The Story of 'The Federalist': How Hamilton and Madison Reconceived America.

• Author: Denning, Brannon P.
• Position: Book review

THE STORY OF THE FEDERALIST: HOW HAMILTON AND MADISON RECONCEIVED AMERICA. By Dan T. Coenen. (1) Twelve Tables Press. 2007. Pp. xi + 406. $28.95 paper.

The eighty-five essays written by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison (with an assist from John Jay)--known collectively as The Federalist--have attained canonical status among the documents of the Founding Era. And yet for all of the ink spilled recently over the Founders and the Framing Era, little recent attention has been given to The Federalist itself. One of the most famous popular commentaries on The Federalist, Garry Wills's Explaining America, is over twenty-five years old. Other treatments are either older or geared towards the specialist. (3) That gap in the literature makes Dan Coenen's The Story of The Federalist particularly timely. (4)

Contrary to what one might think by reading the title, Coenen has not simply written a narrative telling the story of how Madison, Hamilton, and Jay came to write the papers, or the role that the papers played (or didn't play) in the Constitution's eventual ratification. That story is included, but sandwiched in between Coenen's account of the essays' writing and publication is a rich and accessible introduction to The Federalist's political thought.

Foremost among the book's strengths is Coenen's deft organization. A lover of mercy, Coenen does not frog march readers through each of The Federalist's eighty-five essays. Instead, he organizes his book into five parts: Parts I and V tell the story of The Federalist's origin and execution, along with its role in the ratification of the Constitution and its lasting impact on constitutional law and American political thought. Sandwiched in between, however, is an analysis of the work itself. Part II explains the rhetorical style of the essays. (5) Part III describes The Federalist's case for change, which was not as obvious to all as it was to the Constitution's prominent backers. Part IV then takes up The Federalist's brief for the new government the Constitution had created.

I.

In the Preface, Coenen offers an explanation for the lack of interest in The Federalist relative to the enormous interest shown over the last ten years in the Framers themselves and in Framing-era history. "There are just too many obstacles," he writes, "the coverage of technical topics, an unfamiliar literary style, allusions to then-current but now-forgotten events, the length of the work, its density and detail" (p. ix). His intention, then, is to situate the papers in context and tell their story, as well as "lay out the central messages of The Federalist in a readable fashion" and "consider how the papers matter today" (p. x). His hope, he writes, is "to pique interest in the papers," and to encourage people to read the original (p. xi).

He begins with the origins of the essays. Troubled by the prospects for the Constitution's ratification in New York, Hamilton sought a seat at New York's ratifying convention, and then embarked on a writing campaign to produce a comprehensive set of essays favoring ratification. After several prominent persons turned him down, James Madison, in town for a session of the Confederation Congress, agreed to collaborate, as did John Jay (p. 5). Illness forced Jay to bow out, leaving this unlikely pair--the volatile, confident Hamilton and the shy, bookish Madison--with the laboring oar. And labor they did. Hamilton's Federalist No. 1 appeared on October 27, 1787, with Jay's Federalist No. 2 appearing three days later; Madison's first, Federalist No. 10, appeared a little less than a month after Hamilton's on November 22, 1787 (pp. 8, 13). The last of the eighty-five essays appeared an astonishing seven months after the first, on May 28, 1788. (6) "IT]he pace of production was breathtaking. Altogether, the essayists pumped out over 190,000 words, more than three essays per week, and almost 2,300 words per essay" (p. 16). Initially published in one of several local papers, "[e]ach of the essays, after its initial printing, appeared in at least one additional newspaper; many appeared in all four," though publication outside New York was "limited" (pp. 17, 18).

Hamilton and Madison had little time to consult with one another on each other's essays (p. 15), and thus Coenen notes that it is "not surprising that some historians have reported the discovery of internal dissonance, if not outright schizophrenia, in the pages of The Federalist" (p. 21). Others have stressed how similar the papers are, and how consistent over the course of the essays. Coenen stresses the consistency of "Publius" (7) rather than emphasizing any "schizophrenia" (p. 22). Moreover, he follows many historians in attributing authorship of the "disputed" papers to Madison instead of Hamilton (p. 22). Hamilton and Madison were to go their separate ways politically after their historic collaboration, but the quantity and quality of the essays produced continue to command our respect. (8)

II.

Having identified an "unfamiliar literary style" (p. ix) as one of the barriers to contemporary appreciation of The Federalist, it is fitting that Coenen begins his discussion with The Federalist's rhetorical style. The papers, he writes, "embodied, first and foremost, a vigorous effort at persuasion aimed at a particular audience situated in a particular time and place. That effort centered on reasoned argument" as well as "appeals to emotion and credibility" (p. 27). They were, at bottom, "campaign literature" (p. 28) and addressed the pressing issues of the day: the weakness of the Confederation government, interstate trade conflicts, and the specter of violence in the form of Shay's Rebellion (p. 29). The essays "did not draw [their] greatest strength from appeals to lofty abstractions" but rather from appeals to the circumstances of the time and the good sense of the authors' audience (p. 28).

In fact, Hamilton and Madison were not above a little flattery. They argued that the virtuous and generous citizens of all the United States would, when the facts were before them, see how the new government was essential to the future success of the country. For while the particular problems of New York were discussed (pp. 30-31), Publius's essays were not entirely parochial--appealing to planters, manufacturers, merchants, urban and rural dwellers alike (p. 30). Further, they invited readers to draw lessons from history, both ancient and modern, in support of their project (pp. 32-37). They often portrayed opponents of ratification (whom they shrewdly characterized as "antifederalists") as succumbing to undue suspicion, even paranoia (p. 39). By contrast, "the voice of The Federalist took on the tone of a trustworthy and omniscient neutral, marked by a rhetorical detachment calculated to contribute to the credibility of the overall project" (p. 42). This neutrality was bolstered by the authors' willingness to discuss the Constitution's shortcomings (9) and concede that some of the line-drawing involved in its provisions was arbitrary (pp. 44-45). But, the essays often pointed out, the document was the product of politically necessary compromises (p. 43). Both strategies "buil[t] a bridge of candor to their readers designed to reinforce the credibility of their larger project" (p. 45).

Both men recognized the utility of non-reasoned arguments as well. Appeals to emotion, appeals to logic leavened "by mixing color, symbolism, and imagery" as well as "invocation of America's revolutionary heritage" (pp. 51, 47), all played important roles in The Federalist. As noted above, the essays mocked antifederalist concerns with varying degrees of aggressiveness, occasionally hinting that the objections to the Constitution were so far-fetched they must be the product not of real concern but of more sinister motives (p. 48). "With the repeated tying of aspersion to reasoned argument," Coenen writes, "Publius sowed the seeds of skepticism at a visceral level. By portraying antifederalists as dark-hearted as well as wrongheaded, Hamilton and Madison appealed to deep-seated human sensibilities connected up with pride, caution, indignation, and even self-preservation" (p. 50).

Further, "[t]ime and again, Madison and Hamilton aligned the Constitution, its framers, and its defenders with the spirit of the American Revolution and the intellectual forces that had given that revolution birth" (p. 53). In part, this invocation was defensive, helping to "undercut concerns about the purported unlawfulness of the Philadelphia Convention" (p. 54, footnote omitted). Because the Revolution had come to be seen as a unifying event for the nascent country, tapping into that nationalist sentiment had obvious uses when the authors of The Federalist were asking readers to undertake another leap of faith in throwing the Articles of Confederation aside for an entirely new type of government.

But Madison and Hamilton were not content merely to rest on stating the logical or even the emotional case for the Constitution. Both were practical men; both were very much concerned with the pressing issues of the day. So The Federalist went on to press the case for a strengthened central government capable of meeting those challenges, and to describe in detail how the authors saw the various parts of the new government working--and to explain why a decrease in liberty did not ineluctably follow from increased central power. It is in Parts III and IV that Coenen hits his stride, first canvassing the themes to which Publius recurred; then discussing Hamilton and Madison's vigorous defense of the government that emerged from the Constitution.

III.

Coenen entitles the third part of The Story of The Federalist, "Themes for a Nation." He explains that Hamilton and Madison's key task was selling the need for "strengthening the American union" (p. 59). The authors further invoked the idea, often associated with Adam Smith, of yoking private interest to...