in the White House.rnThe proponents of popular election of electors (in particular,rnof the general ticket) insisted that since “all power belongsrnto the people. . . they should exercise it directly withoutrnthe intervention of any intermediate agency. . . .” But, arguedrnCalhoun, the real effect of the proposed change “so farrnfrom giving the power to the people . . . would be the most effectualrnway that could be devised of . . . transferring it to partyrnmanagers and cliques.”rnThe cornerstone of Calhoun’s objection was his observationrnthat “where many are to select many, especially over a large extentrnof country, it does not, in fact, constitute an election butrna mere delusion, undeserving the name.” It is impossible, hernsaid, “for the great body of voters to be guided by their individualrnknowledge in selecting the candidates, either from personalrnacquaintance or reputation.”rnCalhoun, in making this argument, hearkens back to Hamilton’srnobjection to a national popularity contest, and he concludedrnthat where the result of such voting was not mere accidentrnit would be due to cabal:rnA few prominent and influential individuals would enterrninto a secret concert to control the election. . . . Thernnext [step] would be for others to enter into like concertrnto defeat them; and finally there would grow out ofrnthis state of things two parties, with all the usual partyrnmachinery of caucus, conventions, cliques, and managersrnto control the election. The whole would be putrninto active operation every four years, on the approachrnof the presidential election, and each party would makernout a full ticket by what would be called a state convention,rnand every voter, whether he approve of it or not,rnwould have to vote for one or the other, or to throwrnaway his vote on a ticket formed without concert.rnCalhoun’s final objection derived from his theory of concurrentrnmajorities. South Carolina had labored to produce arnconstitution that could reconcile the conflict between thernstate’s major sections. While a mere numerical majority couldrnoppress a weaker section, South Carolina had arrived at arnmeans of fairly representing the various interests of the state, tornthe prejudice of none, and it was this method—as representedrnby the state legislature—that should be used in selecting presidentialrnelectors.rnThe party system, in Calhoun’s view, was in the process ofrnreplacing the Constitution, and the principal devices were therngeneral ticket, which gave the state party machines the abilityrnto deliver all the state’s electoral votes and the lavish system ofrnexecutive patronage that rewarded the state machines. “ThernPresidential election is no longer a struggle for great principles,”rnhe told the Senate in 1846, “but only a great struggle asrnto who shall have the spoils of office. Look at the machinery.rnA convention nominates the President—in which, not infrequently,rnmany of the representatives of the States join in arngeneral understanding to divide the offices amongst themselvesrnand their friends. . . . as soon as the Government becomesrnthe mere creature of seekers of office, your free institutionsrnare at an end.”rnEven if the framers had been able to anticipate the rise ofrnthe party system, it is not at all clear that they could havernbound the states to a uniform method of choosing electors. Inrnthe debate over electoral qualifications in the election of representativesrnto the House, John Dickinson and GouverneurrnMorris argued convincingly that the franchise should be restrictedrnto freeholders, and, among the objections made byrnFranklin and John Rutledge, the most telling was: “The right ofrnsuffrage was a tender point, and strongly guarded by the staternconstitutions. . . . The states are the best judges of the circumstancesrnand temper of their own people.”rnIt was up to the states, then, to determine the qualificationsrnfor electors—both presidential and congressional. No constitutionalrninstitution so embodied the confederal principle asrnthe Senate, whose members represented the states not accordingrnto size or population but as equal constituents of thernunion. To make this point even more graphic, the senatorsrnwere to be elected not directly by the people but by the staternlegislatures. The discussion of the election of senators sometimesrntook the form of a debate between (successful) advocatesrnof states’ rights and the partisans of centralized authority,rnand Sherman argued—quite correctly—that direct electionrnof senators was tantamount to the annihilation of state governments.rnHowever, the overriding concern—as expressed by JohnrnDickinson in particular—was the quality of the men whornwould sit in the American House of Lords, and the authors ofrnthe Federalist dilate on the advantages to be derived from arn”temperate and respectable body of citizens” who mightrn”cheek the misguided career” of popular passions. This councilrnof wise and substantial gentlemen could not be electedrndirectly by people who would have no real knowledge of therncandidates’ characters, and the choice was left to an intermediaternbody, elected by the people who knew them and who inrnturn could be expected to know the most eminent men inrnthe state.rnThe framers’ concern with the character of the nation’srnhighest governors made them reluctant to trust the generalrnpopulace, not so much because the generality of people arernstupid and unlettered—although that seems to have been thernopinion of the South Carolinians—as because the vast extentrnof the individual states and the even vaster extent of the entirernunion precluded the possibility of the voters having any faceto-rnface contact with the men who would hold the offices ofrnPresident, senator, and Supreme Court Justice.rnThe size of the overgrown infant republic was a matter ofrnconcern to many thoughtful Americans of the time. Theyrnremembered Montesquieu’s injunction that republicanrngovernment could only work in small nations, smaller evenrnthan the larger states of the union. Hamilton, addressing thisrnpoint in Federalist No. 9, points out that Montesquieu himselfrnhad offered eonfederalism as the solution to the problem ofrnsize and insists upon the truly federal nature of the proposedrnConstitution: “The proposed Constitution, so far from implyingrnan abolition of the State governments, makes themrnconstituent parts of the national sovereignty, by allowing themrna direct representation in the Senate, and leaves them in theirrnpossession certain exclusive and very important portions ofrnsovereign power.” This is the archcentralist, Hamilton, talkingrneven before the passage of the 10th Amendment!rnThe question of size was not invented by Montesquieu; itrngoes back to discussions of ancient philosophers reflecting uponrnthe experiences of Greek city-states. The most systematicrnanalysis is provided by Aristotle in the seventh book of thernPolitics, where he argues that it is not mere size but “dy-rn12/CHRONICLESrnrnrn