Federalist No. 57 is an essay by James Madison, the fifty-seventh of The Federalist Papers. It was first published by The New York Packet on February 19, 1788, under the pseudonymPublius, the name under which all The Federalist papers were published. It is titled "The Alleged Tendency of the New Plan to Elevate the Few at the Expense of the Many".
The central criticism Madison refutes in the essay is that the House of Representatives will comprise legislators having the "least sympathy with the mass of the people," and that they will be likely to coalesce in the "ambitious sacrifice of the many to the aggrandizement of the few."
Reassuring the reader first of the general properties of republics which prevent tyranny, namely elections and term limits for people in a public trust, he moves more specifically to the safeguards present in the United States Constitution for that purpose. Drawing on the meritocratic benefits of the popular mode of election for representatives in the House, Madison guarantees the election of "men who possess most wisdom to discern, and ... pursue, the common good of the society."
So long as the representatives are elected by the "free suffrages of their fellow-citizens," Madison stipulates, there are five reasons they will remain faithful to their constituents: first, the people chose these men to uphold their engagements, so the representatives have an obligation to stand by their words. Second, the representatives, sensing a mark of honor and gratitude, feel at least some affection to these constituents. Third, selfish motives of human nature bind the representative to his constituents because the delegates hope to seek advancement from his followers rather than the government. Fourth, frequent elections remind the representatives that they are dependent on the constituents for their loyalty and support. Therefore, the representatives are compelled to remain faithful to their constituents. Finally, the laws created by the legislators will apply to all members of society, including the legislators themselves.
Lastly, Madison addresses the criticism that departing from the limited number of a few hundred electors in the present state constitutions to thousands of electors in a federal system is bound to elect untrustworthy representatives. To the contrary, Madison reasons, hearkening back to Federalist No. 10, a greater number of electors is more likely to elect a "fit representative" than a small one.
Moreover, he questions the practicality of a small pool of electors logistically, and ends citing examples in contemporary state constitutions of large bodies of voters which nevertheless elect fit representatives. For example, the mode of senatorial election in New Hampshire, whose "districts ... are nearly as large as will be necessary for her representatives in the [proposed] Congress," and those of Massachusetts, whose districts are even larger than those which the new Constitution would demand.
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The Federalist Papers is a collection of 85 articles and essays written by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay under the collective pseudonym "Publius" to promote the ratification of the Constitution of the United States. The collection was commonly known as The Federalist until the name The Federalist Papers emerged in the twentieth century.
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The United States elections of 1788–1789 were the first federal elections in the United States following the ratification of the United States Constitution in 1788. In the elections, George Washington was elected as the first president and the members of the 1st United States Congress were selected.
Brutus was the pen name of an Anti-Federalist in a series of essays designed to encourage New Yorkers to reject the proposed Constitution. His essays are considered among the best of those written to oppose adoption of the proposed constitution. They paralleled and confronted The Federalist Papers during the ratification fight over the Constitution. Brutus published 16 essays in the New-York Journal, and Weekly Register, beginning shortly before The Federalist started appearing in New York newspapers. The essays were widely reprinted and commented on throughout the American states. All 16 of the essays were addressed to "the Citizens of the State of New York."
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