Foresight of Our Founding Fathers

The Federalist Papers was written by a number of our Founding Fathers to promote and encourage ratification of the United States Constitution in place of a dysfunctional Articles of Confederation.

There are 83 essays. We will focus only on those essays reflecting the thinking of our Forefathers that had the most impact on the recent 2010 election: the requirement to have the House of Representatives, the House closest to the people, elected every two years.

In November 2008, the American electorate voted the Democrats into power in the House, Senate and White House. The Democrats commanded clear majorities in Congress and closely worked with the White House. Immediately, normal “checks and balances” between the two legislative bodies and the executive branch disappeared, and an oppressive oligarchy was born.

“What method should we use, then, to maintain the necessary partition of power between the different branches as laid down in the Constitution?. . . the government must be structured, designed, so that the three constitutional branches and their relationships will have the ability to keep each other in their proper places.”[1]

What the Founding Fathers did not take into account, because political parties did not exist in 1787, was the tyranny of one political party controlling the executive and legislative branches.

This tyranny was clearly seen during the State of the Union when the President of the United States attacked the Supreme Court before Congress and the nation, an event never before seen in this country. At this time, there was only one “independent” branch of government: the judicial branch.

The Founding Fathers viewed the States as an additional check on the Federal Government. “In the compound republic of America, the power surrendered by the people is first divided between two distinct governments, state and federal. Then the portion allotted to each is subdivided among distinct and separate branches. Hence the rights of the people are doubly protected. The different governments will control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself.”[2]

The Constitution originally called for Senators to be chosen by State legislatures, giving States an ability to “check and balance” the power of the federal government. State legislature election of federal Senators provided the cornerstone of two important principles: federalism and the separation of powers. The Senate was seen as a link between State governments and the federal government.

However, during the great progressive-socialist surge of the early 20th century, the 17th Amendment to the Constitution was adopted, stripping states of the “check and balance power” against the federal government. Thus began the “master-slave” relationship between the federal and state governments, where the federal government expanded its powers at the expense of state governments and imposed unfunded mandates upon the states.

Madison also furthered the appointment of Senators by State legislatures by writing,
“. . . Of all the ways that this branch [Senate] of government might have been formed, the method . . . is probably the most consistent with public opinion. It has two advantages. It is a select appointment that gives the State governments a role in the forming the federal government. It secures the States’ authority and links the two systems.”[3]


The progressive-socialist argument supporting the 17th Amendment rested on the notion that Senators chosen by State legislatures were nothing more than puppets for those legislatures. James Madison, on the other hand, wrote, “The State governments are essential parts of the federal government. But the federal government is in no way essential to the operation or organization of the State governments.”[4]

By eliminating the selection of Senators by their legislatures, the 17th Amendment severed the States’ checks and balances against the federal government, allowing a tyrannical oligarchy, in this case a political party, without checks and balances, to begin transforming the United States from a capitalist free market into a centralized progressive-socialist society dependent on the handouts of a corrupt government. As a result of the 17th Amendments alteration of balance of power and “checks and balances,” there is a growing interest in nullifying the 17th Amendment thereby reverting back to the original design of the Constitution.

What saved America in the 2010 election? The specific design of the Constitution by our Founding Fathers saved America, where the People’s House, the House of Representatives, is subject to direct election every two years. While the President is elected to four year terms and the Senate to six year terms (with one–third of the Senate up for election every two years), the entire House of Representatives is elected every two years. Consequently, the People have an opportunity to impact 100% of their Representatives every two years rather than one third of the Senators every two years.

The Founding Fathers discussed having Representatives elected annually, as many States required of their larger Houses. However, traveling with States was an easier matter that traveling greater distances to a National Capitol. Hence, elections every two years were established. This two year election cycle is, in and of itself, a further check and balance on the excess of the federal government.

This two year “check and balance” allowed the People to break up an oligarchy the People themselves installed two years earlier: it was a clear instance of the People correcting an egregious error in judgment. It was a clear repudiation of the policies and politics of the oligarchy, and a clear repudiation of anti-American progressive-socialist philosophy.

It should noted that during the last two years, a small group of people in the House and the Senate fought a legislative guerilla war against the insidious efforts of progressive –socialists to destroy our Country as we know it. Their courageous stand in voting against bad legislation left the progressive-socialist Democrat oligarch starkly alone in promoting bad public policy.

The American people, confronting this assault upon American principles and values, acknowledged the heroic stance of this small group of Republicans by overturning the unilateral tyranny of the oligarchy. As a result, the American people have not only established a reprieve from continued assault by progressive-socialists but also established a political beachhead from which to begin the counterattack.

[1] Mary. E. Webster, Federalist Papers in Modern Language, (Bellevue, WA., 1999) Number 51, Section 1
[2] Ibid., Number 51, Section 9
[3] Ibid., Number 62, Section 3
[4] Ibid., Number 45, Section 7