Federalist Paper No. 5

Jay recaps the general argument of the first set of Federalist Papers in paragraph two: ‘that weakness and divisions at home [will] invite dangers from abroad; and that nothing [will] tend more to secure us from them than union, strength, and good government within ourselves.’ In this last in the series on the Dangers from Foreign Force and Influences, Jay invokes the union of England and Scotland (part of what makes it the United Kingdom), the example with which the former colonists were ‘in general the best acquainted.’ He begins with Queen Anne’s appeal to the Scottish Parliament in 1706 to accept the proposed union. The predicted benefits:

An entire and perfect union… will secure… religion, liberty, and property; remove the animosities amongst [Scottish clans and regions], and the jealousies and differences betwixt [the] two kingdoms. It must increase… strength, riches, and trade; and by this union the whole island, being joined… will be ENABLED TO RESIST ALL ITS ENEMIES.

In contrast, Jay reminds the reader of the island’s history before the union: divided into three nations, ‘almost constantly embroiled in quarrels and wars with one another.’ Despite their shared interests and common cause, at least with respect to the ‘continent’- Europe-, instead, mutual jealousies, often nursed by their very enemies in Europe, kept the island divided.

He then returns specifically to America. He asks directly: if America is divided into three or four different nations (confederations; we’ve already tried and failed at 13 individual states), won’t the result be the same as in Britain? Although he couches it in terms of ‘envy’, what Jay is really describing in the fifth through seventh paragraphs is the possibility of unstable balance of power, resulting in an arms or trade race, but importantly, ‘formidable only to each other.’ Not exactly a future worthy of a country that defeated Britain.

Jay also addresses the possible counter-argument, that the confederacies will form defense unions. He challenges the reader to name such a time when the independent states combined in an alliance and united their forces against a foreign enemy. This line actually confuses me. Wasn’t that what they did with the Revolutionary War? Perhaps Britain wasn’t a foreign enemy, because it was the colonizing power?*

He also raises the point that should the confederacies go to war with each other, they may be tempted to reach out to foreign nations for assistance, but these powers, once received, could then turn on their American allies to conquer, as the Romans did millennia before.

Jay debates the subject of the Dangers from Foreign Force and Influence through four consecutive Papers. His work sometimes tiptoes this side of specious, being more convinced of his own rightness than in presenting a fully fledged argument, but, especially in the latter Papers, with their wealth of historical examples, he does present a strong argument.

This is also the last of Jay until Paper No. 64, when he returns to discuss the Powers of the Senate. Next, we’ll explore the problem of Dissensions between the States, and reintroduce Alexander Hamilton.

* A friend offers this interpretation: "I think he is asking, rhetorically, when Britain and Spain, which had formerly been divided (Britain consisted of Scotland, Wales, etc., and before that England was just the name of land mass that contained the kingdoms of Mercia, Wessex, Northumbria, etc., and before it was united Spain contained Aragon and other kingdoms) opted to form the loose kind of confederation that anti-Federalists preferred. The answer, he implies, is that they did not. They formed strong unions that allowed them to repel foreign invaders."

So, basically a restatement of his previous points, with more historical evidence.