Of the three reasons for attending to The Federalist, it is this last, the tract’s underlying viewpoint on government per se, that is the focus of the present inquiry. Previous analyses of the argument of Publius have tended to emphasize its significance as an arbiter of constitutional questions, but that aspect is not the central concern of the following pages. It is here presumed that the general political outlook of the great treatise constitutes the work’s best claim to the attention of posterity.
Constitutional disputes in the United States will arise only occasionally, and then not necessarily in relation to the most critical issues. But, because Hamilton, Madison, and Jay based their case largely on what they plausibly asserted to be enduring elements of political behavior, their fundamental notions of government can frequently be applied to the problems of the modern world. Indeed, if The Federalist is really to be ranked as one of the political classics of Western civilization, this clearly cannot be merely on the basis of its role as an adjunct to the particular charter of a single community, but must result from the light it throws on the essential nature of politics everywhere.
Before we can follow the advice of Publius, however, we must know what it is. And, as noted, there exists a remarkable lack of consensus on this point.