tion of the great question before the People. They can answer no other end than to cast a mist over the truth.

As to the suggestion of double taxation, the answer is plain. The wants of the Union are to be supplied in one way or another; if to be done by the authority of the Fœderal Government, it will not be to be done by that of the State Government. The quantity of taxes to be paid by the community must be the same in either case; with this advantage, if the provision is to be made by the Union that the capital resource of commercial imposts, which is the most convenient branch of revenue, can be prudently improved to a much greater extent under Fœderal than under State regulation, and of course will render it less necessary to recur to more inconvenient methods; and with this further advantage, that as far as there may be any real difficulty in the exercise of the power of internal taxation, it will impose a disposition to greater care in the choice and arrangement of the means; and must naturally tend to make it a fixed point of policy in the National administration to go as far as may be practicable in making the luxury of the rich tributary to the public treasury, in order to diminish the necessity of those impositions which might create dissatisfaction in the poorer and most numerous classes of the society. Happy it is when the interest which the Government has in the preservation of its own power, coincides with a proper distribution of the public burdens, and tends to guard the least wealthy part of the community from oppression!

*

As to poll-taxes, I, without scruple, confess my disapprobation of them; and though they have prevailed from an early period in those States, which have uniformly been the most tenacious of their rights, I should lament to see them introduced into practice under th National Government. But does it follow because there *The New England States. — Publius.

is a power to lay them, that they will actually be laid? Every State in the Union has power to impose taxes of this kind; and yet in several of them they are unknown in practice. Are the State Governments to be stigmatized as tyrannies, because they possess this power? If they are not, with what propriety can the like power justify such a charge against the National Government, or even be urged as an obstacle to its adoption? As little friendly as I am to the species of imposition, I still feel a thorough conviction, that the power of having recourse to it ought to exist in the Fœderal Government. There are certain emergencies of nations, in which expedients, that in the ordinary state of things ought to be forborne, become essential to the public weal. And the Government, from the possibility of such emergencies, ought ever to have the option of making use of them. The real scarcity of objects in this country, which may be considered as productive sources of revenue, is a reason peculiar to itself, for not abridging the discretion of the National councils in this respect. There may exist certain critical and tempestuous conjunctures of the State, in which a poll-tax may become an inestimable resource. And as I know nothing to exempt this portion of the globe from the common calamities that have befallen other parts of it, I acknowledge my aversion to every project that is calculated to disarm the Government of a single weapon, which in any possible contingency might be usefully employed for the general defence and security.

PUBLIUS.

[From the Daily Advertiser, Thursday, January 10, 1788.]

THE FEDERALIST. No. XXXV.

TO THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK:

THE

HE power of regulating the militia, and of commanding its services in times of insurrection and invasion, are natural incidents to the duties of superintending the common defence, and of watching over the internal peace of the Confederacy.

It requires no skill in the science of war to discern, that uniformity in the organization and discipline of the militia would be attended with the most beneficial effects, whenever they were called into service for the public defence. It would enable them to discharge the duties of the camp and of the field, with mutual inte ligence and concert - an advantage of peculiar moment in the operations of an army: and it would fit them much sooner to acquire the degree of proficiency in military functions, which would be essential to their usefulness. This desirable uniformity can only be accomplished by confiding the regulation of the militia. to the direction of the National authority. It is, therefore, with the most evident propriety, that the plan of the Convention proposes to empower the Union " to provide "for organizing, arming, and disciplining the militia, "and for governing such part of them as may be em"ployed in the service of the United States, reserving "to the States respectively the appointment of the officers, "and the authority of training the militia according to "the discipline prescribed by Congress."

Of the different grounds which have been taken in opposition to the plan of the Convention, there is none.

that was so little to have been expected, or is so unten able in itself, as the one from which this particular provision has been attacked. If a well-regulated militia be the most natural defence of a free country, it ought certainly to be under the regulation and at the disposal of that body, which is constituted the guardian of the National security. If standing armies are dangerous to liberty, an efficacious power over the militia, in the body to whose care the protection of the State is committed, ought, as far as possible, to take away the inducement and the pretext to such unfriendly institutions. If the Fœderal Government can command the aid of the militia in those emergencies, which call for the military arm in support of the civil magistrate, it can the better dispense with the employment of a different kind of force. If it cannot avail itself of the former, it will be obliged to recur to the latter. To render an army unnecessary, will be a more certain method of preventing its existnce, than a thousand prohibitions upon paper.

In order to cast an odium upon the power of calling forth the militia to execute the laws of the Union, it has been remarked that there is nowhere any provision in the proposed Constitution for calling out the POSSE COMITATUS, to assist the magistrate in the execution of his duty; whence it has been inferred, that military force was intended to be his only auxiliary. There is a striking incoherence in the objections which have appeared, and sometimes even from the same quarter, not much calculated to inspire a very favorable opinion of the sincerity or fair dealing of their authors. The same. persons who tell us in one breath, that the powers of the Fœderal Government will be despotic and unlimited, inform us in the next, that it has not authority sufficient even to call out the POSSE COMITATUS. The latter, fortunately, is as much short of the truth as the former exceeds it. It would be as absurd to doubt, that

a right to pass all laws necessary and proper to execute its declared powers, would include that of requiring the assistance of the citizens to the officers who may be in trusted with the execution of those laws, as it would be to believe, that a right to enact laws necessary and proper for the imposition and collection of taxes, would involve that of varying the rules of descent and of the alienation of landed property, or of abolishing the trial by jury in cases relating to it. It being therefore evident, that the supposition of a want of power to require the aid of the POSSE COMITATUS is entirely destitute of color, it will follow, that the conclusion which has been drawn from it, in its application to the authority of the Fœderal Government over the militia, is as uncandid as it is illogical. What reason could there be to infer, that force was intended to be the sole instrument of authority, merely because there is a power to make use of it when necessary? What shall we think of the motives, which could induce men of sense to reason in this manner? How shall we prevent a conflict between charity and judgment?

By a curious refinement upon the spirit of republican jealousy, we are even taught to apprehend danger from the militia itself, in the hands of the Federal Government. It is observed, that select corps may be formed, composed of the young and ardent, who may be rendered subservient to the views of arbitrary power. What plan for the regulation of the militia may be pursued by the National Government, is impossible to be foreseen. But so far from viewing the matter in the same light with those who object to select corps as dangerous, were the Constitution ratified, and were I to deliver my sentiments to a member of the Fœderal Legislature from this State on the subject of a militia establishment, I should hold to him, in substance, the following discourse: