Letter from James Madison (1833)

It seems to be forgotten, that the abuses committed within the individual States previous to the present Constitution, by interested or misguided majorities, were among the prominent causes of its adoption, and particularly led to the provision contained in it which prohibits paper emissions and the violations of contracts, and which gives an appellate supremacy to the judicial department of the U. S. Those who framed and ratified the Constitution believed that as power was less likely to be abused by majorities in representative Govts. than in democracies, where the people assembled in mass, and less likely in the larger than in the smaller communities, under a representative Govt. inferred also, that by dividing the powers of Govt. and thereby enlarging the practicable sphere of government, unjust majorities would be formed with still more difficulty, and be therefore the less to be dreaded, . . . Farrand, 4:86-87 319