Federalist No. 10 × Brutus No. 1
Work in teams of 3–4. Read the documents, test each author’s reasoning, and defend your conclusion. Use one device per team. Discuss before selecting an answer.
40 minutes · 10 challenges · 100 possible game points
No account, class code, or team name required.
Your question: Would a large republic protect liberty, or put government too far beyond the people’s control?
Reads aloud and pauses at difficult words.
Points to words that support the answer.
Asks: “Why?” and “What would the other author say?”
Enters and explains the agreed answer.
With three students, combine reader and recorder. Rotate roles at Brutus. Everyone speaks before the team checks an answer.
Game points are practice feedback, not an AP score or automatic course grade. Written work receives teacher feedback separately. Every section is open from the start.
Progress stays in this browser when storage is available. Download your work before leaving.
Core: Topics 1.2 (models of democracy) and 1.3 (Federalist and Anti-Federalist views). Both documents are required. Review: Topic 1.6, Federalist No. 51 and constitutional restraints on power.
Practice identifying claims and evidence, explaining reasoning, applying concepts, and defending a claim. Modern scenarios are invented examples. The final paragraph is practice, not a full AP Argument Essay.
Aligned to the fall 2026 CED. Independent classroom activity.
Context: James Madison wrote Federalist No. 10 as Publius in November 1787 to support ratification. Read A–C aloud. Point to words that justify each answer.
PASSAGE A · DEFINING FACTION
“By a faction, I understand a number of citizens, whether amounting to a majority or a minority of the whole, who are united and actuated by some common impulse of passion, or of interest, adversed to the rights of other citizens, or to the permanent and aggregate interests of the community.”
Actuated: motivated. Adversed: opposed. Aggregate: combined. Sharing an interest does not automatically make a group a faction in Madison’s sense.
PASSAGE B · CAUSES OR EFFECTS?
“There are again two methods of removing the causes of faction: the one, by destroying the liberty which is essential to its existence; the other, by giving to every citizen the same opinions, the same passions, and the same interests.”
“The inference to which we are brought is, that the CAUSES of faction cannot be removed, and that relief is only to be sought in the means of controlling its EFFECTS.”
Two separate selections. Between them, Madison rejected destroying liberty and argued that making everyone think alike was impracticable.
PASSAGE C · EXTEND THE SPHERE
“Extend the sphere, and you take in a greater variety of parties and interests; you make it less probable that a majority of the whole will have a common motive to invade the rights of other citizens; or if such a common motive exists, it will be more difficult for all who feel it to discover their own strength, and to act in unison with each other.”
Sphere: the republic’s population and territory. In unison: together. Notice “less probable”: a safeguard, not a guarantee.
A–C: Federalist No. 10, Yale Avalon Project. Passage labels are supplied for this activity.
Rotate roles. Brutus, an Anti-Federalist writing under a pseudonym in October 1787, opposed ratifying the proposed Constitution. Read D–F and ask what could go wrong in a large republic.
PASSAGE D · REPRESENTING THE PEOPLE
“If the people are to give their assent to the laws, by persons chosen and appointed by them, the manner of the choice and the number chosen, must be such, as to possess, be disposed, and consequently qualified to declare the sentiments of the people; for if they do not know, or are not disposed to speak the sentiments of the people, the people do not govern, but the sovereignty is in a few.”
Assent: agreement. Sentiments: views. Sovereignty: ultimate authority. Brutus accepted representation; he worried about whether representatives would truly know and speak for the people.
PASSAGE E · DIVERSITY AND DISAGREEMENT
“This will retard the operations of government, and prevent such conclusions as will promote the public good.”
Retard: slow down. In the preceding sentences, Brutus argued that a republic needed similar interests and views; otherwise, representatives of different areas would clash. Discuss how his conclusion differs from Madison’s in C.
PASSAGE F · THE STATES’ FUTURE
“all that is reserved for the individual states must very soon be annihilated”
An excerpt from a longer sentence. Brutus warned that national power would consume state power. Earlier, he singled out the Necessary and Proper Clause and Supremacy Clause. This was his prediction, not a statement that the Constitution immediately abolished states.
D–F: Brutus No. 1, Teaching American History. Glosses are explanations, not part of the original text.
PASSAGE G · MADISON ON REPRESENTATION
“to refine and enlarge the public views, by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens”
Madison hoped elected representatives would exercise judgment for the public good. He also acknowledged that representatives could betray the people. Compare this hope with Brutus’s concern in D.
Participatory: broad citizen involvement.
Pluralist: organized groups competing for influence.
Elite: a smaller set of leaders or influential people making decisions.
These are lenses for analysis. Neither document fits only one label. Brutus favored closer representation, not necessarily direct voting on every law.
Discuss all three rows. The first is a worked example. Complete the other two with a short quotation or accurate paraphrase, a passage letter, and an explanation. Invent a present-day example.
| Democracy model | Evidence and reasoning | Contemporary example |
|---|---|---|
| Pluralist | Example: In C, Madison described a “greater variety of parties and interests.” Competing interests could make an oppressive majority harder to organize. | Hypothetical: Tenant groups, builders, and neighborhood associations negotiate a housing proposal. No group wins everything it wants. |
| Participatory | ||
| Elite |
Explain the connection. Merely naming a document or group does not show how a model works.
These are hypothetical scenarios. Analyze the mechanism; you do not need to agree with any policy.
A group wants a law excluding a religious minority from public office. It wins a majority in one state, but supporters cannot build a national majority because people in other states have different priorities.
Assume the facts above for this exercise. The proposal also raises constitutional rights issues; this question isolates Madison’s argument about factions.
A national transportation committee designs one policy for rural towns, suburbs, and major cities. Residents argue that distant representatives barely know local travel needs. The committee’s members disagree so sharply that it takes no action.
Separate two questions: Does diversity obstruct effective government, or prevent one interest from dominating? Can a proposal be inefficient yet still protect liberty? Explain each author’s likely reasoning.
You have already studied this document. Recall how institutional design limits the abuse of power.
PASSAGE H · FEDERALIST NO. 51
“Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.”
“The different governments will control each other, at the same time that each will be controlled by itself.”
Separate selections from Federalist No. 51. The second connects national/state division with checks within each government.
No. 10: representation and competing interests in a large republic help control factions. No. 51: divided institutions and checks on power help restrain officials. These safeguards complement one another; they are not the same mechanism.
Which argument better explains how to protect liberty: Madison’s case for a large republic or Brutus’s case for smaller, more responsive republics?
Write 4–6 substantial sentences together. You may qualify your claim. Use about 5 minutes to write, 2 minutes for a partner check, and 1 minute for the exit response.
This checklist guides feedback. The paragraph is not automatically graded or included in the game score.
Complete: “Madison and Brutus agreed that ___, but disagreed about ___ because ___.” Each person must supply an explanation in their own words.
Complete the challenges and the written work, then download your record.
Before leaving: Download your responses or print/save a PDF. Follow your teacher’s directions for turning in the file or sharing your reasoning in class.
Responses and points stay on this device; they are not sent to your teacher or synced across devices. This activity does not submit grades to Canvas. On a shared device, download your work before starting a new team.
Pacing: setup 3 minutes; No. 10, 8; Brutus, 8; comparison, 7; application, 6; argument and exit, 8. Use a team reporter to explain one missed question during debrief.
Look for: factions can be majorities or minorities; liberty cannot safely be destroyed to stop them. Madison’s solution relies on representation and a larger variety of interests. Brutus feared remote representation, clashing interests, and consolidation of national power.
Written responses: Accept either defensible position if evidence and causal reasoning support it. Brutus’s local accountability connects to participation; Madison’s selected representatives connect to elite filtering. Neither connection means the author fits only that model. In Scenario 2, Brutus could see gridlock and remoteness; Madison could see competing interests checking domination and a role for state/local attention to local needs.
Correct common confusions: Federalism divides power between levels; separation of powers assigns functions to branches; checks and balances allow branches to restrain each other. Brutus did not oppose all representation. Madison did not promise that large republics eliminate factions.
Students have open access to explanations and hints because this is a learning activity. Scores are device-local practice records, not secure assessment results.