What Centinel and James Wilson Would Think About Simplicity Versus Complexity in Government
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.
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In our previous post, we explored what the Founding Fathers would think about Presidential Character. Today, ‘Centinel’ and James Wilson debate whether the Constitution’s machinery is too intricate for a free people.
Centinel I (October 5, 1787) — likely written by Samuel Bryan of Pennsylvania
‘Centinel’ was the pen name of Samuel Bryan, a Philadelphia patriot and son of George Bryan, the second President (Governor) of Pennsylvania. Writing just weeks after the Constitutional Convention adjourned, Centinel published one of the earliest and most systematic Anti-Federalist critiques of the proposed Constitution. His central complaint: the intricate machinery of separated powers and checks and balances was a snare—too complicated for ordinary citizens to monitor, and designed to produce ‘a permanent ARISTOCRACY’ rather than genuine republican accountability.
James Wilson of Pennsylvania was among the Constitution’s most brilliant architects and eloquent defenders. At the Pennsylvania ratifying convention, Wilson answered Centinel’s objections directly, arguing that the Constitution’s complexity was not a defect but a virtue—the only reliable means of securing liberty against the ever-present danger of concentrated power. In this imagined exchange, the two Pennsylvanians debate whether simplicity or structure better serves a free people.
* * *
Philadelphia, October 8, 1787
Dear Mr. Wilson,
I have read the new plan of government with the attention it deserves, and I confess myself astonished. You have given us a machine of such intricate construction that I doubt whether any citizen not bred to the law can comprehend its operations. Three great branches, each checking the others, each balanced against the others—and the people left to guess which wheel has failed when the engine produces tyranny instead of liberty.
Our Pennsylvania constitution is simple. One legislative body, elected frequently, accountable directly. When the people feel a grievance, they know whom to blame. They apply the remedy at the next election with certainty and effect. But your elaborate contrivance—with its Senate serving six years, its President commanding armies, its judges appointed for life—where shall the citizen look when his liberty is violated? To the House? To the Senate? To the Executive? Each will point at the others, and the people will be ‘perplexed and divided.’
I ask you plainly, Sir: Is not simplicity the friend of freedom, and complexity the instrument of those who would rule without accountability?
Your fellow citizen,
Centinel
* * *
Philadelphia, October 12, 1787
Dear Centinel,
Your devotion to simplicity does you credit, but I fear it proceeds from a premise that experience contradicts. You assume that simple government is gentle government—that a single assembly, unchecked, will naturally serve the people’s interest. But consider: a single body, acting swiftly and without opposition, may be swift in tyranny as well as in justice. The history of republics teaches that popular assemblies can be as oppressive as kings, and rather more capricious.
The machinery you disparage was designed not to confuse but to protect. When ambition is made to counteract ambition, when no single organ of government can act without the concurrence of others, liberty finds shelter in the very friction you deplore. Yes, the citizen must look in several directions—but that is because power itself has been distributed among several guardians, none of whom may act alone.
You ask whether complexity serves the artful and designing. I ask in return: Does simplicity not serve the demagogue, who requires only one body to capture in order to rule absolutely?
With great respect for your vigilance,
James Wilson
* * *
Philadelphia, October 18, 1787
Dear Mr. Wilson,
You speak of ambition counteracting ambition as though it were a self-regulating principle. But I ask you to speculate upon the future: What if the several branches, rather than checking one another, should learn to accommodate?
Your machine assumes eternal vigilance among its parts. But men grow weary. Institutions settle into habits. And a people bewildered by the intricacy of their government may cease to watch altogether, trusting to the machinery that was designed to need no trust at all.
Is this not the very aristocracy I warned against—achieved not by conquest but by complexity?
Centinel
* * *
Philadelphia, October 24, 1787
Dear Centinel,
Your speculation troubles me, for it contains a truth I cannot entirely dismiss. Yes—the branches may accommodate. Yes—the friction may diminish.
But what is the alternative? Your simple assembly, however accountable in theory, places all power in one vessel. If that vessel is captured—by faction, by passion, by a temporary majority inflamed against liberty—there is no appeal. The citizen’s remedy at the next election comes too late if his rights have been extinguished before it arrives.
Our Constitution is indeed complicated—because liberty is complicated. It requires not only virtue in the people but structure in their government. Neither alone suffices.
Yours in the common cause,
James Wilson
* * *
Philadelphia, October 30, 1787
Dear Mr. Wilson,
Then we have reached the heart of our disagreement. You trust structure; I trust virtue. You believe that well-designed institutions can substitute for an engaged and vigilant citizenry; I believe that no machinery, however ingenious, can long preserve liberty if the people cease to care.
Perhaps posterity will render the verdict. If your intricate machine produces a race of citizens who understand it, who watch its operations, who hold each branch accountable despite the difficulty—then you will have been vindicated. But if it produces instead a people who delegate their vigilance to the machinery itself, trusting that checks will check and balances will balance without their attention—then I fear the permanent aristocracy I warned against will have arrived by a road neither of us anticipated.
May future generations judge between us.
Centinel
* * * * *
If they only knew . . . that their descendants would inhabit a republic so elaborately structured that citizens routinely confuse which branch does what, blame the wrong officials for policies they oppose, and delegate their vigilance to mechanisms they barely comprehend—while the branches themselves have learned, exactly as Centinel feared, to accommodate one another in ways that serve those who govern more than those who are governed. Wilson’s machine still runs. But whether it runs for the people, or merely runs, remains the question neither founder could answer.
Questions for Reflection
- Centinel argued that simple government keeps power accountable. Wilson countered that complexity protects liberty by distributing power. Which argument do you find more persuasive—and why?
- Has the intricate machinery of American government made citizens more vigilant or less? Do voters today understand which branch is responsible for which policies?
- Centinel worried that the branches would ‘accommodate’ rather than check one another. Where do you see evidence of accommodation—or genuine friction—in contemporary government?
Please share your thoughts in the comments—and if this exchange made you think, click ‘Like’ to help it reach others who care about the republic.