Abstract
The essays written by A [Maryland] Farmer were printed in the Maryland
Gazette during February, March, and April of 1788. While no direct evidence
of authorship has been found, it seems likely that A [Maryland] Farmer was John
Francis Mercer, a non-signing member of the Constitutional Convention and an
active Maryland Anti-Federalist. The attribution is inconclusive since it
depends almost entirely on a similarity in argument between those of A Farmer
and those known to have been made by Mercer. The chief source of Mercer's views
is Madison's report of his speech in the Convention on 14 August. We have in
addition a useful letter to Jefferson, written in 1804, and the "Address
to the Members of the Conventions of New York and Virginia".
In the first essay he replies to a Federalist pamphlet by Aristides, the
pseudonym of Alexander Contee Hanson, a Maryland legislator and judge. A Farmer
contends that, whereas in a monarchy numbers are typically on the side of the
individual, in a popular government the danger to the individual lies in the
interests or heated passions of the majority and that, therefore, the freer or
more democratic the government, the greater the need for clear expressions of
individual rights. A Farmer concludes this essay with the question whether a
national government is to be preferred for the United States to a league or a
confederation.
In his second essay A Farmer takes up the subject of representation. The
argument is that representative government is aristocracy, which is corrupt and
tyrannical and which leads the desperate people to hand themselves over to a
single man. Normally, then, representative government leads to tyranny
supported by a standing army; but A Farmer holds out a possibility of tempering
the aristocracy with a strong and independent executive.
In the third essay, A Farmer takes up the question of whether a national or
a federal government is to be preferred. A Farmer sees little in the present
corrupted manners of his fellow citizens to suggest that they are now capable
of sustaining self-government, and provides a very interesting sketch of the
three main classes in the United States, and their probable future.
In the fourth essay A Farmer criticizes the absence of provision for trial
by jury in civil cases and discusses the value of the jury as the democratic
part of the judiciary—the people's check on government and their school
in public affairs.
In his fifth essay, A Farmer returns to his major theme of representation.
He argues that we should proceed slowly and carefully. A representative system
can only succeed if based on fixed and permanent orders, but the only such
order in America is the yeomanry, which is powerless. The Constitution tries to
erect a republic on the ruins of a corrupt monarchy. A government for the
United States founded on representation requires at least an executive for life
and a senate also for life appointed by the executive. The problem is to
prevent the executive from becoming hereditary.
In his sixth essay A Farmer replies to Aristides on various minor points,
chiefly the question of concurrent jurisdiction of federal and state courts.
In the seventh and final essay, extending over several numbers of the
Maryland Gazette, A Farmer replies to some further criticisms of
Aristides and summarizes his own argument. He traces the decline of government
from its initial devotion to equal rights to its unavoidably unequal operation.
Oppressed by the few, the people call on one man to rule them.
