Federalist No. 5

The third reason for a united America: In Unity there is Strength

“It was remarked in the preceding paper, that weakness and divisions at home would invite dangers from abroad; and that nothing would tend more to secure us from them than union, strength, and good government within ourselves.”

“Behold, this I have given unto you as a parable, and it is even as I am. I say unto you, be one; and if ye are not one ye are not mine.” (Doctrine and Covenants 38:27)

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist Nos. 6 + 7

(A Federalist is someone who favors some sort of Federal government, that is, a government which consists of a federation of independent political bodies. An Anti-Federalist is against such a federation. More specifically, the Anti-Federalists in colonial America were against the ratification of the proposed Constitution and the new Federal government that would be created thereby. Federalists wrote the Federalist Papers. Anti-Federalists, perhaps in a less organized and methodical fashion, created a body of writings sometimes referred to as the “Anti-Federalist Papers”. A lot of the material found in the first few Federalist Papers is an attempt to convince the people of the various States that it would be more in their interest to create one national government rather than three or four smaller confederacies, or to remain as thirteen independent States. Some of the arguments used might seem obvious today, therefore we won’t dwell upon the first Papers quite so extensively. However, we should remember that the colonists had just finished fighting a war against a government which they felt did not represent them effectively and therefore the necessity of assuaging their fear of tyranny by an overly powerful national government can be well understood.)

Sources of international discord

“The causes of hostility among nations are innumerable. There are some which have a general and almost constant operation upon the collective bodies of society. Of this description are the love of power or the desire of pre-eminence and dominion—the jealousy of power, or the desire of equality and safety. There are others which have a more circumscribed though an equally operative influence within their spheres. Such are the rivalships and competitions of commerce between commercial nations. And there are others, not less numerous than either of the former, which take their origin entirely in private passions; in the attachments, enmities, interests, hopes, and fears of leading individuals in the communities of which they are members. Men of this class, whether the favorites of a king or of a people, have in too many instances abused the confidence they possessed; and assuming the pretext of some public motive, have not scrupled to sacrifice the national tranquillity to personal advantage or personal gratification.”

“Are not popular assemblies frequently subject to the impulses of rage, resentment, jealousy, avarice, and of other irregular and violent propensities? Is it not well known that their determinations are often governed by a few individuals in whom they place confidence, and are, of course, liable to be tinctured by the passions and views of those individuals?”

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist Nos. 8 + 9

Results of War on Political Freedom

“Safety from external danger is the most powerful director of national conduct. Even the ardent love of liberty will, after a time, give way to its dictates. The violent destruction of life and property incident to war, the continual effort and alarm attendant on a state of continual danger, will compel nations the most attached to liberty to resort for repose and security to institutions which have a tendency to destroy their civil and political rights. To be more safe, they at length become willing to run the risk of being less free.”

“The institutions chiefly alluded to are STANDING ARMIES and the correspondent appendages of military establishments.”

{The colonists believed that standing armies were dangerous liberty as their existance leads to misuse of military power. The Constitution of the United States then proposed contained no provision preventing the creation and support of standing armies, in time of peace, within the United States. Thus concern was used by the Anti-Federalists against the ratification of the Constitution. As part of his argument for the creation of one national government in these Federalists, the author turns this concern to his advantage by pointing out that if the states were governed by three or thirteen seperate governments, it would be much more likely that standing armies would exist to protect the borders of each governmental unit than if there was one national government. See the complete text of Federalist Nos. 8 + 9 for a detailed discussion of these questions in regard to the ratification of the Constitution.}

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist No. 10

“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.”

{This was included not because of the point being made by the author, but because of the examples he used. For the author, paper money, abolition of debts, and an equalization of the division of property were obviously improper and even wicked.}

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist No. 11

“The rights of neutrality will only be respected when they are defended by an adequate power. A nation, despicable by its weakness, forfeits even the privilege of being neutral.”

Another view by President Kimball:

“When enemies rise up, we commit vast resources to the fabrication of gods of stone and steel — ships, planes, missiles, fortifications — and depend on them for protection and deliverance. When threatened, we become antienemy instead of pro-kingdom of God; we train a man in the art of war and call him a patriot, thus, in the manner of Satan’s counterfeit of true patriotism, perverting the Savior’s teaching:

“Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

“That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven” (Matthew 5:44-45).

We forget that if we are righteous the Lord will either not suffer our enemies to come upon us — and this is the special promise to the inhabitants of the land of the Americas (see 2 Nephi 1:7) — or he will fight our battles for us (Exodus 14:14; D&C 98:37, to name only two references of many).”

Source: President Spencer W. Kimball
“The False Gods We Worship”, Ensign, June 1976

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist No. 12

“A nation cannot long exist without revenues.”

Source: Alexander Hamilton

Topics: Federalist Papers

The twelth Federalist deals in depth with different possible sources of revenue for the Federal government. The following is a short primer for those of us who may need one in the area of “early colonial tax theory and practice”. The concepts in this primer are important in understanding the meaning of the Constitution and the Federalist Papers concerning taxes.

The author sees two possible sources of revenue for the government.

1. Property taxes (direct taxes) and

2. Consumption taxes (indirect taxes)

“3. In the sense above mentioned, taxes are usually divided into two great classes, those which are direct, and those which are indirect. Under the former denomination are included taxes on land or real property, and under the latter taxes on articles of consumption. 5 Wheat. R. 317.

“4. Congress have plenary {complete} power over every species of taxable property, except exports. But there are two rules prescribed for their government, the rule of uniformity and the rule of apportionment. Three kinds of taxes, namely, duties, imposts and excises are to be laid by the first rule; and capitation and other direct taxes, by the second rule. Should there be any other species of taxes, not direct, and not included within the words duties, imposts or customs, they might be laid by the rule of uniformity or not, as congress should think proper and reasonable. Id.”

Source: Bouvier’s Law Dictionary - 1856 ed.

Topics: ; Federalist Papers

“duty - tax; esp : a tax on imports”

“excise -

1: an internal tax levied on the manufacture, sale, or consumption of a commodity

2: any of various taxes on privileges often assessed in the form of a license or fee”

“impost: something imposed or levied : tax”

“customs -

a : duties, tolls, or imposts imposed by the sovereign law of a country on imports or exports”

“capitation -

1: a direct uniform tax imposed on each head or person: poll tax

2: a uniform per capita payment or fee”

Merriam Websters Collegiate Dictionary 1996 edition

He then uses these terms throughout Federalist No. 12 to describe what advantages one national government would have in financing its operations compared to three or four or thirteen smaller governments.

Topics: ; Federalist Papers

Federalist Nos. 13 + 14

The Federal System

“In the first place it is to be remembered that the general government is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws. Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects, which concern all the members of the republic, but which are not to be attained by the separate provisions of any. The subordinate governments, which can extend their care to all those other subjects which can be separately provided for, will retain their due authority and activity.”

“Hearken not to the unnatural voice which tells you that the people of America, knit together as they are by so many cords of affection, can no longer live together as members of the same family; can no longer continue the mutual guardians of their mutual happiness; can no longer be fellowcitizens of one great, respectable, and flourishing empire. Hearken not to the voice which petulantly tells you that the form of government recommended for your adoption is a novelty in the political world; that it has never yet had a place in the theories of the wildest projectors; that it rashly attempts what it is impossible to accomplish. No, my countrymen, shut your ears against this unhallowed language. Shut your hearts against the poison which it conveys; the kindred blood which flows in the veins of American citizens, the mingled blood which they have shed in defense of their sacred rights, consecrate their Union, and excite horror at the idea of their becoming aliens, rivals, enemies. And if novelties are to be shunned, believe me, the most alarming of all novelties, the most wild of all projects, the most rash of all attempts, is that of rendering us in pieces, in order to preserve our liberties and promote our happiness. But why is the experiment of an extended republic to be rejected, merely because it may comprise what is new? Is it not the glory of the people of America, that, whilst they have paid a decent regard to the opinions of former times and other nations, they have not suffered a blind veneration for antiquity, for custom, or for names, to overrule the suggestions of their own good sense, the knowledge of their own situation, and the lessons of their own experience? To this manly spirit, posterity will be indebted for the possession, and the world for the example, of the numerous innovations displayed on the American theatre, in favor of private rights and public happiness. Had no important step been taken by the leaders of the Revolution for which a precedent could not be discovered, no government established of which an exact model did not present itself, the people of the United States might, at this moment have been numbered among the melancholy victims of misguided councils, must at best have been laboring under the weight of some of those forms which have crushed the liberties of the rest of mankind. Happily for America, happily, we trust, for the whole human race, they pursued a new and more noble course. They accomplished a revolution which has no parallel in the annals of human society. They reared the fabrics of governments which have no model on the face of the globe. They formed the design of a great Confederacy, which it is incumbent on their successors to improve and perpetuate. If their works betray imperfections, we wonder at the fewness of them. If they erred most in the structure of the Union, this was the work most difficult to be executed; this is the work which has been new modelled by the act of your convention, and it is that act on which you are now to deliberate and to decide.”

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist No. 15

“If the road over which you will still have to pass should in some places appear to you tedious or irksome, you will recollect that you are in quest of information on a subject the most momentous which can engage the attention of a free people, that the field through which you have to travel is in itself spacious, and that the difficulties of the journey have been unnecessarily increased by the mazes with which sophistry has beset the way.”

” ... how little dependence is to be placed on treaties which have no other sanction than the obligations of good faith, and which oppose general considerations of peace and justice to the impulse of any immediate interest or passion.

“Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint. Has it been found that bodies of men act with more rectitude or greater disinterestedness than individuals? The contrary of this has been inferred by all accurate observers of the conduct of mankind; and the inference is founded upon obvious reasons. Regard to reputation has a less active influence, when the infamy of a bad action is to be divided among a number than when it is to fall singly upon one. A spirit of faction, which is apt to mingle its poison in the deliberations of all bodies of men, will often hurry the persons of whom they are composed into improprieties and excesses, for which they would blush in a private capacity.

“In addition to all this, there is, in the nature of sovereign power, an impatience of control, that disposes those who are invested with the exercise of it, to look with an evil eye upon all external attempts to restrain or direct its operations. ... Power controlled or abridged is almost always the rival and enemy of that power by which it is controlled or abridged.”

Topics: Federalist Papers

Federalist No. 16

“The majesty of the national authority must be manifested through the medium of the courts of justice. The government of the Union, like that of each State, must be able to address itself immediately to the hopes and fears of individuals; and to attract to its support those passions which have the strongest influence upon the human heart. It must, in short, possess all the means, and have aright to resort to all the methods, of executing the powers with which it is intrusted, that are possessed and exercised by the government of the particular States.”

{What is being criticized here is the theory that some people had that the Federal government should only be allowed to work upon individuals through the intermediate agency of the State governments. But the author points out that without a Federal court system which has authority to act on individual citizens, the only way for the government to enforce its decisions would be through military force, which naturally was unwanted by all.}

Topics: Federalist Papers

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