FEDERALIST No. 31



The Same Subject Continued

(Concerning the General Power of Taxation)

From the New York Packet.

Tuesday, January 1, 1788.



HAMILTON



To the People of the State of New York:



IN DISQUISITIONS of every kind, there are certain primary truths, or

first principles, upon which all subsequent reasonings must depend.

These contain an internal evidence which, antecedent to all reflection

or combination, commands the assent of the mind. Where it produces not

this effect, it must proceed either from some defect or disorder in the

organs of perception, or from the influence of some strong interest, or

passion, or prejudice. Of this nature are the maxims in geometry, that

"the whole is greater than its part; things equal to the same are equal

to one another; two straight lines cannot enclose a space; and all right

angles are equal to each other." Of the same nature are these other

maxims in ethics and politics, that there cannot be an effect without a

cause; that the means ought to be proportioned to the end; that every

power ought to be commensurate with its object; that there ought to be

no limitation of a power destined to effect a purpose which is itself

incapable of limitation. And there are other truths in the two latter

sciences which, if they cannot pretend to rank in the class of axioms,

are yet such direct inferences from them, and so obvious in themselves,

and so agreeable to the natural and unsophisticated dictates of

common-sense, that they challenge the assent of a sound and unbiased

mind, with a degree of force and conviction almost equally irresistible.



The objects of geometrical inquiry are so entirely abstracted from those

pursuits which stir up and put in motion the unruly passions of the

human heart, that mankind, without difficulty, adopt not only the more

simple theorems of the science, but even those abstruse paradoxes which,

however they may appear susceptible of demonstration, are at variance

with the natural conceptions which the mind, without the aid of

philosophy, would be led to entertain upon the subject. The INFINITE

DIVISIBILITY of matter, or, in other words, the INFINITE divisibility of

a FINITE thing, extending even to the minutest atom, is a point agreed

among geometricians, though not less incomprehensible to common-sense

than any of those mysteries in religion, against which the batteries of

infidelity have been so industriously leveled.



But in the sciences of morals and politics, men are found far less

tractable. To a certain degree, it is right and useful that this should

be the case. Caution and investigation are a necessary armor against

error and imposition. But this untractableness may be carried too far,

and may degenerate into obstinacy, perverseness, or disingenuity. Though

it cannot be pretended that the principles of moral and political

knowledge have, in general, the same degree of certainty with those of

the mathematics, yet they have much better claims in this respect than,

to judge from the conduct of men in particular situations, we should be

disposed to allow them. The obscurity is much oftener in the passions

and prejudices of the reasoner than in the subject. Men, upon too many

occasions, do not give their own understandings fair play; but, yielding

to some untoward bias, they entangle themselves in words and confound

themselves in subtleties.



How else could it happen (if we admit the objectors to be sincere in

their opposition), that positions so clear as those which manifest the

necessity of a general power of taxation in the government of the Union,

should have to encounter any adversaries among men of discernment?

Though these positions have been elsewhere fully stated, they will

perhaps not be improperly recapitulated in this place, as introductory

to an examination of what may have been offered by way of objection to

them. They are in substance as follows:



A government ought to contain in itself every power requisite to the

full accomplishment of the objects committed to its care, and to the

complete execution of the trusts for which it is responsible, free from

every other control but a regard to the public good and to the sense of

the people.



As the duties of superintending the national defense and of securing the

public peace against foreign or domestic violence involve a provision

for casualties and dangers to which no possible limits can be assigned,

the power of making that provision ought to know no other bounds than

the exigencies of the nation and the resources of the community.



As revenue is the essential engine by which the means of answering the

national exigencies must be procured, the power of procuring that

article in its full extent must necessarily be comprehended in that of

providing for those exigencies.



As theory and practice conspire to prove that the power of procuring

revenue is unavailing when exercised over the States in their collective

capacities, the federal government must of necessity be invested with an

unqualified power of taxation in the ordinary modes.



Did not experience evince the contrary, it would be natural to conclude

that the propriety of a general power of taxation in the national

government might safely be permitted to rest on the evidence of these

propositions, unassisted by any additional arguments or illustrations.

But we find, in fact, that the antagonists of the proposed Constitution,

so far from acquiescing in their justness or truth, seem to make their

principal and most zealous effort against this part of the plan. It may

therefore be satisfactory to analyze the arguments with which they

combat it.



Those of them which have been most labored with that view, seem in

substance to amount to this: "It is not true, because the exigencies of

the Union may not be susceptible of limitation, that its power of laying

taxes ought to be unconfined. Revenue is as requisite to the purposes of

the local administrations as to those of the Union; and the former are

at least of equal importance with the latter to the happiness of the

people. It is, therefore, as necessary that the State governments should

be able to command the means of supplying their wants, as that the

national government should possess the like faculty in respect to the

wants of the Union. But an indefinite power of taxation in the LATTER

might, and probably would in time, deprive the FORMER of the means of

providing for their own necessities; and would subject them entirely to

the mercy of the national legislature. As the laws of the Union are to

become the supreme law of the land, as it is to have power to pass all

laws that may be NECESSARY for carrying into execution the authorities

with which it is proposed to vest it, the national government might at

any time abolish the taxes imposed for State objects upon the pretense

of an interference with its own. It might allege a necessity of doing

this in order to give efficacy to the national revenues. And thus all

the resources of taxation might by degrees become the subjects of

federal monopoly, to the entire exclusion and destruction of the State

governments."



This mode of reasoning appears sometimes to turn upon the supposition of

usurpation in the national government; at other times it seems to be

designed only as a deduction from the constitutional operation of its

intended powers. It is only in the latter light that it can be admitted

to have any pretensions to fairness. The moment we launch into

conjectures about the usurpations of the federal government, we get into

an unfathomable abyss, and fairly put ourselves out of the reach of all

reasoning. Imagination may range at pleasure till it gets bewildered

amidst the labyrinths of an enchanted castle, and knows not on which

side to turn to extricate itself from the perplexities into which it has

so rashly adventured. Whatever may be the limits or modifications of the

powers of the Union, it is easy to imagine an endless train of possible

dangers; and by indulging an excess of jealousy and timidity, we may

bring ourselves to a state of absolute scepticism and irresolution. I

repeat here what I have observed in substance in another place, that all

observations founded upon the danger of usurpation ought to be referred

to the composition and structure of the government, not to the nature or

extent of its powers. The State governments, by their original

constitutions, are invested with complete sovereignty. In what does our

security consist against usurpation from that quarter? Doubtless in the

manner of their formation, and in a due dependence of those who are to

administer them upon the people. If the proposed construction of the

federal government be found, upon an impartial examination of it, to be

such as to afford, to a proper extent, the same species of security, all

apprehensions on the score of usurpation ought to be discarded.



It should not be forgotten that a disposition in the State governments

to encroach upon the rights of the Union is quite as probable as a

disposition in the Union to encroach upon the rights of the State

governments. What side would be likely to prevail in such a conflict,

must depend on the means which the contending parties could employ

toward insuring success. As in republics strength is always on the side

of the people, and as there are weighty reasons to induce a belief that

the State governments will commonly possess most influence over them,

the natural conclusion is that such contests will be most apt to end to

the disadvantage of the Union; and that there is greater probability of

encroachments by the members upon the federal head, than by the federal

head upon the members. But it is evident that all conjectures of this

kind must be extremely vague and fallible: and that it is by far the

safest course to lay them altogether aside, and to confine our attention

wholly to the nature and extent of the powers as they are delineated in

the Constitution. Every thing beyond this must be left to the prudence

and firmness of the people; who, as they will hold the scales in their

own hands, it is to be hoped, will always take care to preserve the

constitutional equilibrium between the general and the State

governments. Upon this ground, which is evidently the true one, it will

not be difficult to obviate the objections which have been made to an

indefinite power of taxation in the United States.



PUBLIUS