The States were not relinquishing their sovereignty to a Federal government; instead, they were ceding certain powers to a Federal government that would be composed of Representatives and Senators accountable to the electorate and legislators of the States from which they came.

Uniting the States under the US Constitution, for Hamilton, was the surest way to persevere liberty and minimize the tendency of standing armies to tend toward authoritarianism.

For Hamilton, it was clear, the States united under one, limited government, stood the best chance of survival against threats from abroad, and from internal dissensions. The central government, to whom the public debt would fall, with whom the authority to mitigate territorial disputes, and by whom interstate commerce would be regulated, gave the States a uniform structure within to operate, and mitigated possibilities of internal altercations.

This Federalist Paper goes a long way in explaining the enumerated Congressional powers in Section 1 Article 8 of the US Constitution. The Congressional powers were supposed to be very limited, and were to be used to provide levels of uniformity between the States in specific areas.

Federalist No.1 introduced the topic of the Constitution and prepared the readers for the coming papers in support of adoption. Hamilton argued that no less than, “the existence of the Union, the safety and welfare of the parts of which it is composed, the fate of an empire in many respects the most interesting in the world,” were at stake.