Why the American Government Works

The American form of government works because it protects the liberty of the people, allows for freedom of belief, and is comprised of three branches of government which check one another's power through a system of checks and balances.

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"Liberty is to faction what air is to fire, an aliment without which it instantly expires. But it could not be less folly to abolish liberty, which is essential to political life, because it nourishes faction, than it would be to wish the annihilation of air, which is essential to animal life, because it imparts to fire its destructive agency"

The government exists to protect the liberty of the people.

"As long as the reason of man continues fallible, and he is at liberty to exercise it, different opinions will be formed. As long as the connection subsists between his reason and his self-love, his opinions and his passions will have a reciprocal influence on each other; and the former will be objects to which the latter will attach themselves. The diversity in the faculties of men, from which the rights of property originate, is not less an insuperable obstacle to a uniformity of interests. The protection of these faculties is the first object of government"

The American government upholds its responsibility to represent and accept differing opinions of its people.

"the representatives must be raised to a certain number, in order to guard against the cabals of a few; and that, however large it may be, they must be limited to a certain number, in order to guard against the confusion of a multitude"

The number of representatives within the American government are enough to properly guard the interests of the people, but not so many that it becomes disorganized.

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"In order to lay a due foundation for that separate and distinct exercise of the different powers of government, which to a certain extent is admitted on all hands to be essential to the preservation of liberty, it is evident that each department should have a will of its own; and consequently should be so constituted that the members of each should have as little agency as possible in the appointment of the members of the others. Were this principle rigorously adhered to, it would require that all the appointments for the supreme executive, legislative, and judiciary magistracies should be drawn from the same fountain of authority, the people, through channels having no communication whatever with one another"

The government, separated into three branches, receives all its power from the people.

"In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself"

The American government has sufficient control over the people, but also controls itself through a system of checks and balances between branches.

"Hence a double security arises to the rights of the people. The different governments will control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself"

The government ensures the rights of the people are secure by using a separation of powers.