In October 1787, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison, together under the
pseudonym ‘Publius’, wrote the Federalist Papers, which are often considered the primary explanation of the U.S. Constitution. Consisting of eighty-five essays, the Papers refer to ‘security’ 116 times, and ‘war’ and ‘wars’ 79 times. Numbers 1-9, as well as 22 29 and 41-43, concentrate almost entirely on security issues, ranging from defence against external enemies to the roles of the militia, army and navy. Reflecting the same preoccupation with the need for national unity and concerns regarding war and defence as had been heard at the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Publius repeatedly argued that the adoption of the new Constitution was necessary to ensure the security of the union. On numerous occasions
throughout the Papers, Publius writes on matters of defence in terms often starkly
reminiscent of Kriegsraison. As has been argued elsewhere, we ‘cannot escape the extent to which the drums of war provide the background accompaniment to most of Publius’s arguments for adoption of the new U.S. Constitution.’ Nor can we escape the sound of those drums, which continue to reverberate through American political life some 230 years later. This paper will assess the influence of the Papers, and the security concerns of the ‘Founding Fathers’ as enshrined in the U.S. Constitution, on U.S. interpretations of the international law
of war. In so doing, the paper will demonstrate that the United States’ historic relationship
with insecurity and war continues to exert tremendous influence on U.S. interpretations of the international law on the use of force today, and indeed, has shaped U.S. applications of this law for many decades.