THE more candid opposers of the provision respecting elections,
contained in the plan of the convention, when pressed in argument,
will sometimes concede the propriety of that provision; with this
qualification, however, that it ought to have been accompanied with
a declaration, that all elections should be had in the counties
where the electors resided. This, say they, was a necessary
precaution against an abuse of the power. A declaration of this
nature would certainly have been harmless; so far as it would have
had the effect of quieting apprehensions, it might not have been
undesirable. But it would, in fact, have afforded little or no
additional security against the danger apprehended; and the want of
it will never be considered, by an impartial and judicious examiner,
as a serious, still less as an insuperable, objection to the plan.
The different views taken of the subject in the two preceding papers
must be sufficient to satisfy all dispassionate and discerning men,
that if the public liberty should ever be the victim of the ambition
of the national rulers, the power under examination, at least, will
be guiltless of the sacrifice.
If those who are inclined to consult their jealousy only, would
exercise it in a careful inspection of the several State
constitutions, they would find little less room for disquietude and
alarm, from the latitude which most of them allow in respect to
elections, than from the latitude which is proposed to be allowed to
the national government in the same respect. A review of their
situation, in this particular, would tend greatly to remove any ill
impressions which may remain in regard to this matter. But as that
view would lead into long and tedious details, I shall content
myself with the single example of the State in which I write. The
constitution of New York makes no other provision for locality of
elections, than that the members of the Assembly shall be elected in
the counties; those of the Senate, in the great districts into which
the State is or may be divided: these at present are four in number,
and comprehend each from two to six counties. It may readily be
perceived that it would not be more difficult to the legislature of
New York to defeat the suffrages of the citizens of New York, by
confining elections to particular places, than for the legislature
of the United States to defeat the suffrages of the citizens of the
Union, by the like expedient. Suppose, for instance, the city of
Albany was to be appointed the sole place of election for the county
and district of which it is a part, would not the inhabitants of
that city speedily become the only electors of the members both of
the Senate and Assembly for that county and district? Can we imagine
that the electors who reside in the remote subdivisions of the
counties of Albany, Saratoga, Cambridge, etc., or in any part of the
county of Montgomery, would take the trouble to come to the city of
Albany, to give their votes for members of the Assembly or Senate,
sooner than they would repair to the city of New York, to
participate in the choice of the members of the federal House of
Representatives? The alarming indifference discoverable in the
exercise of so invaluable a privilege under the existing laws, which
afford every facility to it, furnishes a ready answer to this
question. And, abstracted from any experience on the subject, we can
be at no loss to determine, that when the place of election is at an
inconvenient distance from the elector, the effect upon his conduct
will be the same whether that distance be twenty miles or twenty
thousand miles. Hence it must appear, that objections to the
particular modification of the federal power of regulating elections
will, in substance, apply with equal force to the modification of
the like power in the constitution of this State; and for this
reason it will be impossible to acquit the one, and to condemn the
other. A similar comparison would lead to the same conclusion in
respect to the constitutions of most of the other States.
If it should be said that defects in the State constitutions furnish
no apology for those which are to be found in the plan proposed, I
answer, that as the former have never been thought chargeable with
inattention to the security of liberty, where the imputations thrown
on the latter can be shown to be applicable to them also, the
presumption is that they are rather the cavilling refinements of a
predetermined opposition, than the well-founded inferences of a
candid research after truth. To those who are disposed to consider,
as innocent omissions in the State constitutions, what they regard
as unpardonable blemishes in the plan of the convention, nothing can
be said; or at most, they can only be asked to assign some
substantial reason why the representatives of the people in a single
State should be more impregnable to the lust of power, or other
sinister motives, than the representatives of the people of the
United States? If they cannot do this, they ought at least to prove
to us that it is easier to subvert the liberties of three millions
of people, with the advantage of local governments to head their
opposition, than of two hundred thousand people who are destitute of
that advantage. And in relation to the point immediately under
consideration, they ought to convince us that it is less probable
that a predominant faction in a single State should, in order to
maintain its superiority, incline to a preference of a particular
class of electors, than that a similar spirit should take possession
of the representatives of thirteen States, spread over a vast
region, and in several respects distinguishable from each other by a
diversity of local circumstances, prejudices, and interests.
Hitherto my observations have only aimed at a vindication of the
provision in question, on the ground of theoretic propriety, on that
of the danger of placing the power elsewhere, and on that of the
safety of placing it in the manner proposed. But there remains to be
mentioned a positive advantage which will result from this
disposition, and which could not as well have been obtained from any
other: I allude to the circumstance of uniformity in the time of
elections for the federal House of Representatives. It is more than
possible that this uniformity may be found by experience to be of
great importance to the public welfare, both as a security against
the perpetuation of the same spirit in the body, and as a cure for
the diseases of faction. If each State may choose its own time of
election, it is possible there may be at least as many different
periods as there are months in the year. The times of election in
the several States, as they are now established for local purposes,
vary between extremes as wide as March and November. The consequence
of this diversity would be that there could never happen a total
dissolution of renovation of the body at one time. If an improper
spirit of any kind should happen to prevail in it, that spirit would
be apt to infuse itself into the new members, as they come forward
in succession. The mass would be likely to remain nearly the same,
assimilating constantly to itself its gradual accretions. There is a
contagion in example which few men have sufficient force of mind to
resist. I am inclined to think that treble the duration in office,
with the condition of a total dissolution of the body at the same
time, might be less formidable to liberty than one third of that
duration subject to gradual and successive alterations.
Uniformity in the time of elections seems not less requisite for
executing the idea of a regular rotation in the Senate, and for
conveniently assembling the legislature at a stated period in each
year.
It may be asked, Why, then, could not a time have been fixed in the
Constitution? As the most zealous adversaries of the plan of the
convention in this State are, in general, not less zealous admirers
of the constitution of the State, the question may be retorted, and
it may be asked, Why was not a time for the like purpose fixed in
the constitution of this State? No better answer can be given than
that it was a matter which might safely be entrusted to legislative
discretion; and that if a time had been appointed, it might, upon
experiment, have been found less convenient than some other time.
The same answer may be given to the question put on the other side.
And it may be added that the supposed danger of a gradual change
being merely speculative, it would have been hardly advisable upon
that speculation to establish, as a fundamental point, what would
deprive several States of the convenience of having the elections
for their own governments and for the national government at the
same epochs.
Signed "PUBLIUS"
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