The Debate on the Constitution: Federalist and Antifederalist Speeches, Articles, and Letters During the Struggle over Ratification, 2 vols.

The ratification of the United States Constitution was the result of a remarkably civil result, the occasion for grand argument and great politics. Interests and pragmatic calculations, as always, shaped much of the conflict - most obviously, in the framers' accommodation with slavery, that violation of natural rights - but the participants also knew they were playing on a bigger stage, arguing over futures and redefining the very terms of political speech. They saw, with tolerable clarity, the possibilities and limitations of public life under the Constitution and their disputes shadow our present discontents.

Both the Federalist champions of the Constitution and their Antifederalist opponents saw themselves as advocates of republican, broadly democratic government. But where Federalists considered that the requirements of republican consent are satisfied if citizens have a vote, Antifederalists insisted that they have a voice. The Antifederalists began with the proposition that republican liberty requires a public freely obedient to the laws it makes: self-government includes the government of the self, the subordination of private interests and inclinations to the rule of law and the common good. Since the stronger the assent, the more perfect the republicanism of a regime, republican policy aims "to arm persuasion on every side and to render force as little necessary as possible," a goal which points toward a politics rooted in small, deliberative communities. The larger and more diverse a regime, Antifederalists reasoned, the more distant and impersonal its government, the more fractional the say enjoyed by any citizen, and the feebler the sense of civic obligation or public spirit. Accordingly, Antifederalists predicted that government under the Constitution would depend more and more on enforcement and on the essentially covert politics of administration, part of a system "too mysterious for you to understand and observe."

By contrast, the more familiar case of the Federalists maintained that republics - like all political societies - exist to protect the liberty and enhance the power of individuals. Consequently, Federalists held that a large state is to be preferred for its greater diversity and resources, and because it frees individuals from small political societies - "nurseries of unceasing discord," at best, and at worst, subject to the tyranny of some local faction. Moreover, as Madison observed, the fragmentary influence of any single group in a large republic means that majorities must be the creations of coalition and compromise. Reducing the possibility of oppression, the mediocrity of such politics encourages limited and short-term political commitments, and develops citizens who are "circumspect," the wary guardians of their private rights and interests.

Looking at the big picture, both sides were on target. So here we are, wrestling with the old dilemmas.

Some collections of Antifederalist writings have recently become generally available, but for the most part, Americans have heard the ratification controversy only through The Federalist, if at all. The Debate on the Constitution, an extensive collection of primary sources selected by Bernard Bailyn, offers a more full-throated version of the argument, including important supporters of the Constitution - like James Wilson, John Stevens ("Americanus"), and Noah Webster - who are often ignored in favor of The Federalist, as well as a wide range of voices on the Antifederalist side. The announced aim of The Debate on the Constitution is to present the Founders in an "embattled journalistic context," up to their armpits in praxis, so while the order of the selections is basically chronological, Bailyn often departs from that arrangement to sharpen the exchanges or to clarify a position. All in all, these volumes capture a good deal of the clamor and confusion of politics, and the fervor of a contest for titanic stakes.

Still, there is a caveat: the selections from The Federalist are presented in a strictly chronological relation to other writings, sometimes in a way that almost willfully fragments their argument. For example, The Federalist No. 9, printed November 21, 1787, emphasizes the Union as a barrier against "faction and insurrection," and is obviously closely tied to Madison's well-known treatment of the problem of faction in The Federalist No. 10, which appeared a day later, on November 22. In The Debate on the Constitution, however, the two essays are separated from each other by George Mason's "Objections," (grouped together with a long list of replies) and by an unrelated essay of "Cato," both of which were also printed on November 22. Even in a rigidly chronological scheme, these selections could have been printed after The Federalist No. 10, since all three essays appeared on the same day. The effect of Bailyn's ordering is to separate The Federalist No. 9 from its sequel by fifty-nine pages. (And by a similar contrivance, sixty-six pages intervene between The Federalist No. 62, on the Senate, and the crucial continuation of the argument in No. 63.)

Elsewhere, in Faces of the Revolution, Bailyn has argued that The Federalist was less important in the politics of ratification than Americans have been taught to believe. This is a sensible corrective, but Bailyn's editing seems a little too eager to reinforce the point, since even on a generous reading, the text of The Federalist is in danger of being lost amid so much context. Bailyn's position tempts him to slight the fact that The Federalist towers and endures, as George Washington predicted and hoped it would, because, while a tract for the times, it was also self-consciously something more. Like the best statements on both sides of the ratification debate, The Federalist speaks to the theoretical foundations of the laws, telling us something fundamental about ourselves. It is the virtue of The Debate on the Constitution, other quarrels aside, that it provides us with so much of that indispensable civic curriculum.