ABSTRACT
Martin Diamond's "commercial republic" interpretation of Federalist 10 is widely embraced by political scientists, especially Straussians. This chapter argues that Madison was not a "commercial republican" and that his conception of political economy is not, as Diamond insists, implicit in Madison's understanding of an extended republic. In general, Diamond argues that the theory Madison presents in Federalist 10 "anticipated and refuted Marxism." More specifically, Diamond argues that Madison's principal purpose is to promote competition between economic interests and thus to diffuse the possibility of a class struggle. Diamond begins his reading of Federalist 10 by noting that Madison is trying to find a cure for the perennial pathology of democracies: their vulnerability to the violence of majority factions. Diamond used Federalist 10 as a vehicle to teach the conclusions he had reached and that he and others were unifying into the critique of Marxism and defense of the American system.
