These ideas are convincing if one shares Calhoun's conviction that a functioning concurrent majority never leads to stalemate in the legislature; rather, talented statesmen, practiced in the arts of conciliation and compromise would pursue "the common good", however explosive the issue.
Calhoun considered the concurrent majority essential to provide structural restraints to governance, believing that "a vast majority of mankind is entirely biased by motives of self-interest and that by this interest must be governed".