"Federalist No. 10"

Friday, November 23, 1787.

To the People of the State of New York:

AMONG the numerous advantages promised by a wellconstructed Union,

none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency

to break and control the violence of faction. The friend of popular

governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character

and fate, as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous

vice. He will not fail, therefore, to set a due value on any plan

which, without violating the principles to which he is attached,

provides a proper cure for it. The instability, injustice, and

confusion introduced into the public councils, have, in truth,

been the mortal diseases under which popular governments have

everywhere perished; as they continue to be the favorite and fruitful

topics from which the adversaries to liberty derive their most

specious declamations. The valuable improvements made by the American

constitutions on the popular models, both ancient and modern,

cannot certainly be too much admired; but it would be an unwarrantable

partiality, to contend that they have as effectually obviated

the danger on this side, as was wished and expected. Complaints

are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens,

equally the friends of public and private faith, and of public

and personal liberty, that our governments are too unstable, that

the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties,

and that measures are too often decided, not according to the

rules of justice and the rights of the minor party, but by the

superior force of an interested and overbearing majority. However

anxiously we may wish that these complaints had no foundation,

the evidence, of known facts will not permit us to deny that they

are in some degree true. It will be found, indeed, on a candid

review of our situation, that some of the distresses under which

we labor have been erroneously charged on the operation of our

governments; but it will be found, at the same time, that other

causes will not alone account for many of our heaviest misfortunes;

and, particularly, for that prevailing and increasing distrust

of public engagements, and alarm for private rights, which are

echoed from one end of the continent to the other. These must

be chiefly, if not wholly, effects of the unsteadiness and injustice

with which a factious spirit has tainted our public administrations.

By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting

to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated

by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to

the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate

interests of the community.

There are two methods of curing the mischiefs of faction: the

one, by removing its causes; the other, by controlling its effects.

There are again two methods of removing the causes of faction:

the one, by destroying the liberty which is essential to its existence;

the other, by giving to every citizen the same opinions, the same

passions, and the same interests.

It could never be more truly said than of the first remedy, that

it was worse than the disease. Liberty is to faction what air

is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But

it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential

to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would

be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal

life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency.

The second expedient is as impracticable as the first would be

unwise. As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he

is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed.

As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his

self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal

influence on each other; and the former will be objects to which

the latter will attach themselves. The diversity in the faculties

of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less

an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection

of these faculties is the first object of government. From the

protection of different and unequal faculties of acquiring property,

the possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately

results; and from the influence of these on the sentiments and

views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of the

society into different interests and parties.

The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man;

and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity,

according to the different circumstances of civil society. A zeal

for different opinions concerning religion, concerning government,

and many other points, as well of speculation as of practice;

an attachment to different leaders ambitiously contending for

pre-eminence and power; or to persons of other descriptions whose

fortunes have been interesting to the human passions, have, in

turn, divided mankind into parties, inflamed them with mutual

animosity, and rendered them much more disposed to vex and oppress

each other than to co-operate for their common good. So strong

is this propensity of mankind to fall into mutual animosities,

that where no substantial occasion presents itself, the most frivolous

and fanciful distinctions have been sufficient to kindle their

unfriendly passions and excite their most violent conflicts. But

the most common and durable source of factions has been 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, grow up of necessity in civilized nations, and

divide them into different classes, actuated by different sentiments

and views. The regulation of these various and interfering interests

forms the principal task of modern legislation, and involves the

spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations

of the government.

No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his

interest would certainly bias his judgment, and, not improbably,

corrupt his integrity. With equal, nay with greater reason, a

body of men are unfit to be both judges and parties at the same

time; yet what are many of the most important acts of legislation,

but so many judicial determinations, not indeed concerning the

rights of single persons, but concerning the rights of large bodies

of citizens? And what are the different classes of legislators

but advocates and parties to the causes which they determine?

Is a law proposed concerning private debts? It is a question to

which 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; and the most

numerous party, or, in other words, the most powerful faction

must be expected to prevail. Shall domestic manufactures be encouraged,

and in what degree, by restrictions on foreign manufactures? are

questions which would be differently decided by the landed and

the manufacturing classes, and probably by neither with a sole

regard to justice and the public good. The apportionment of taxes

on the various descriptions of property is an act which seems

to require the most exact impartiality; yet there is, perhaps,

no legislative act in which greater opportunity and temptation

are given to a predominant party to trample on the rules of justice.

Every shilling with which they overburden the inferior number,

is a shilling saved to their own pockets.

It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will be able to

adjust these clashing interests, and render them all subservient

to the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at

the helm. Nor, in many cases, can such an adjustment be made at

all without taking into view indirect and remote considerations,

which will rarely prevail over the immediate interest which one

party may find in disregarding the rights of another or the good

of the whole.

The inference to which we are brought is, that the CAUSES of faction

cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the

means of controlling its EFFECTS.

If a faction consists of less than a majority, relief is supplied

by the republican principle, which enables the majority to defeat

its sinister views by regular vote. It may clog the administration,

it may convulse the society; but it will be unable to execute

and mask its violence under the forms of the Constitution. When

a majority is included in a faction, the form of popular government,

on the other hand, enables it to sacrifice to its ruling passion

or interest both the public good and the rights of other citizens.

To secure the public good and private rights against the danger

of such a faction, and at the same time to preserve the spirit

and the form of popular government, is then the great object to

which our inquiries are directed. Let me add that it is the great

desideratum by which this form of government can be rescued from

the opprobrium under which it has so long labored, and be recommended

to the esteem and adoption of mankind.

By what means is this object attainable? Evidently by one of two

only. Either the existence of the same passion or interest in

a majority at the same time must be prevented, or the majority,

having such coexistent passion or interest, must be rendered,

by their number and local situation, unable to concert and carry

into effect schemes of oppression. If the impulse and the opportunity

be suffered to coincide, we well know that neither moral nor religious

motives can be relied on as an adequate control. They are not

found to be such on the injustice and violence of individuals,

and lose their efficacy in proportion to the number combined together,

that is, in proportion as their efficacy becomes needful.

From this view of the subject it may be concluded that a pure

democracy, by which I mean 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. A common passion

or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority

of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form

of government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements

to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual. Hence

it is that such democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence

and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal

security or the rights of property; and have in general been as

short in their lives as they have been violent in their deaths.

Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of government,

have erroneously supposed that by reducing mankind to a perfect

equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time,

be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their

opinions, and their passions.

A republic, by which I mean a government in which the scheme of

representation takes place, opens a different prospect, and promises

the cure for which we are seeking. Let us examine the points in

which it varies from pure democracy, and we shall comprehend both

the nature of the cure and the efficacy which it must derive from

the Union.

The two great points of difference between a democracy and a republic

are: first, the delegation of the government, in the latter, to

a small number of citizens elected by the rest; secondly, the

greater number of citizens, and greater sphere of country, over

which the latter may be extended.

The effect of the first difference is, on the one hand, to refine

and enlarge the public views, by passing them through the medium

of a chosen body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the

true interest of their country, and whose patriotism and love

of justice will be least likely to sacrifice it to temporary or

partial considerations. Under such a regulation, it may well happen

that the public voice, pronounced by the representatives of the

people, will be more consonant to the public good than if pronounced

by the people themselves, convened for the purpose. On the other

hand, the effect may be inverted. Men of factious tempers, of

local prejudices, or of sinister designs, may, by intrigue, by

corruption, or by other means, first obtain the suffrages, and

then betray the interests, of the people. The question resulting

is, whether small or extensive republics are more favorable to

the election of proper guardians of the public weal; and it is

clearly decided in favor of the latter by two obvious considerations:

In the first place, it is to be remarked that, however small the

republic may be, the representatives must be raised to a certain

number, in order to guard against the cabals of a few; and that,

however large it may be, they must be limited to a certain number,

in order to guard against the confusion of a multitude. Hence,

the number of representatives in the two cases not being in proportion

to that of the two constituents, and being proportionally greater

in the small republic, it follows that, if the proportion of fit

characters be not less in the large than in the small republic,

the former will present a greater option, and consequently a greater

probability of a fit choice.

In the next place, as each representative will be chosen by a

greater number of citizens in the large than in the small republic,

it will be more difficult for unworthy candidates to practice

with success the vicious arts by which elections are too often

carried; and the suffrages of the people being more free, will

be more likely to centre in men who possess the most attractive

merit and the most diffusive and established characters.

It must be confessed that in this, as in most other cases, there

is a mean, on both sides of which inconveniences will be found

to lie. By enlarging too much the number of electors, you render

the representatives too little acquainted with all their local

circumstances and lesser interests; as by reducing it too much,

you render him unduly attached to these, and too little fit to

comprehend and pursue great and national objects. The federal

Constitution forms a happy combination in this respect; the great

and aggregate interests being referred to the national, the local

and particular to the State legislatures.

The other point of difference is, the greater number of citizens

and extent of territory which may be brought within the compass

of republican than of democratic government; and it is this circumstance

principally which renders factious combinations less to be dreaded

in the former than in the latter. The smaller the society, the

fewer probably will be the distinct parties and interests composing

it; the fewer the distinct parties and interests, the more frequently

will a majority be found of the same party; and the smaller the

number of individuals composing a majority, and the smaller the

compass within which they are placed, the more easily will they

concert and execute their plans of oppression. Extend the sphere,

and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you

make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a

common motive to invade the rights of other citizens; or if such

a common motive exists, it will be more difficult for all who

feel it to discover their own strength, and to act in unison with

each other. Besides other impediments, it may be remarked that,

where there is a consciousness of unjust or dishonorable purposes,

communication is always checked by distrust in proportion to the

number whose concurrence is necessary.

Hence, it clearly appears, that the same advantage which a republic

has over a democracy, in controlling the effects of faction, is

enjoyed by a large over a small republic,--is enjoyed by the Union

over the States composing it. Does the advantage consist in the

substitution of representatives whose enlightened views and virtuous

sentiments render them superior to local prejudices and schemes

of injustice? It will not be denied that the representation of

the Union will be most likely to possess these requisite endowments.

Does it consist in the greater security afforded by a greater

variety of parties, against the event of any one party being able

to outnumber and oppress the rest? In an equal degree does the

increased variety of parties comprised within the Union, increase

this security. Does it, in fine, consist in the greater obstacles

opposed to the concert and accomplishment of the secret wishes

of an unjust and interested majority? Here, again, the extent

of the Union gives it the most palpable advantage.

The influence of factious leaders may kindle a flame within their

particular States, but will be unable to spread a general conflagration

through the other States. A religious sect may degenerate into

a political faction in a part of the Confederacy; but the variety

of sects dispersed over the entire face of it must secure the

national councils against any danger from that source. A rage

for paper money, for an abolition of debts, for an equal division

of property, or for any other improper or wicked project, will

be less apt to pervade the whole body of the Union than a particular

member of it; in the same proportion as such a malady is more

likely to taint a particular county or district, than an entire

State.

In the extent and proper structure of the Union, therefore, we

behold a republican remedy for the diseases most incident to republican

government. And according to the degree of pleasure and pride

we feel in being republicans, ought to be our zeal in cherishing

the spirit and supporting the character of Federalists.

PUBLIUS.

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