Tag: Federalist Papers

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A Bolingbrokean Argument Hidden in Hamilton’s Federalist 71

Alexander Hamilton penned most of the famous series of essays called the Federalist Papers. In Federalist 71, published in March 1788, he wrote this notable paragraph: It is a just observation, that the people commonly INTEND the PUBLIC GOOD. This often applies to their very errors. But their good sense would despise the adulator who […]

by Haimo Li
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Partly National, Partly Federal: James Madison, the Amphictyonic Confederacy, and the Republican Balance

Following the Constitutional Convention’s completion of the United States Constitution in the Fall of 1787, many of those involved in its creation embarked on a campaign to ensure its ratification among the several states. The most significant effort was the publication of the Federalist in New York, published anonymously in a long series of newspaper articles […]

by James A. Cornelius
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Hamilton’s Revenge

Having just attained his thirteenth (or eleventh) birthday, he found himself confined to a bed on the second floor of a small two-story house on the Caribbean island of St. Croix, gripped by a violent fever now in its second week.[1] Next to him was his mother, who had been the first to come down […]

by Geoff Smock
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Standing Armies: The Constitutional Debate

Introduction Few ideas were more widely accepted in early America than that of the danger of peacetime standing armies.[1] This anti-standing army sentiment motivated colonial opposition to post-French and Indian War British policies, intensified after the Boston Massacre, influenced the writings of most founding fathers, and remained politically relevant well after the Revolutionary War ended. […]

by Griffin Bovée
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The Federalist #10 and #51

Myth: The Federalist Nos. 10 and 51, written by James Madison, provided the closing case in the ratification debates. Opponents of the proposed federal Constitution argued that republican governments invariably failed if attempted over too large an area, but Madison contended a republic would work better in a large country than in a small one […]

by Ray Raphael
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The Federalist (Papers): Then and Now

Myth: During the ratification debates The Federalist Papers, with their reasoned arguments, convinced people to vote in favor of the Constitution. Busted: Numbers suggest a different story. The newspaper essays we now celebrate were less widely circulated than many other Federalist and Anti-Federalist tracts, book sales were miniscule, and references to them during the extensive […]

by Ray Raphael