to a reasonable man, may appear to be as near the proper medium as any number whatever; at least, for the present. There is one source of increase, also, which does not depend upon any constructions of the Constitution; it is the creation of new states. Vermont and Kentucky will probably soon become independent. New members of the Union will also be formed from the unsettled tracts of Western territory. These must be represented, and will all contribute to swell the federal legislature. If the whole number in the United States be at present three millions, as is commonly supposed, according to the ratio of one for thirty thousand, we shall have, on the first census, a hundred representatives. In ten years thirty more will be added; and in twenty-five years the number will double. Then, sir, we shall have two hundred, if the increase goes on in the same proportion. The convention of Massachusetts, who made the same objection, have fixed upon this number as the point at which they chose to limit the representation. But can we pronounce with certainty that it will not be expedient to go beyond this number? We cannot. Experience alone may determine. This problem may with more safety be left to the discretion of the legislature, as it will be the interest of the larger and increasing states of Massachusetts, New York, and Pennsylvania to augment the representation. Only Connecticut, Rhode Island, Delaware, and Maryland can be interested in limiting it. We may, therefore, safely calculate upon a growing representation, according to the advance of population and the circumstances of the country.

The state governments possess inherent advantages, which will ever give them an influence and ascendancy over the national government, and will forever preclude the possibility of federal encroachments. That their liberties, indeed, can be subverted by the federal head is repugnant to every rule of political calculation. Is not this arrangement then, sir, a most wise and prudent one? Is not the present representation fully adequate to our present exigencies, and sufficient to answer all the purposes of the Union? I am persuaded that an examination of the objects of the federal government will afford a conclusive answer.

THE UNITED STATES SENATE

This speech is another of the series delivered in the New York Convention of 1788. Hamilton urges that the Senate be established to represent the states and act as a check upon the passions of a popular assembly and regulate its fluctuations.

I. THE SENATE A CHECK UPON THE HOUSE

We all, with equal sincerity, profess to be anxious for the establishment of a republican government on a safe and solid basis. It is the object of the wishes of every honest man in the United States, and I presume I shall not be disbelieved when I declare that it is an object, of all others, the nearest and most dear to my own heart. The means of accomplishing this great purpose become the most important study which can interest mankind. It is our duty to examine all those means with peculiar attention, and to choose the best and most effectual. It is our duty to draw from nature, from reason, from examples, the justest principles of policy, and to pursue and apply them in the formation of our government. We should contemplate and compare the systems which, in the examination, come under our view; distinguish with a careful eye the defects and excellencies of each, and discarding the former, incorporate the latter, as far as circumstances will admit, into our Constitution. If we pursue a different course and neglect this duty, we shall probably disappoint the expectations of our country and of the world.

In the commencement of a revolution, which received its birth from the usurpations of tyranny, nothing was more natural than that the public mind should be influenced by an extreme spirit of jealousy. To resist these encroachments, and to nourish this spirit, was the great object of all our public and private institutions. The zeal for liberty became predominant and excessive. In forming our Confederation this passion alone seemed to actuate us, and we appear to have had no other view than to secure ourselves from despotism. The object certainly was a valuable one, and deserved

our utmost attention. But there is another object, equally important, and which our enthusiasm rendered us little capable of regarding. I mean a principle of strength and stability in the organization of our government, and vigor in its operations. This purpose could never be accomplished but by the establishment of some select body, formed peculiarly on this principle. There are few positions more demonstrable than that there should be in every republic some permanent body to correct the prejudices, check the intemperate passions, and regulate the fluctuations of a popular assembly. It is evident that a body instituted for these purposes must be so formed as to exclude as much as possible from its own character those infirmities and that mutability which it is designed to remedy. It is, therefore, necessary that it should be small, that it should hold its authority during a considerable period, and that it should have such an independence in the exercise of its powers as will divest it, as much as possible, of local prejudices. It should be so formed as to be the center of political knowledge, to pursue always a steady line of conduct, and to reduce every irregular propensity to system. Without this establishment we may make experiments without end, but shall never have an efficient government.

It is an unquestionable truth that the body of the people in every country desire sincerely its prosperity. But it is equally unquestionable that they do not possess the discernment and stability necessary for systematic government. To deny that they are frequently led into the grossest errors by misinformation and passion would be a flattery which their own good sense must despise. That branch of administration, especially, which involves our political relation with foreign states, a community will ever be incompetent to. These truths are not often held up in public assemblies, but they cannot be unknown to any who hear me.

Gentlemen in their reasoning have placed the interests of the several states and those of the United States in contrast. This is not a fair view of the subject. They must necessarily be involved in each other. What we apprehend is that some sinister prejudice or some prevailing passion may assume the form of a genuine

interest. The influence of these is as powerful as the most permanent conviction of the public good, and against this influence we ought to provide. The local interests of a state ought in every case to give way to the interests of the Union. For when a sacrifice of one or the other is necessary, the former becomes only an apparent, partial interest, and should yield, on the principle that the smaller good ought never to oppose the greater one. When you assemble from your several counties in the legislature, were every member to be guided only by the apparent interest of his county, government would be impracticable. There must be a perpetual accommodation and sacrifice of local advantage to general expediency. But the spirit of a more popular assembly would rarely be actuated by this important principle. It is therefore absolutely necessary that the Senate should be so formed as to be unbiased by false conceptions of the real interests, or undue attachment to the apparent good, of their several states.

Gentlemen indulge too many unreasonable apprehensions of danger to the state governments. They seem to suppose that the moment you put men into the national council they become corrupt and tyrannical, and lose all their affection for their fellow citizens. But can we imagine that the senators will ever be so insensible of their own advantage as to sacrifice the genuine interest of their constituents? The state governments are essentially necessary to the form and spirit of the general system. As long, therefore, as Congress has a full conviction of this necessity, it must, even upon principles purely national, have as firm an attachment to the one as to the other. This conviction can never leave its members unless they become madmen. While the Constitution continues to be read, and its principles known, the states must, by every rational man, be considered as essential component parts of the Union; and therefore the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is totally inadmissible.

II. STATE GOVERNMENTS NECESSARY

Hamilton upholds the action of the federal Convention in not disturbing the local powers of the several states. He believes that Congress should have only general powers, that domestic and civil affairs should be regulated by the states, and that the Senate should represent the states as units.

Mr. Chairman, it has been advanced as a principle that no government but a despotism can exist in a very extensive country. This is a melancholy consideration indeed. If it were founded on truth, we ought to dismiss the idea of a republican government, even for the state of New York. This idea has been taken from a celebrated writer, who, by being misunderstood, has been the occasion of frequent fallacies in our reasoning on political subjects. But the position has been misapprehended, and its application is entirely false and unwarrantable. It relates only to democracies, where the whole body of the people meet to transact business, and where representation is unknown. Such were a number of ancient, and some modern independent cities. Men who read without attention have taken these maxims respecting the extent of country, and, contrary to their proper meaning, have applied them to republics in general. This application is wrong, in respect to all representative governments, but especially in relation to a confederacy of states, in which the supreme legislature has only general powers, and the civil and domestic concerns of the people are regulated by the laws of the several states. This distinction being kept in view, all the difficulty will vanish, and we may easily conceive that the people of a large country may be represented as truly as those of a small one. An assembly constituted for general purposes may be fully competent to every federal regulation, without being too numerous for deliberate conduct. If the state governments were to be abolished, the question would wear a different face; but this idea is inadmissible. They are absolutely necessary to the system. Their existence must form a leading principle in the most perfect constitution we could form. I insist that it never can be the interest or desire of the national legislature