Representative Government

The thesis finds its roots in a critique by Robert Dahl on the Federalist Papers. The Federalist Papers, as a classic masterpiece of the modern political science, has been honored as the Bible of American Constitution and expanded profoundly on the meaning of the Constitution of the Unite States in theory. According to the whole train of thoughts of the Federalists, the republic concept (especially Madison's differentiation of "republic" and "democracy"), which is the core of the Federalist Papers, is the foundation stone of the compound republic theory the Federalists wanted to construct. In On Democracy, however, Robert Dahl made the following comments: to express their Popular Government, the Greeks created "democracy";while Roman people called their government "republic" according to the Latin (their mother tongue) meaning of the word. Later, Italian people also called some of the Popular Governments among the Poleis "republic". Thus, the Federalist Papers differentiated the two words with insufficient historical evidence, and confused the readers on the connotation of the two concepts. Is he correct that the Federalist Papers differentiated the two concepts with insufficient historical evidence? Are there any new meanings in the republic concept revealed in the Papers? This thesis aims to study the compound republic theory the Federalists wanted to construct mainly through the review of the Federalist Papers, and try to answer the questions posed above.The thesis first traces the classical republic concept pertinent to the theme: republicanism in the minds of Aristotle, Cicero and Montesquieu. Classical authors such as Aristotle and Cicero made the earliest descriptions of "republic". Aristotle made "Common Advantage", "Regime of Mixture", "Political Partnership Made up of Middling Elements" and "Constitutionalism" the main components of republicanism. Cicero believed that the republic was people's concern, with "mixed and balanced constitution" as its governing system, and "equality", "stability", "harmony" and "balance" as its aims. These ideas, together with Montesquieu's virtuous, peaceful, moderate and equal republic, helped to build up the theoretical foundation for the federalist republicanism;and based on the comments by John Patrick Diggins on therelationship between the Federalist Constitution and Classical thoughts, the thesis aims to further study the relationship between the Federalist Republicanism and Classical thoughts from another perspective.The thesis then focuses on how the Federalists constructed the compound republic theory through their Federalist Papers. In the construction of the republicanism, the writers of The Federalist Papers believed that there was a negative aspect to human nature, and that framing a republic required a balance of power that liberated human dignity and rationality and controlled human sin and depravity. Then, they not only applied representative government and developed the classical republic conception, but also drew the constitutionalism into it and explained the meaning of constitutionalism from such aspects as the supremacy of constitution, check and balance, federalism and compound republicanism, thus broadened the republic concept. In the inheritance and development of the Classical thoughts, the Federalists successfully integrated democracy, constitutionalism and republicanism, and finally constructed their compound republic theory.Through the study of the relationship between the Federalist Papers and Classical Republicanism, the present thesis answers the questions posed by Dahl and makes some reflections on the significances and limitations of the Federalist Papers.