also, without which it would have been evidently and radically defective. To be fully sensible of this, we need only suppose for a moment, that the supremacy of the State Constitutions had been left complete, by a sav ing clause in their favor.

In the first place, as these Constitutions invest the State Legislatures with absolute sovereignty, in all cases not excepted by the existing Articles of Confederation, all the authorities contained in the proposed Constitution, so far as they exceed those enumerated in the Confederation, would have been annulled, and the new Congress would have been reduced to the same impotent condition with their predecessors.

In the next place, as the Constitutions of some of the States do not even expressly and fully recognize the existing powers of the Confederacy, an express saving of the supremacy of the former would, in such States, have brought into question every power contained in the proposed Constitution.

In the third place, as the Constitutions of the States differ much from each other, it might happen that a treaty or National law, of great and equal importance to the States, would interfere with some and not with other Constitutions, and would consequently be valid in some of the States, at the same time that it would have no effect in others.

In fine, the world would have seen, for the first time, a system of Government founded on an inversion of the fundamental principles of all Government; it would have seen the authority of the whole society everywhere subordinate to the authority of the parts; it would have seen a monster, in which the head was under the direction of the members.

3. "The Senators and Representatives, and the mem"bers of the several State Legislatures, and all Exec"utive and Judicial officers, both of the United States

"and the several States, shall be bound by oath or affir"mation, to support this Constitution."

It has been asked why it was thought necessary, that the State magistracy should be bound to support the Fœderal Constitution, and unnecessary that a like oath should be imposed on the officers of the United States, in favor of the State Constitutions?

Several reasons might be assigned for the distinction. I content myself with one, which is obvious and conclusive. The members of the Federal Government will have no agency in carrying the State Constitutions into effect. The members and officers of the State Governments, on the contrary, will have an essential agency in giving effect to the Fœderal Constitution. The election of the President and Senate will depend, in all cases, on the Legislatures of the several States. And the election of the House of Representatives will equally depend on the same authority in the first instance; and will, probably, forever be conducted by the officers, and according to the laws of the States.

4. Among the provisions for giving efficacy to the Fœderal powers might be added those which belong to the Executive and Judiciary departments: but as these are reserved for particular examination in another place, them over in this.

pass

We have now reviewed, in detail, all the Articles composing the sum or quantity of power, delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Fœderal Government; and are brought to this undeniable conclusion, that no part of the power is unnecessary or improper for accomplishing the necessary objects of the Union. The question, therefore, whether this amount of power shall be granted or not, resolves itself into another question, whether or not a Government commensurate to the exigencies of the Union shall be established; or, in other words, whether the Union itself shall be preserved.

PUBLIUS.

For the Independent Journal.

THE FEDERALIST. No. XLIV.

TO THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK:

HA

AVING shown that no one of the powers transferred to the Federal Government is unnecessary or improper, the next question to be considered is, whether the whole mass of them will be dangerous to the portion of authority left in the several States.

The adversaries to the plan of the Convention, instead of considering in the first place what degree of power was absolutely necessary for the purposes of the Fœderal Government, have exhausted themselves in a secondary inquiry into the possible consequences of the proposed degree of power to the Governments of the particular States. But if the Union, as has been shown, be essential to the security of the People of America against foreign danger; if it be essential to their security against contentions and wars among the different States; if it be essential to guard them against those violent and oppressive factions which embitter the blessings of liberty, and against those military establishments which must gradually poison its very fountain; if, in a word, the Union be essential to the happiness of the People of America, is it not preposterous, to urge as an objec tion to a Government, without which the objects of the Union cannot be attained, that such a Government may derogate from the importance of the Governments of the individual States? Was then the American Revolution effected, was the American Confederacy formed, was the precious blood of thousands spilt, and the hardearned substance of millions lavished, not that the Peo

ple of America should enjoy peace, liberty, and safety; but that the Governments of the individual States, that particular municipal establishments, might enjoy a certain extent of power, and be arrayed with certain dignities and attributes of Sovereignty? We have heard of the impious doctrine in the Old World, that the People were made for kings, not kings for the People. Is the same doctrine to be revived in the New, in another shape, that the solid happiness of the People is to be sacrificed to the views of political institutions of a different form? It is too early for politicians to presume on our forgetting that the public good, the real welfare of the great body of the People, is the supreme object to be pursued; and that no form of Government whatever has any other value, than as it may be fitted for the attainment of this object. Were the plan of the Convention adverse to the public happiness, my voice would be, reject the plan. Were the Union itself inconsistent with the public happiness, it would be, abolish the Union. In like manner, as far as the sovereignty of the States cannot be reconciled to the happiness of the People, the voice of every good citizen must be, let the former be sacrificed to the latter. How far the sacrifice is necessary, has been shown. How far the unsacrificed residue will be endangered, is the question before us.

Several important considerations have been touched in the course of these papers, which discountenance the supposition, that the operation of the Fœderal Government will by degrees prove fatal to the State Governments. The more I revolve the subject, the more fully I am persuaded, that the balance is much more likely to be disturbed by the preponderancy of the last than of the first scale.

We have seen, in all the examples of ancient and modern Confederacies, the strongest tendency continually betraying itself in the members, to despoil the General

Government of its authorities, with a very ineffectual capacity in the latter to defend itself against the encroachments. Although, in most of these examples, the system has been so dissimilar from that under consideration as greatly to weaken any inference concerning the latter from the fate of the former, yet, as the States will retain, under the proposed Constitution, a very extensive portion of active sovereignty, the inference ought not to be wholly disregarded. In the Achæan league it is probable that the Fœderal head had a degree and species of power, which gave it a considerable likeness to the Government framed by the Convention. The Lycian Confederacy, as far as its principles and form are transmitted, must have borne a still greater analogy to it. Yet history does not inform us, that either of them ever degenerated, or tended to degenerate, into one consolidated Government. On the contrary, we know that the ruin of one of thein proceeded from the incapacity of the Fœderal authority to prevent the dissensions, and finally the disunion, of the subordinate authorities. These cases are the more worthy of our attention, as the external causes by which the component parts were pressed together were much more numerous and powerful than in our case; and consequently less powerful ligaments within would be sufficient to bind the members to the head, and to each other.

In the feudal system, we have seen a similar propensity exemplified. Notwithstanding the want of proper sympathy in every instance between the local sovereigns and the People, and the sympathy in some instances between the general sovereign and the latter, it usually happened that the local sovereigns prevailed in the rivalship for encroachments. Had no external dangers enforced internal harmony and subordination, and particularly, had the local sovereigns possessed the affections of the People, the great kingdoms in Europe would at