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The Federalist Papers · Federalist No. 26 · paragraph 13

If such suppositions could even be reasonably made, still the concealment of the design, for any duration, would be impracticable. It would be announced, by the very circumstance of augmenting the army to so great an extent in time of profound peace. What colorable reason could be assigned, in a country so situated, for such vast augmentations of the military force? It is impossible that the people could be long deceived; and the destruction of the project, and of the projectors, would quickly follow the discovery.
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Publius · Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, James Madison · 1787–1788
Project Gutenberg #18, updated 11 October 2025; its author-attribution labels and source notes are retained. The supplied file does not identify one uniform underlying print edition.
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