Another effect of public instability is the unreasonable advantage it gives to the sagacious, the enterprising, and the moneyed few, over the industrious and uninformed mass of the People. Every new regulation concerning commerce or revenue, or in any way affecting the value of the different species of property, presents a new harvest to those who watch the change and can trace its consequences; a harvest, reared not by themselves, but by the toils and cares of the great body of their fellow-citizens. This is a state of things, in which it may be said, with some truth, that laws are made for the few, not for the many.
In another point of view, great injury results from an unstable Government. The want of confidence in the public councils damps every useful undertaking, the success and profit of which may depend on a continuance of existing arrangements. What prudent merchant will hazard his fortunes in any new branch of commerce, when he knows not but that his plans may be rendered unlawful before they can be executed? What farmer or manufacturer will lay himself out for the encouragement given to any particular cultivation or establishment, when he can have no assurance that his preparatory labors and advances will not render him a victim to an inconstant Government? In a word, no great improvement or laudable enterprise can go forward, which requires the auspices of a steady system of National policy.
But the most deplorable effect of all is that diminution of attachment and reverence, which steals into the hearts of the People, towards a political system which betrays so many marks of infirmity, and disappoints so many of their flattering hopes. No Government, any more than an individual, will long be respected, without being truly respectable; nor be truly respectable, without possessing a certain portion of order and stability.
PUBLIUS.
