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Federalist No. 13 Explained: Why One Country Is Cheaper Than Several
Running a country costs money — and Federalist No. 13 is Alexander Hamilton's short, sharp answer to the most relatable objection anyone made against the Constitution: that a whole new federal government would simply cost too much. Hamilton flips the math. The real choice was never between one government and none — it was between paying for one national government or paying for two or three, because a broken-up America would have to build the same expensive machinery over and over again. And along the way, the shortest paper in the entire series makes its eeriest prediction: that if America…
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