The collection of 85 essays known collectively as the Federalist Papers, or simply as The Federalist, stand as the chief exposition of the American Constitution and the system of government which it prescribed. The 1787 convention in Philadelphis, which produced the Constitution itself, published and preserved no official record of its deliberations. While several members later gave partial and personal accounts of the proceedings, none of these has obtained the weight of the Federalist Papers.
Written variously by Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison under the common pseudonym of Publius, these were originally published as newspaper pieces. The immediate objective was to encourage the adoption of the new Constitution in the place of the nation's original written constitution, the Articles of Confederation. However, the authors plainly had in view a longer-term goal as well, to explain and justify the system of government embodied in the Constitution.
How effective are the Federalist Papers in meeting these objectives? On one level that is answered by events. The Constitution itself has survived as the basis of American government, with only one serious breakdown, the American Civil War, after which with some amendments regarding slavery and civil rights the system was restored. In the same period of time, France has had five republics, two monarchies, and two empires. The Federalist Papers, effective at the time in persuading public opinion in favor of the Constitution, retain an authoritative standing. They are not only key documents in the history of American political thought, but are regularly consulted and cited in American public debate. Very recently, for example, a few sentences dealing with impeachment in Federalist 63 became the subject of exegesis and argument. (The authorship of most of the articles is not in dispute, but that of some is. Since individual authorship is not central to ...