes of

their respective States to the places of election, to voerthrow

their tyrants, and to substitute men who would be disposed to avenge

the violated majesty of the people?

PUBLIUS.