then merely to require a proportion of the attending members. The
former, by making a determinate number at all times requisite to a
resolution, diminishes the motives to punctual attendance. The latter,
by making the capacity of the body to depend on a proportion which
may be varied by the absence or presence of a single member, has the
contrary effect. And as, by promoting punctuality, it tends to keep
the body complete, there is great likelihood that its resolutions would
generally be dictated by as great a number in this case as in the other;
while there would be much fewer occasions of delay. It ought not to be
forgotten that, under the existing Confederation, two members may, and
usually do, represent a State; whence it happens that Congress, who now
are solely invested with all the powers of the Union, rarely consist of
a greater number of persons than would compose the intended Senate. If
we add to this, that as the members vote by States, and that where there
is only a single member present from a State, his vote is lost, it will
justify a supposition that the active voices in the Senate, where the
members are to vote individually, would rarely fall short in number of
the active voices in the existing Congress. When, in addition to these
considerations, we take into view the co-operation of the President,
we shall not hesitate to infer that the people of America would
have greater security against an improper use of the power of making
treaties, under the new Constitution, than they now enjoy under the
Confederation. And when we proceed still one step further, and look
forward to the probable augmentation of the Senate, by the erection of
new States, we shall not only perceive ample ground of confidence in the
sufficiency of the members to whose agency that power will be intrusted,
but we shall probably be led to conclude that a body more numerous than
the Senate would be likely to become, would be very little fit for the
proper discharge of the trust.

PUBLIUS

FEDERALIST No. 76

The Appointing Power of the Executive

From the New York Packet. Tuesday, April 1, 1788.

HAMILTON

To the People of the State of New York:

THE President is "to nominate, and, by and with the advice and consent
of the Senate, to appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and
consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the
United States whose appointments are not otherwise provided for in the
Consti