The Essays of Brutus

The Essays of Brutus

         In the late 1780’s the administrators of the United States, through a Constitutional Convention, decided to reform the structure of government in order to create an equal division of power and a more lasting stability. The resulting constitutional document provided the blueprint for a radically new kind of government based on the federalist principles of separation of powers between a relatively stronger central government and the numerous state governments. A man known only by the pseudonym of “Brutus” - through a collection of essays - sought to persuade the citizens of New York of the dangers of this new constitution by illuminating the inherent limitations of national representation, along with the hazards of allowing too much power into the hands of too few men.

In his first essay, Brutus lays out the backdrop of the Constitutional Convention: the confederacy which united the “several states” had proven too weak to address the demands of the young and growing nation. He claims that “[p]erhaps this country never saw so critical a period in their political concerns. We have felt the feebleness of the ties which these Unites-States are held together, and the want of sufficient energy in our present confederation, to manage, in some instances, our general concerns.” (142) In this admission, Brutus does not dispute the essentially broken state of the union. Unlike the Federalists, however, he does not see the possible redemption of the nation in the then-proposed Constitution, but rather a more real threat: the creation of an aristocratic oligarchy masquerading as a republican democracy. In his third essay he laments what he sees as the inevitable death of popular rule at the hands of “the well born, and highest orders in life”. (151) Acutely aware of the propensities of men to align themselves with the already powerful he foresees that the “natural aristocracy will be elected.” (150-151)

His concerns over the specter of “influence” do not stop at the electoral level. Brutus goes to great pains to address what he sees as the genuine menace of the corruption of the legislature. In what might be his most scathing indictment of the notion of a national congress, he alleges that the “legislature will not only be an imperfect representation, but there will be no security in so small a body, against bribery, and corruption… a majority of [legislators]… may pass any law – so that twenty-five men, will have all the power to give away all the property of the citizens of these states – what security therefore can there be for the people, were their liberties and property are at the disposal of so few men? It will literally be a government in the hands of the few to oppress and plunder the many.” (151) Brutus places no faith in the integrity of men with power, rather reminding his readers that this is a lesson learned by the “unerring experience of the ages, that every man, and every body of men, invested with power are ever disposed to increase it and to acquire superiority over everything that stands in their way.” (145) Not relenting in his campaign to sow anxiety of an imminent return to aristocracy and corruption, he does not stop merely with the men comprising the body of representatives but extrapolates his assumptions of the nature of mankind onto the entire federal government as a whole. In a string of arguments Brutus makes clear that Americans cannot trust a strong Federal government to respect the rights of the states. He claims that the Constitution, through its delegation of powers in regards to taxation and revenue generation, puts the national government at a serious advantage at the expense of the states. The fact that the Constitution prohibits the states from collecting tariffs without the consent of the Federal government makes sure that “the only mean therefore left, for any state to support its government and discharge its debts, is by direct taxation; and… when the foederal government begins to exercise the right of taxation in all its parts, the legislatures of the several states will find it impossible to raise monies to support their governments. Without money they cannot be supported, and they must dwindle away, and, as before observed, their powers absorbed in that of the general government.” (144) This, he asserts, is the carefully crafted plan of the Federalists. In addition to depriving the states any way of supporting themselves, he claims the Constitution gives the national government the right to create “all laws, proper and necessary, for carrying all these into execution; and they may so exercise this power as entirely to annihilate all the state governments… for it will be found that the power retained by individual states, small as it is, will be a clog upon the wheels of the [national] government”. (145) 

While many might accuse Brutus of being a cynic or a misanthropist, he does not limit his arguments to that of the innate depravity of men with power. In, perhaps, a more practical matter he seems to say that the larger of the problems is not with corruption so much as it is simply with execution. The nation, according to Brutus, is too large and too diverse for any national body to effectively represent the constituency. “Now, in a large extended country it is impossible to have a representation… without having it so numerous and unwieldy, as to be subject in a measure to the inconveniency of the democratic government.” (146) On the one hand, he notes, a representative body must be small in order to proceed quickly and nimbly through the people’s business. On the other, however, a small representative body for a nation so large and diverse in interests would not be representative at all. Too much of the population’s needs would go unheard and unheeded simply because of the lack of individuals to cater to them. Connecting this argument back to his warning of corruption, Brutus offers up the example of his name’s sake in prompting us to remember that history “furnishes no example of a free republic, any thing like the extent of the United States. The Grecian republics were of small extent; so also was that of the Romans. Both of these, it is true, in process of time, extended their conquests over large territories of country; and the consequence was, that their governments were changed from that of free governments to those of the most tyrannical that ever existed in the world.” (146) In this observation Brutus offers up a chilling reminder of the demise of past republics warning that the new American government is not so enlightened as to abstain from the same path.

What’s more, he observes, that there is incredible diversity in the states. That diversity extends so far that some of the states have laws and customs that work in opposite of each other. Under the Constitution, he sees, the diversity and heterogeneous aspects of the states will be forced to conform to a single, national identity – at the expense of the minority. Since “each [state] would be in favor of its own interests and customs”, there would be built in conflicts between the states which the Federal government would have to resolve. (147) That resolution would likely, according to Brutus, favor the more populous representation in the national legislature and oppress the rights of the minority. This argument ties in to his next point of the argument: how can a national government execute its laws over a dissenting or nonconformist state except by force of arms? This, to Brutus, seems to be a great sin and in great opposition to the creation of a free country. “[S]tanding armies… have always proved the destruction of liberty, and [are] abhorrent to the spirit of a free republic… A free republic will never keep a standing army to execute its laws.” (147) In the Constitutional system Brutus foresees a number of inherent conflicts between the states that, according to him, could only be resolved and executed in minority states by force of arms. His argument suggests that this is the same tyranny that the colonies all just escaped.

Brutus’ first and third essays on federalism stand as a sobering admonition against the creation of a strong central government with sweeping administrative powers. While he freely admitted that the citizens of the United States were at the crest of a possible “golden age”, he alerted the people of New York that they were dangerously close to the “subversion of liberty”. If this new government establishes “a despotism, or, what is worse, a tyrannic aristocracy” then “this only remaining asylum for liberty will be shut up, and posterity will execrate your memory.” (142)