have been, to have submitted in this instance to an inconvenience, for the attainment of a necessary advantage or a greater good, no inference can be drawn from thence to favor an accumulation of the evil, where no necessity urges, nor any greater good invites.

It may be easily discerned, also that the National Government would run a much greater risk, from a pow er in the State Legislatures over the elections of its House of Representatives, than from their power of appointing the members of its Senate. The Senators are to be chosen for the period of six years; there is to be a rotation, by which the seats of a third part of them are to be vacated and replenished every two years; and no State is to be entitled to more than two Senators; a quorum of the body is to consist of sixteen members. The joint result of these circumstances would be, that a temporary combination of a few States, to intermit the appointment of Senators, could neither annul the existence, nor impair the activity of the body; and it is not from a general and permanent combination of the States, that we can have anything to fear. The first might proceed from sinister designs in the leading members of a few of the State Legislatures: the last would suppose a fixed and rooted disaffection in the great body of the People; which will, either never exist at all, or will, in all probability, proceed from an experience of the inaptitude of the General Government to the advancement of their happiness; in which event, no good citizen could desire its continuance.

But with regard to the Fœderal House of Representatives, there is intended to be a general election of members once in two years. If the State Legislatures were to be invested with an exclusive power of regulating these elections, every period of making them would be a delicate crisis in the National situation; which might issue in a dissolution of the Union, if the leaders of a few of

the most important States should have entered into a previous conspiracy to prevent an election.

I shall not deny, that there is a degree of weight in the observation, that the interest of each State, to be represented in the Fœderal Councils, will be a security against the abuse of a power over its elections in the hands of the State Legislatures. But the security will not be considered as complete, by those who attend to the force of an obvious distinction between the interest of the People in the public felicity, and the interest of their local rulers in the power and consequence of their offices. The People of America may be warmly attached to the Government of the Union, at times when the particular rulers of particular States, stimulated by the natural rivalship of power, and by the hopes of personal aggrandizement, and supported by a stong faction in each of those States, may be in a very opposite temper. This diversity of sentiment between a majority of the People, and the individuals who have the greatest credit in their councils, is exemplified in some of the States at the present moment, on the present question. The scheme of separate Confederacies, which will always multiply the chances of ambition, will be a never failing bait to all such influential characters in the State administrations, as are capable of preferring their own emolument and advancement to the public weal. With so effectual a weapon in their hands as the exclusive power of regulating elections for the National Government, a combination of a few such men, in a few of the most considerable States, where the temptation will always be the strongest, might accomplish the destruction of the Union, by seizing the opportunity of some casual dissatisfaction among the People, (and which perhaps they may themselves have excited,) to discontinue the choice of members for the Fœderal House of Repre sentatives. It ought never to be forgotten, that a firm

Union of this country, under an efficient Government, will probably be an increasing object of jealousy to more than one nation of Europe; and that enterprises to subvert it will sometimes originate in the intrigues of foreign powers, and will seldom fail to be patronized and abetted by some of them. Its preservation therefore ought in no case, that can be avoided, to be committed to the guardianship of any but those, whose situation will uniformly beget an immediate interest in the faithful and vigilant performance of the trust.

PUBLIUS.

[From the New York Packet, Tuesday, February 26, 1788.]

THE FEDERALIST. No. LIX.

TO THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK.

WE

E have seen, that an uncontrollable power over the elections for the Federal Government could not, without hazard, be committed to the State Legisla tures. 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 eve oe used for the exclusion of any State from its sare 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 still 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 sev eral 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 it self would not be included? Or to what purpose would it be established, in reference to one branch of the Leg islature, 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 coöperation of the State Legislatures. If we make the latter supposition, it then becomes immaterial where the pow er in question is placed, whether 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