To the People of the State of New York:
HAVING shown that no one of the powers transferred to the federal government is unnecessary or
improper, the next question to be considered is, whether the whole mass of them will be dangerous to the
portion of authority left in the several States.
The adversaries to the plan of the convention, instead of considering in the first place what degree of
power was absolutely necessary for the purposes of the federal government, have exhausted themselves in
a secondary inquiry into the possible consequences of the proposed degree of power to the governments
of the particular States. But if the Union, as has been shown, be essential to the security of the people of
America against foreign danger....
To the People of the State of New York:
HAVING reviewed the general form of the proposed government and the general mass of power allotted
to it, I proceed to examine the particular structure of this government, and the distribution of this mass of
power among its constituent parts.
One of the principal objections inculcated by the more respectable adversaries to the Constitution, is its
supposed violation of the political maxim, that the legislative, executive, and judiciary departments ought
to be separate and distinct. In the structure of the federal government, no regard, it is said, seems to have
been paid to this essential precaution in favor of liberty. The several departments of power are distributed
and blended in such a manner as at once to destroy all symmetry and beauty of form, and to expose some
of the essential parts of the edifice....
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To the People of the State of New York
RESUMING the subject of the last paper, I proceed to inquire whether the federal government or the
State governments will have the advantage with regard to the predilection and support of the people.
Notwithstanding the different modes in which they are appointed, we must consider both of them as
substantially dependent on the great body of the citizens of the United States. I assume this position here
as it respects the first, reserving the proofs for another place. The federal and State governments are in
fact but different agents and trustees of the people, constituted with different powers, and designed for
different purposes. The adversaries of the Constitution seem to have lost sight of the people altogether in
their reasonings on this subject; and to have viewed these different establishments, not only as mutual
rivals and enemies, but as uncontrolled by any common superior in their efforts to usurp the authorities of
each other. These gentlemen must here be reminded of their error....
To the People of the State of New York:
IT WAS shown in the last paper that the political apothegm there examined does not require that the
legislative, executive, and judiciary departments should be wholly unconnected with each other. I shall
undertake, in the next place, to show that unless these departments be so far connected and blended as to
give to each a constitutional control over the others, the degree of separation which the maxim requires,
as essential to a free government, can never in practice be duly maintained.
It is agreed on all sides, that the powers properly belonging to one of the departments ought not to be
directly and completely administered by either of the other departments. It is equally evident, that none of
them ought to possess, directly or indirectly, an overruling influence over the others, in the administration
of their respective powers....
 
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