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.









THE FEDERALIST.