… is from page 89 of George Will’s newly published 2019 book, The Conservative Sensibility:
The words “leader” or “leaders” appear in thirteen times in The Federalist, once with reference to those who led the Revolution and twelve times in a context of disparagement. The Founders, apprehensive about the people’s potential for irrational passions, were wary of leaders who would seek to ascend to power on waves of such passions.
DBx: Right they were to so worry, for – as brilliantly argued by my GMU Econ colleague Bryan Caplan, and by Geoffrey Brennan and Loren Lomasky – political action is especially prone to be irrational.