Work Text:
The Federalist, No. 86: The Constitution and Wizardly Citizens of the United States.
Debate has begun to spring up, most notably within the more learned of our cities, regarding what role magic users will play within these United States, and whether the new Constitution and its government would intend to advocate adherence to the International Statute of Secrecy, now that we are no longer colonies shepherded into laws by the mother country. The deliberate distancing of part of our population that such a move implies would become an inexcusable distraction in the present moment; the proposed Constitution addresses the matter in a fashion befitting the spirit of compromise thus far presented.
Some among us, even at this critical moment, would protest that secrecy is only proper maintenance of the wizardly community, and that such separation from the mundane government is as necessary as that between Church and State to uphold our common interest. Such statements become utterly false in the face of more than a century's ample proof that the contrary approach has served us well, and further supports our intent since the War to put the Old World's certainty in its rectitude to the test.
The Statute of Secrecy was designed to suit European concerns regarding anti-magical prejudice, which arose from the likes of the Spanish Inquisition. However, it does not properly address the needs of frontier living in the New World; and most of the United States have largely disregarded it since the horrors of the Salem Witch Trials. Secrecy is further a vain hope when one is among the Indians; their wizardly traditions are peculiar from those of European heritage, not least regarding lack of concern over hiding their gifts.
The United States cannot abide further segregation of their own people if they hope to survive the perils of sovereignty. A number of more pressing concerns remain: The French still hold the Louisiana Territory to our West; Britain yet lingers to our North, and she will certainly press that advantage at the first sign of our weakness; Spain remains to our South; Indians abound on all sides; and the matters upon which the States have thus far compromised continually threaten to tear us asunder. Should we stumble now, the Union shall not survive the fall; we ought to seize this opportunity to spare ourselves one further point of conflict.
Finally, the wizardly communities of Britain fashion themselves after her aristocracy, prizing the greatest distance from mundane heritage they might achieve; it would, then, be prudent to avoid allowing that pattern of behavior to establish itself here, and mire our fledgling Republic.
Still, separate of this author's opinion, the new Constitution would allow this matter to be settled, for or against secrecy, by the people's representatives, and would thence provide for regulation of wizardly affairs in much the same way as it proposes to accommodate the everyday governing of the people. Enforcement or rejection of the Statute of Secrecy, pending the vote of Congress, would fall to the Federal government, as would regulation of the most potent spells and potions. The individual State Legislatures would then be permitted to address the remainder of wizardly concerns as they saw fit, providing a reasonable balance of the responsibilities.
We are well aware that the United States' wizardly and mundane populations are perfectly capable of coexistence. The new Constitution provides an opportunity for us to grasp that coexistence, or, failing that, to provide an equal measure of integration and awareness throughout the States, as the Articles of Confederation have thus far failed to do. It is unreasonable to allow adjacent States to draw opposing conclusions on the matter of secrecy, and to then suppose this fragile Union might still stand.
PUBLIUS.
***
This final Federalist Paper was written by Alexander Hamilton (himself a wizard of no prior magical heritage, and the most able of the group to comment on the situation). The Statute of Secrecy was one of many British laws treated more like a guideline, especially after the witch-hunt fiasco in Salem, all of three years after Britain signed into the Statute, proved hiding would not save the mundane population from itself. ('Muggle' did not fall out of use until the 20th century, but Hamilton avoided the derogatory term out of respect for his family as well as non-magical colleagues.)
Abandoning the Statute of Secrecy was not a popular idea among the Southern gentry, who frequently lived in denial that their slaves might come into magical talent and hoped to use the official silence as a smokescreen; however, they agreed that a broader application of the Statute than the Articles could provide was in their best interest for doing business with the North. The issue was among the first to face the newly minted Congress. Deemed important enough a 'treaty' to merit consideration of both houses, it went before the House of Representatives first, which narrowly voted in favor of rejecting the Statute. It went on to produce the first-ever senatorial tie vote, famously broken by vice president John Adams: "It yet pains me to postpone the end of human bondage in this Republic for the sake of the Union; I will be damned if I allow those selfsame concerns to rob me of my knowledge." Washington signed the new nation's refusal to comply with the Statute of Secrecy shortly thereafter.
Britain's Ministry of Magic apparently took the decision as a personal affront - which, in all fairness, it partly was - and used it to justify their involvement in instigating the War of 1812. Their part in the war, combined with the Monroe Doctrine's explicit reference to an end to magical meddling in the Western Hemisphere, deepened a rift between the US and the Ministry of Magic that only began healing in the late 1990s, as Britain pulled out of the latest in a long line of magical civil wars.
While it is relatively unsung today, the last of the Federalist Papers did quite a bit for the shape of modern America. The policy of coexistence it produced drastically limited the available fuel for the breed of maniacs that has caused so many problems in Britain and Europe. It also provided what many minority-rights groups call the earliest groundwork of federal policy in favor of equality across the board.