Federalist 46

[Recursion]

I was looking this up as part of a thread in the Gungeon and ended up re-reading the whole thing... just wanted to throw some of Madison's own thoughts about federal and state power, public opinion, and, yes, the right to keep and bear arms (which hopefully this discussion won't entirely devolve into) up tonight. What do we think of Madison's take here at DU? (Stuff in italics is me.)

http://www.constitution.org/fed/federa46.htm

The federal and State governments are in fact but different agents and trustees of the people, constituted with different powers, and designed for different purposes. The adversaries of the Constitution seem to have lost sight of the people altogether in their reasonings on this subject; and to have viewed these different establishments, not only as mutual rivals and enemies, but as uncontrolled by any common superior in their efforts to usurp the authorities of each other. These gentlemen must here be reminded of their error. They must be told that the ultimate authority, wherever the derivative may be found, resides in the people alone, and that it will not depend merely on the comparative ambition or address of the different governments, whether either, or which of them, will be able to enlarge its sphere of jurisdiction at the expense of the other. Truth, no less than decency, requires that the event in every case should be supposed to depend on the sentiments and sanction of their common constituents.

I really like the bit about how they are designed for different purposes. As a progressive I do like the idea of an activist government, but I'm not convinced that this activism need be federal in all cases. I think the times federal action has done a lot of good have been cases where the states and localities have simply dropped the ball. That leads to a question I've often had: why is the federal government seemingly more in tune with activist public sentiment than state governments are? What are the strengths and weaknesses inherent in that?

If, therefore, as has been elsewhere remarked, the people should in future become more partial to the federal than to the State governments, the change can only result from such manifest and irresistible proofs of a better administration, as will overcome all their antecedent propensities. And in that case, the people ought not surely to be precluded from giving most of their confidence where they may discover it to be most due; but even in that case the State governments could have little to apprehend, because it is only within a certain sphere that the federal power can, in the nature of things, be advantageously administered.

That, I think, is very true... the federal government has worked well, I suggested above, in places where the states and localities haven't been working well at all (civil rights, environmental regulations, etc.) I think Madison is too optimistic, however, about the natural limitation of the federal sphere of power, or perhaps he's viewing it from a late-18th-century mindset where a federal government simply did not have the communication infrastructure to even imagine some of the projects our government has taken on.

It has been already proved that the members of the federal will be more dependent on the members of the State governments, than the latter will be on the former.

This relationship, it seems, has entirely reversed itself in the intervening 200+ years. The direct election of Senators and the devolution of the electoral college to a series of statewide plebiscites has, in my mind, reversed the relationship Madison envisioned.

Were it admitted, however, that the Federal government may feel an equal disposition with the State governments to extend its power beyond the due limits, the latter would still have the advantage in the means of defeating such encroachments. If an act of a particular State, though unfriendly to the national government, be generally popular in that State and should not too grossly violate the oaths of the State officers, it is executed immediately and, of course, by means on the spot and depending on the State alone. The opposition of the federal government, or the interposition of federal officers, would but inflame the zeal of all parties on the side of the State, and the evil could not be prevented or repaired, if at all, without the employment of means which must always be resorted to with reluctance and difficulty. On the other hand, should an unwarrantable measure of the federal government be unpopular in particular States, which would seldom fail to be the case, or even a warrantable measure be so, which may sometimes be the case, the means of opposition to it are powerful and at hand. The disquietude of the people; their repugnance and, perhaps, refusal to co-operate with the officers of the Union; the frowns of the executive magistracy of the State; the embarrassments created by legislative devices, which would often be added on such occasions, would oppose, in any State, difficulties not to be despised; would form, in a large State, very serious impediments; and where the sentiments of several adjoining States happened to be in unison, would present obstructions which the federal government would hardly be willing to encounter.

I think his point is well-taken, but that Madison did not imagine the enormous power of the federal purse. The central government can make states toe the line now by simply threatening to cut off federal monies, which would be a death blow to most states' economies. Still, in the end there is little Congress can do to actually make a state do something it is unwilling to do, if the state is willing to forgo some money (and we will probably see this soon as No Child Left Standing^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Behind starts coming to fruition in the next few years.

The only refuge left for those who prophesy the downfall of the State governments is the visionary supposition that the federal government may previously accumulate a military force for the projects of ambition. The reasonings contained in these papers must have been employed to little purpose indeed, if it could be necessary now to disprove the reality of this danger. That the people and the States should, for a sufficient period of time, elect an uninterupted succession of men ready to betray both; that the traitors should, throughout this period, uniformly and systematically pursue some fixed plan for the extension of the military establishment; that the governments and the people of the States should silently and patiently behold the gathering storm, and continue to supply the materials, until it should be prepared to burst on their own heads, must appear to every one more like the incoherent dreams of a delirious jealousy, or the misjudged exaggerations of a counterfeit zeal, than like the sober apprehensions of genuine patriotism. Extravagant as the supposition is, let it however be made. Let a regular army, fully equal to the resources of the country, be formed; and let it be entirely at the devotion of the federal government

Hello, 1946-2001...

Besides the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation, the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it. Let us not insult the free and gallant citizens of America with the suspicion, that they would be less able to defend the rights of which they would be in actual possession, than the debased subjects of arbitrary power would be to rescue theirs from the hands of their oppressors.

It is often pointed out that Americans still, over 200 years later, are disproportionately armed (I seem to recall that something like a quarter of all privately-owned firearms are owned by Americans). Like Madison, I'm not sure that's a bad thing...