Federalist No. 34 is an essay by Alexander Hamilton

Alexander Hamilton

Alexander Hamilton was a Founding Father, soldier, economist, political philosopher, one of America's first constitutional lawyers and the first United States Secretary of the Treasury...

, the thirty-fourth of the Federalist Papers

Federalist Papers

The Federalist Papers are a series of 85 articles or essays promoting the ratification of the United States Constitution. Seventy-seven of the essays were published serially in The Independent Journal and The New York Packet between October 1787 and August 1788...

. It was published on January 5, 1788 under the pseudonym

Pseudonym

A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...

 Publius, the name under which all the Federalist Papers were published. This is the fifth of seven essays by Hamilton on the then-controversial issue of taxation. It is titled, "The Same Subject Continued: Concerning the General Power of Taxation."

Brief Precis

Hamilton's aim is to demonstrate that a government must have unlimited power of taxation for such circumstances as war and natural disaster. He argues that the state governments, which share taxation rights with the federal government, will serve as a balance and prevent abuse of such powers. He argues, further, that the federal government will always incur the greatest expenses, should have the greatest body to draw taxes from, and require a greater power of taxation than the states.

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