The costs add up

What are the chief sources of expense in every Government? … The answer, plainly is, war and rebellions – the support of those institutions which are necessary to guard the body politic, against those two most mortal diseases of society.

Alexander Hamilton in Federalist No. 34

How a constitution is breached

… the executive department had not been innocent of frequent breaches of the Constitution. … The great proportion of the instances were either immediately produced by the necessities of war or recommended by Congress or the Commander in Chief. … In most of the other instances, they conformed either to the declared or the known sentiments of the legislative department.

James Madison in Federalist No. 48

No House of Lords

… the federal senate will never be able to transform itself, by gradual usurpation, into an independent and aristocratic body; we are warranted in believing that if such a revolution should ever happen from causes which the foresight of man cannot guard against, the house of representatives with the people on their side will at all times be able to bring back the constitution to its primitive form and principles.

James Madison in Federalist No. 63