CRISIS > TYRANNY
The Articles of Confederation created a government so limited that it's laws did not apply to the people directly and there was no way to enforce those laws except with military force (no executive or judicial branches). It also created a single Congress.
Number 22 [18] …If the new Constitution is not adopted, the country will either fall apart or Congress will be given tyrannical powers. A weak federal government and the schemes of ambitious men who expect to increase their personal power will push the Union towards dissolution. If the country doesn't fall apart, a single "congress" will accumulate all the sovereign powers, creating the tyranny that adversaries of the new Constitution say they don't want.
But many patriot people didn't support ratification of the Constitution. They considered supporters of the new Constitution "liberal." Why? The new Constitution increased the federal government's powers. For people who had lived under a tyranny, any powers given to the federal government seemed like the first step on the slippery slope. However, in times of danger, the Federalist Papers authors warn that a federal government with too few powers will usurp authority.
Number 20 [18] A weak constitution ends up being ignored. Then it dissolves either from a lack of power or government officials usurp the powers necessary for the public safety. The usurpation may stop at a healthy point or go forward to a dangerous extreme. Tyranny more frequently grows out of the assumptions of unconstitutional power that is needed in an emergency but is not included in a defective constitution, than out of the full exercise of the largest constitutional authorities.
(I want to make a comment about the Federalist Papers here. Many people seem to believe that there are a few "essential" or "important" Papers. Numbers 20 and 22 are probably not among that group. I can't stress enough that every Paper teaches us about the Constitution and the construction of the United States federal government, and why self-government is so difficult.)
Tyrannical government
"Tyranny more frequently grows out of the assumptions of unconstitutional
power that is needed in an emergency but is not included in a defective
constitution, than out of the full exercise of the largest constitutional
authorities."
In this one sentence, the authors explain why people in power talk about a
"crisis" or "emergency" when they want to usurp unconstitutional power.
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* All Federalist Paper quotes are from The Federalist
Papers: Modern English Edition Two, available on my website and Amazon.com
for $24.95
http://Mary.Webster.org
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