128 ALEXANDER HAMILTON 



question tended to unite the Northern states in favour 

 of a centralizing policy and the Southern states in 

 opposition to the same. This was because the great 

 majority of the public creditors were to be found 

 among Northern capitalists. Hamilton's policy ap- 

 pealed directly to their selfish interests, but it did not 

 so appeal to the Southern planters. One of the chief 

 reasons for Virginia's hesitancy in accepting the Con- 

 stitution had been her fear that the commercial North 

 might acquire such a majority in Congress as to en- 

 able it to tyrannize over the agricultural South. The 

 Virginians now denounced the assumption policy as 

 unconstitutional, and Hamilton in self-defence was 

 obliged to formulate what is known as the doctrine 

 of " implied powers." He gave a liberal interpretation 

 to that clause in the Constitution (Art I., Sect, viii., 

 p. 1 8) which authorized Congress "to make all laws 

 which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into 

 execution " such powers as are explicitly vested in the 

 government of the United States. The opponents of 

 a strong government, on the other hand, insisted upon 

 a strict and narrow interpretation of that clause ; and 

 thus arose that profound antagonism between " strict 

 constructionists " and " loose constructionists " which 

 has run through the entire political history of the last 

 hundred years. As a rule the Republican party of 

 Jefferson, with its lineal successor, the Democratic 

 party from Jackson to Cleveland, has advocated strict 

 construction ; while loose construction has character- 

 ized the Federalist party of Hamilton, with its later 

 representatives, the National Republican party of 

 Quincy Adams, the Clay and Webster wing of the 

 Whig party, and the Republicans of the present day. 



