Federalist No. 10: How Do Factions Affect the President as Administrator‐in‐Chief?

• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-6210.2011.02458.x
• Author: David H. Rosenbloom
• Published date: 01 December 2011
• Date: 01 December 2011

David H. Rosenbloom is Distinguished

Professor of Public Administration in

the School of Public Affairs at American

University in Washington, D.C. A member of

the National Academy of Public Administra-

tion, he is the recipient of the Gaus, Waldo,

Brownlow, and Levine awards, among

others. His scholarship focuses primarily

on public administration and democratic

constitutionalism.

E-mail: rbloom313@hotmail.com

S22 Public Administration Review • December 2011 • Special Issue

David H. Rosenbloom

American University

Federalist No. 10 arguably is the most frequently read

of the Federalist Papers, in no small measure because it

of‌f ers a distinct and often negative image of the polity

as a source of conf‌l ict. It argues that factions cannot be

tamed, but they can be controlled.  is essay argues that

factions have weakened ef‌f ective public administration

and of‌f ers a detailed discussion of the proliferation of

interest groups and their role in undermining the system

of checks and balances.

Federalist No. 10 deals primarily with the

problem of factions in republican govern-

ment. Written by James Madison, it considers

factions to be “a number of citizens, whether amount-

ing to a majority or minority of the whole, who are

united and actuated by some

common impulse of passion,

or of interest, adverse to the

rights of other citizens, or to

the permanent and aggregate

interests of the community”

(Carey and McClellan 2001,

43). Madison argues that elimi-

nating factions is undesirable

and impractical. Consequently,

the ef‌f‌i cacy of the Constitution

in dealing with factions depends

on its provisions for control-

ling them. Madison points to

majority rule as a check on

minority factions and to federal-

ism and an extended republic

as bulwarks against the forma-

tion of majority factions. He

mentions the roles of citizens,

electors, and representatives in

controlling factions, but not those of the president or

the judiciary—and he of‌f ers only passing reference to

administration.

Introduction: The Problem of Factions

Despite massive changes in the structure of U.S. gov-

ernment, federalism, the extensiveness of the extended

republic, and the proliferation of interest groups,

Madison’s diagnosis of the causes and consequences

of factions still resonates in our hyperpluralistic age.

Factions are caused by human nature. First, “as long

as the connection subsists between … reason and …

self-love,” an individual’s “opinions and … passions

will have a reciprocal inf‌l uence on each other; and the

former will be objects to which the latter will attach

themselves” (Federalist No. 10, Carey and McClellan

2001, 43). Second, “the diversity in the faculties of

men, from which the rights of property originate, is

not less an insuperable obstacle to an [sic] uniformity

of interests” (43). Among the consequences of factions

are the ability of minority interests to “clog the admin-

istration [and] convulse the society” (45). Majority

factions pose a potential “dan-

ger” to the “public good” and

“private rights” (45).

Madison’s prescription for

controlling factions, by contrast,

has proven inapt. On the sim-

plest level, his extended republic

has generated an extensive

proliferation of interest groups,

many of which f‌i t his def‌i nition

of factions. More complexly,

neither Madison nor any of the

Constitution’s framers pos-

sibly could have foreseen the

development, scope, and policy-

making roles of the contempo-

rary U.S. administrative state.

 ere were roughly 4 million

people in the United States

when the Constitution was rati-

f‌i ed; at the end of World War II, there were approxi-

mately the same number of civilian federal employees.

Although hagiographers of the framers might argue

that the Constitution nevertheless of‌f ers a blueprint

for modern public administration, in reality, it does

not.  e Constitution divides authority over federal

administration between Congress and the president,

Federalist No. 10: How Do Factions Af‌f ect the President

as Administrator-in-Chief?

Madison’s prescription for

controlling factions … has

proven inapt. On the simplest

level, his extended republic

has generated an extensive

proliferation of interest

groups, many of which f‌i t his

def‌i nition of factions. More

complexly, neither Madison

nor any of the Constitution’s

framers possibly could have

foreseen the development,

scope, and policy-making roles

of the contemporary U.S.

administrative state.