And I scruple not to affirm, that it is infinitely
less likely that either of them should gain an ascendant in the national
councils, than that the one or the other of them should predominate in
all the local councils. The inference will be, that a conduct tending to
give an undue preference to either is much less to be dreaded from the
former than from the latter.
The several States are in various degrees addicted to agriculture and
commerce. In most, if not all of them, agriculture is predominant. In a
few of them, however, commerce nearly divides its empire, and in most of
them has a considerable share of influence. In proportion as either
prevails, it will be conveyed into the national representation; and for
the very reason, that this will be an emanation from a greater variety
of interests, and in much more various proportions, than are to be found
in any single State, it will be much less apt to espouse either of them
with a decided partiality, than the representation of any single State.
In a country consisting chiefly of the cultivators of land, where the
rules of an equal representation obtain, the landed interest must, upon
the whole, preponderate in the government.
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