Constitutional history -- United States -- Sources; Constitutional law -- United States
The Achaeans were now reduced to the dilemma of submitting to
Cleomenes, or of supplicating the aid of Macedon, its former oppressor.
The latter expedient was adopted. The contests of the Greeks always
afforded a pleasing opportunity to that powerful neighbor of
intermeddling in their affairs. A Macedonian army quickly appeared.
Cleomenes was vanquished. The Achaeans soon experienced, as often
happens, that a victorious and powerful ally is but another name for a
master. All that their most abject compliances could obtain from him
was a toleration of the exercise of their laws. Philip, who was now on
the throne of Macedon, soon provoked by his tyrannies, fresh
combinations among the Greeks. The Achaeans, though weakened by
internal dissensions and by the revolt of Messene, one of its members,
being joined by the AEtolians and Athenians, erected the standard of
opposition. Finding themselves, though thus supported, unequal to the
undertaking, they once more had recourse to the dangerous expedient of
introducing the succor of foreign arms. The Romans, to whom the
invitation was made, eagerly embraced it. Philip was conquered; Macedon
subdued. A new crisis ensued to the league. Dissensions broke out among
it members. These the Romans fostered. Callicrates and other popular
leaders became mercenary instruments for inveigling their countrymen.
The more effectually to nourish discord and disorder the Romans had, to
the astonishment of those who confided in their sincerity, already
proclaimed universal liberty[1] throughout Greece. With the same
insidious views, they now seduced the members from the league, by
representing to their pride the violation it committed on their
sovereignty. By these arts this union, the last hope of Greece, the
last hope of ancient liberty, was torn into pieces; and such imbecility
and distraction introduced, that the arms of Rome found little
difficulty in completing the ruin which their arts had commenced. The
Achaeans were cut to pieces, and Achaia loaded with chains, under which
it is groaning at this hour.
I have thought it not superfluous to give the outlines of this
important portion of history; both because it teaches more than one
lesson, and because, as a supplement to the outlines of the Achaean
constitution, it emphatically illustrates the tendency of federal
bodies rather to anarchy among the members, than to tyranny in the
head.
PUBLIUS.
[1] This was but another name more specious for the independence of
the members on the federal head.
THE FEDERALIST.
No. XIX.
The Same Subject Continued
(The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union)
For the Independent Journal.
HAMILTON AND MADISON
To the People of the State of New York:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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