Perhaps the best people could hope for was a benign dictator. The Founders saw, though, that there could be order and power in diversity. Keep an eye on each other. Blow the whistle on each other. Keep each other in check.
Factions are the way people ordinarily seek redress of grievances.
My first message is that you are custodians of this glorious creation, American government. However, the Founders did not expect the activities of government, whether in the nation's capitol or state capitols or city halls or county seats or school buildings, to consist only of the clashing of competing interests - each faction, each elected person merely looking out for its own, one's own, private and parochial interests. No, they set up a representative democracy. On another occasion, at the convention called in Virginia to take up the ratification of the Constitution, a fellow delegate taunted Madison, saying that he must have a low opinion of mankind, since he thought it necessary to build in so many checks and balances, so many protections against people taking advantage of each other. To suppose that any form of government will secure liberty or happiness without any virtue in the people is a chimerical idea.