But though one or the other of the substitutes which have been examined,
or some other that might be devised, should be thought preferable to the
plan in this respect, reported by the convention, it will not follow
that the Constitution ought for this reason to be rejected. If mankind
were to resolve to agree in no institution of government, until every
part of it had been adjusted to the most exact standard of perfection,
society would soon become a general scene of anarchy, and the world a
desert. Where is the standard of perfection to be found? Who will
undertake to unite the discordant opinions of a whole commuity, in the
same judgment of it; and to prevail upon one conceited projector to
renounce his INFALLIBLE criterion for the FALLIBLE criterion of his more
CONCEITED NEIGHBOR? To answer the purpose of the adversaries of the
Constitution, they ought to prove, not merely that particular provisions
in it are not the best which might have been imagined, but that the plan
upon the whole is bad and pernicious.
PUBLIUS
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FEDERALIST No. 66
Objections to the Power of the Senate To Set as a Court for
Impeachments Further Considered
From the Independent Journal.
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