isfactory argument be framed to show that
they are chargeable with such an excess. If it be true, as has been
insinuated by some of the writers on the other side, that the difficulty
arises from the nature of the thing, and that the extent of the country
will not permit us to form a government in which such ample powers can
safely be reposed, it would prove that we ought to contract our views,
and resort to the expedient of separate confederacies, which will move
within more practicable spheres. For the absurdity must continually
stare us in the face of confiding to a government the direction of the
most essential national interests, without daring to trust it to the
authorities which are indispensable to their proper and efficient
management. Let us not attempt to reconcile contradictions, but firmly
embrace a rational alternative.

I trust, however, that the impracticability of one general system cannot
be shown. I am greatly mistaken, if any thing of weight has yet been
advanced of this tendency; and I flatter myself, that the observations
which have been made in the course of these papers have served to place
the reverse of that position in as clear a light as any matter still
in the womb of time and experience can be susceptible of. This, at all
events, must be evident, that the very difficulty itself, drawn from
the extent of the country, is the strongest argument in favor of an
energetic government; for any other can certainly never preserve the
Union of so large an empire. If we embrace the tenets of those who
oppose the adoption of the proposed Constitution, as the standard of
our political creed, we cannot fail to verify the gloomy doctrines
which predict the impracticability of a national system pervading entire
limits of the present Confederacy.

PUBLIUS

FEDERALIST No. 24

The Powers Necessary to the Common Defense Further Considered

For the Independent Journal. Wednesday, December 19, 1787

HAMILTON

To the People of the State of New York:

TO THE powers proposed to be conferred upon the federal government, in
respect to the creation and direction of the national forces, I have
met with but one specific objection, which, if I understand it right, is
this, that proper provision has not been made against the existence
of standing armies in time of peace; an objection which, I shall now
endeavor to show, rests on weak and unsubstantial foundations.

It has indeed been brought forward in the