These letters are entirely imaginary–offered with wit, affection, and no partisan agenda. We hope they make you smile, make you think, and perhaps send you back to what the founders actually wrote.
If this makes you think–or smile–please click ‘Like.’ It helps these letters reach more readers who care about the republic the founders imagined.
In our previous post, we learned what the Founding Fathers would think about executive orders. Today, Hamilton and Madison speculate about a danger that lurks within the states themselves–the drawing of districts that twist like serpents to swallow their opponents’ votes.
Source: Federalist #6 — ‘Concerning Dangers from Dissensions Between the States’ by Alexander Hamilton
Hamilton has warned of dissensions between the states. But what if the danger lies not between them, but within–where men draw boundaries not to unite communities but to divide their opponents? Madison, who would one day watch such serpents hatch in his own administration, takes keen interest.
* * * * *
New York, December 8, 1787
Dear Madison,
I have argued in Publius that the states, left to their own devices, would fall into ruinous contentions with one another. Men are ambitious, vindictive, rapacious–and proximity invites conflict. But a darker thought has seized me.
What if states turned such vindictive energies inward? Suppose the party in ascendancy were to draw the boundaries of legislative districts not by the natural contours of county and community, but by the calculated science of arithmetic–packing their opponents into a few districts where votes pile uselessly, while spreading their own supporters thin across many districts where slim majorities prevail?
The map itself becomes a weapon. Districts might twist like serpents through the countryside, swallowing towns that vote one way and spitting out those that vote another. The people would cast their ballots, believing themselves sovereign, while the true decision had been made years before–by the cartographer.
Against such corruption, what remedy exists in our Constitution?
Your obedient servant,
Hamilton
* * * * *
Montpelier, December 14, 1787
My Dear Hamilton,
Your serpent districts coil through my thoughts. I confess I had not fully considered this particular mischief, though I should have. Where men may draw lines, men may draw them crookedly.
The structural flaw is plain: we have left the drawing of districts to the very legislatures who benefit from their design. It is as if we permitted accused men to select their own jurors. Ambition, as I have argued, must be made to counteract ambition–but here we have given ambition the pen and the map both.
The remedy eludes me. Shall we entrust this task to judges? They too are men. To commissioners appointed by the Crown? We have no Crown, thank Providence. To some mathematical formula inscribed in law? Formulas may be gamed by clever men.
Perhaps we must trust that public scrutiny will shame the serpent-drawers. But I suspect posterity will prove more ingenious in concealment than we imagine.
Your friend,
Madison
* * * * *
New York, December 20, 1787
Dear Madison,
Your observation pierces to the heart of the matter: we have made the fox guardian of the henhouse. And you are right that every proposed remedy presents its own corruption.
Consider the dark irony. A citizen casts his vote believing it equal to his neighbor’s. Yet if his district has been drawn to ensure his party can never prevail, his vote is a gesture merely–a prayer without a congregation. The forms of republicanism persist while the substance drains away.
I suspect that if such practices take root, both factions will employ them wherever they hold power, each blaming the other while perfecting the art. The people will grow cynical. And cynicism is the dry rot of republics.
Yr. obt. svt.,
Hamilton
* * * * *
Montpelier, December 28, 1787
My Dear Hamilton,
Cynicism as dry rot–yes, precisely. When the people cease to believe their votes matter, they will cease to vote. And when they cease to vote, they will seek other means to make their voices heard.
We have labored to prevent tyranny from above. I fear we have left a door open to tyranny from within–tyranny wielded not by kings but by cartographers.
Your friend in anxious speculation,
Madison
* * * * *
If they only knew… that within twenty-five years of this correspondence, a salamander-shaped district in Massachusetts would lend its name to the very practice Hamilton feared. The governor who signed that twisted map into law? Elbridge Gerry–who would soon become Madison’s own Vice President. The serpent did not merely hatch; it came home to nest.
* * * * *
Questions for Reflection:
When is the shape of a legislative district evidence of manipulation–and when is it merely the natural consequence of geography and population? Can any system of drawing districts be truly neutral, or does the very act of drawing lines create winners and losers? And if the fox must guard the henhouse, what checks–if any–can prevent him from dining on the hens?
Share your thoughts in the comments–and if this made you think, please Like and share.