Political Science

Perhaps Federalist No.10 is the most important political document of the 18th century primarily because it attempts to define the power relations between the majority and the minority. No.10 addresses the question of how to guard against factions in the state. A faction is a group of citizens with interests contrary to the rights of other individuals or the interests of the state. Madison argued that a strong, well founded republic would be a better guard against those dangers than smaller republics. As Madison argued

Among the numerous advantages promised by a well constructed Union, none deserves to be more accurately developed than its tendency to break and control the violence of faction. The friend of popular governments never finds himself so much alarmed for their character and fate, as when he contemplates their propensity to this dangerous vice. He will not fail, therefore, to set a due value on any plan which, without violating the principles to which he is attached, provides a proper cure for it (Federalist No. 10).

To factions, liberty is the source of political action. It is the ingredient which cures the cure rather than the disease. Factions use liberty as an excuse for their conduct  for their perverted political views. In a democracy, according to Madison, liberty functions as the breathe of law. If liberty is misused, then it becomes the seed of destruction (of the state).

Now, it is impossible and unwise to truly abolish factions within the state. As long as man continues to be fallible, as Madison noted, he is always at liberty to exercise it. Madison continued

As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves. The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government. From the protection of different and unequal faculties of acquiring property, the possession of different degrees and kinds of property immediately results and from the influence of these on the sentiments and views of the respective proprietors, ensues a division of the society into different interests and parties (Federalist No. 10).

The best solution is to minimize the creation of factions within the state by promoting pluralism. Interests though would continue to be differentiated.

There are differences between a democracy and a republic. First, the delegation of power in republics is both direct and immediate. Second, more people are subjected to political authority under a republic than under a democracy. The second difference is significant because in a republic, the state can control the appetites of its citizens at a larger scale. In short, it can minimize the creation of factions.