The Constitution [Menu]

Madison Reflects on the Division of Power

James Madison's views on the appropriate division of power between the federal and state governments were influenced by the events of the day, events in which he was a leading participant.  He came to the Constitutional Convention a proponent of a strong national government, influenced by the "experienced inadequacy" of the Articles of Confederation and by Shay's Rebellion in Massachusetts.  He unsuccessfully advocated that the national legislature (Congress) be given "an indefinite power to negative [veto] legislative acts of the states."  This may have been an overreaction.  In the letter below he later admitted:

"I was among those most anxious to rescue it [the national government] from the danger which seemed to threaten it; and with that view, was willing to give to a Government resting on that foundation as much energy as would insure the requisite stability and efficacy.  It is possible, that in some instances this consideration may have been allowed a weight greater than subsequent reflection within the Convention, or the actual operation of the Government, would sanction."

Later, influenced by Hamilton's economic policies and Adam's Alien and Sedition Acts, he feared for the States and for liberty.  He drafted the Virginia Resolution in 1798 asserting that:

". . . [T]he General Assembly doth . . . express its deep regret, that a spirit has . . . been manifested by the federal government, to enlarge its powers by forced constructions of the constitutional charter which defines them; and that implications have appeared of a design to expound certain general phrases . . . so as to destroy the meaning and effect, of the particular enumeration which necessarily explains and limits the general phrases; and so as to consolidate the states by degrees, into one sovereignty, the obvious tendency and inevitable consequence of which would be, to transform the present republican system of the United States, into an absolute, or at best a mixed monarchy."

He wrote that the States had the right, the duty to "to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities, rights and liberties appertaining to them."  Years later in his retirement, during the Nullification Crisis, he had to argue against his own words in the Virginia Resolution in his efforts to preserve the federal government.

Madison opposed the National Bank proposed by Hamilton as not justified by the "necessary and proper" clause of the Constitution.  Later, having fought a war without a National Bank, he concluded that one was necessary.  Undeterred by charges of inconsistency, the signed the legislation authorizing the Second National Bank,

In retirement, he watched the events, wrote letters, advised Monroe and was able to reflect on the balance of power between the national government and the states.  In the final paragraph of the letter below he seems to be foreshadowing modern political science.  He speaks of the "science of Government" and develops hypotheses.  The factors which might influence the balance of powers between national and state governments are "the size of the States, the number of them, the territorial extent of the whole, and the degree of external danger."

In his mature judgment it was the majority that was to be feared, not the federal government:

If . . . the powers of the General Government be carried to unconstitutional lengths, it will be the result of a majority of the States and of the people, actuated by some impetuous feeling, or some real or supposed interest, overruling the minority, and not of successful attempts by the General Government to overpower both.

That most of us carried into the Convention a profound impression, produced by the experienced inadequacy of the old Confederation, and by the monitory examples of all similar ones, ancient and modern, as to the necessity of binding the States together by a strong Constitution, is certain.  The necessity of such a Constitution was enforced by the gross and disreputable inequalities which had been prominent in the internal administrations of most of the States.  Nor was the recent and alarming insurrection, headed by Shays, in Massachusetts, without a very sensible effect on the public mind.  Such, indeed, was the aspect of things, that, in the eyes of all the best friends of liberty, a crisis had arrived which was to decide whether the American experiment was to be a blessing to the world, or to blast forever the hopes which the republican cause had inspired; and what is not to be overlooked, the disposition to give to a new system all the vigour consistent with Republican principles was not a little stimulated by a backwardness in some quarters towards a Convention for the purpose, which was ascribed to a secret dislike to popular Government, and a hope that delay would bring it more into disgrace, and pave the way for a form of Government more congenial with monarchical or aristocratical predilections.

This view of the crisis made it natural for many in the Convention to lean more than was, perhaps, in strictness, warranted by a proper distinction between causes temporary, as some of them doubtless were, and causes permanently inherent in popular frames of Government.  It is true, also, as has been sometimes suggested, that in the course of discussions in the Convention, where so much depended on compromise, the patrons of different opinions often set out on negotiating grounds more remote from each other than the real opinions of either were from the point at which they finally met.

For myself, having, from the first moment of maturing a political opinion down to the present one, never ceased to be a votary of the principle of self-government, I was among those most anxious to rescue it from the danger which seemed to threaten it; and with that view, was willing to give to a Government resting on that foundation as much energy as would insure the requisite stability and efficacy.  It is possible, that in some instances this consideration may have been allowed a weight greater than subsequent reflection within the Convention, or the actual operation of the Government, would sanction.  It may be remarked, also, that it sometimes happened, that opinions as to a particular modification or a particular power of the Government had a conditional reference to others, which, combined therewith, would vary the character of the whole.

But whatever might have been the opinions entertained in forming the Constitution, it was the duty of all to support it in its true meaning, as understood by the nation at the time of its ratification.  No one felt this obligation more than I have done; and there are few, perhaps, whose ultimate and deliberate opinions on the merits of the Constitution accord in a greater degree with that obligation.

The departures from the true and fair construction of the instrument have always given me pain, and always experienced my opposition when called for.  The attempts in the outset of the Government to defeat those safe, if not necessary, and those politic, if not obligatory, amendments [the Bill of Rights] introduced in conformity to the known desires of the body of the people, and to the pledges of many, particularly myself, when vindicating and recommending the Constitution, was an occurrence not a little ominous.  And it was soon followed by indications of political tenets, and by rules, or rather the abandonment of all rules, of expounding it, which were capable of transforming it into something very different from its legitimate character as the offspring of the national will.  I wish I could say that constructive innovations had altogether ceased.

Whether the Constitution, as it has divided the powers of Government between the States in their separate and in their united capacities, tends to an oppressive aggrandizement of the General Government, or to an anarchical independence of the State Governments, is a problem which time alone can absolutely determine.  It is much to be wished that the division as it exists, or may be made with the regular sanction of the people, may effectually guard against both extremes; for it cannot be doubted that an accumulation of all power in the General Government would as naturally lead to a dangerous accumulation in the Executive hands, as that the resumption of all power by the several States would end in the calamities incident to contiguous and rival Sovereigns; to say nothing of its effect in lessening the security for sound principles of administration within each of them.

There have been epochs when the General Government was evidently drawing a disproportion of power into its vortex.  There have been others, when States threatened to do the same.  At the present moment, it would seem that both are aiming at encroachments, each on the other.  One thing, however, is certain: that in the present condition and temper of the community, the General Government cannot long succeed in encroachments contravening the will of a majority of the States and of the people.  Its responsibility to these would, as was proved on a conspicuous occasion, quickly arrest its career.  If, at the same time, the powers of the General Government be carried to unconstitutional lengths, it will be the result of a majority of the States and of the people, actuated by some impetuous feeling, or some real or supposed interest, overruling the minority, and not of successful attempts by the General Government to overpower both.

In estimating the greater tendency in the political system of the Union to a subversion, or to a separation of the States composing it, there are some considerations to be taken into the account which have been little adverted to by the most oracular authors on the science of Government, and which are but imperfectly developed, as yet, by our own experience.  Such are the size of the States, the number of them, the territorial extent of the whole, and the degree of external danger.  Each of these, I am persuaded, will be found to contribute its impulse to the practical direction which our great political machine is to take.
Excerpted from letter to John G. Jackson, Dec. 27, 1821 (Madison 1865, III, pages 243-247)

This document was transcribed into HTML format by the James Madison University from Madison, James. 1865. Letters and Other Writings of James Madison, Published by order of Congress. 4 volumes. Edited by Philip R. Fendall. Philadelphia: Lippincott.