How a Large and Diverse Republic Guards Against Factions
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Extracts from Federalist No. 10, by James Madison
Editors' Note: Madison’s original 3,000-word letter“To the People of the State of New York” was published under the title The Federalist on November 22, 1787. CivicStory’s goal in posting this roughly 1040-word extract is to highlight Madison’s theme of ”the effect of factions”: what factions are, why they form, the threats they pose to a democracy, and how an extensive republic guards against their ill effects. Since the Constitution was not yet ratified nor a Union of States assured, “parties” or “factions” are understood as locally situated, and the words “republican,” “federalist,” and “democracy” are understood in a nonpartisan way. Some language has been updated, and sub-headings, italics, and bracketed words have been added for today's audiences.
Read the full text here.
AMONG the numerous advantages of a well-constructed union [of states], none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. Friends of popular governments [democracy] will appreciate any plan which, without violating basic freedoms, provides a cure for faction.
Complaints are everywhere heard from our most considerate and virtuous citizens, that our democracy is unstable, that the public good is disregarded in the conflicts of rival parties; and that policies are too often decided, not according to the rules of justice and the rights of the minority, but by the superior force of an overbearing majority.
Faction vs. the interests of the community as a whole
By a faction, I mean a number of citizens, whether a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and motivated by a common passion or interest adverse to the rights of other citizens or to the interests of the community as a whole.
There are two methods of curing the mischiefs of faction: the one, by removing its causes; the other, by controlling its effects. There are likewise two ways to remove 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, passions, and interests.
The first remedy [destroying essential liberty] is worse than the disease. Liberty is to faction what air is to fire. It would be no less foolish to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to eliminate air, which is essential to human and animal life, because it gives fire its destructive agency.
The second expedient (giving everyone the same opinion, passions, and interests) is as impracticable as it is unwise. As long as people can think freely, different opinions will be formed. The protection of people in diverse circumstances is the first object of government.
Property and factions
Yet, from a protection of different and unequal ways to acquire property, ensues divisions of the society into different interests and parties. The latent causes of partisanship are thus sown in human nature; and we see them everywhere, according to our different circumstances.
But the most common and durable source of factions has been the various and unequal distribution of property. Those who own, and those who are without property, have ever formed distinct interests in society.
The regulation of these different competing interests forms the principal task of modern legislation and involves a spirit of party and faction in the necessary and ordinary operations of government.
It is in vain to say that enlightened statesmen will adjust these clashing interests and render them all to serve the public good. Enlightened statesmen will not always be at the helm. Nor can such an adjustment be made at all without taking into view future considerations, which rarely prevail over the immediate interest one party has in disregarding the rights of another or the good of the whole.
Controlling the effects of faction
We can conclude 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 the minority by regular voting.
But when a majority is included in a faction, the democratic form of popular governance enables the majority to sacrifice to its ruling passion or interest both the public good and the rights of other citizens.
To secure the public good and citizens’ rights against such a faction, and at the same time to preserve the spirit and form of popular government, is then the great objective to which our inquiries are directed.
By what means is this objective attainable? Either prevent the existence of a common passion or interest in a majority, or render the majority unable to effect schemes of oppression.
Pure democracy has no cure
We may conclude that a pure democracy, by which I mean a society consisting of a small number of citizens who assemble and self-govern in person, has no cure for the mischiefs of political factions. There is nothing to check the temptation [for the majority] to sacrifice the minority interest. Hence it is that such democracies have forever been spectacles of turbulence and contention.
Differences between a republic and a democracy
A republic, meaning a government in which representation takes place, opens a different prospect and promises the cure which we are seeking. Let us examine the points in which it varies from pure democracy.
The two great differences between a democracy and a republic are: first, the delegation of government in a republic to a small number of citizens elected by the rest; secondly, the greater number of citizens and territory over which the republic extends.
The effect of the first difference is to refine and enlarge public opinion 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 narrow considerations.
On the other hand, the effect may be inverted. Men of factious tempers, local prejudices, or sinister designs may by intrigue, corruption, or other means, first obtain the votes, and then betray the interests of the people.
Dispersal of influence over a larger whole
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, but a variety of religious groups dispersed over the larger whole secure the national legislative bodies against any danger from one source.
In the extent and proper structure of the Union [of states], 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.
*In specifying why large republics are “more favorable to the election of proper guardians,” Madison considers:
greater options, and a greater probability of a “fit choice of representatives”
greater difficulty for unworthy candidates to practice “vicious arts by which elections are too often carried”
greater likelihood for voting to center on candidates “who possess the most attractive merit and the most diffusive and established characters”
the greater territory and number of citizens encompassed by an extensive republic, which renders factious combinations less to be dreaded than in a smaller republic
the Federal Constitution forms a happy combination; the great and aggregate interests being referred to the national [legislatures], the local and particular, to the state legislatures