James Madison Wrote Bill Of Rights

to Protect Liberty, Thu, Jul 02 2015 00:00:00 EA03_LSBY SCOTT S. SMITH, FOR INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY 07/01/2015 01:46 PM ET
James Madison was the great collaborator who worked with other Founding Fathers to create the United States.

• As the youngest delegate to the Continentl Congress in 1783, he persuaded four states to give up territory that would lead to the formation of six new ones.

• He guided the debates of the Constitutional Convention in 1787, then wrote many of the Federalist Papers that led to ratification.

• He pushed the Bill of Rights through Congress, ratified in 1791, ensuring freedom of speech and press and the right to a jury trial.

• He served as the fourth president and guided the U.S. through the War of 1812, confirming its independence from Britain.

Though overshadowed by more famous founders, he "did more than any other to conceive and establish the nation we know," wrote Lynne Cheney, wife of former Vice President Dick Cheney, in "James Madison: A Life Reconsidered."

Madison (1751-1836) was the oldest of 12 children born to a prosperous family of tobacco planters near Port Conway, Va. From 11 to 18, he was tutored and graduated from what would become Princeton University in New Jersey in 1771.

Big Influence Madison's Keys

• Fourth U.S. president and major force in ratifying the Constitution.
• Overcame: Poor health.
• Lesson: Look for partners' strengths and compensate for their weaknesses.
• "A people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives."

Back at the plantation, Montpelier, he became a colonel of the local militia in 1775 — the first year of the War of Independence — but his fragile health and size, at 5 feet 4 inches and never more than 100 pounds, meant that he never saw combat during the Revolution.

The next year, at 25, he became a delegate to Virginia's legislature, where he became a protégé’ of another delegate, Thomas Jefferson.

In 1780, Madison at 29 was the youngest representative to the Continental Congress, where he developed a reputation for doing much of the hard work drafting legislation and building coalitions.

In 1783, the war ended, and he persuaded Virginia, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Maryland to give up claims to western lands to create the Northwest Territory, out of which would come the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and part of Minnesota.

Madison, George Washington and Alexander Hamilton became alarmed by the weak federal government formed under the Articles of Confederation, which had no power to raise taxes to pay the war debt. So in 1787, Madison helped call a Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia to create a better system.

"Madison had a bimodal mind that was capable of functioning with great agility in a complicated political context, then ascend above the fray to the higher level of political theory, the latter a talent that had earned him a reputation as one of America's pre-eminent political philosophers," wrote Joseph Ellis in "The Quartet: Orchestrating the Second American Revolution, 1783-1789." "He promised Washington that nothing short of radical change was worth their effort."

Madison wrote: “In a Republic, the great danger is that the majority may not sufficiently respect the rights of the minority. A popular government without popular information or the means of acquiring it is but a prologue to a farce, or a tragedy or perhaps both. It will be of little avail to the people that the laws were made by men of their own choice if the laws be so voluminous that they cannot be read, or so incoherent that they cannot be understood.

Madison, the youngest delegate at 36, spoke often, arguing for compromises that would be acceptable to a majority. He also took the minutes that have let historians reconstruct the debates. Of the 55 delegates, 39 signed the final document.

After the new Constitution was sent to the state legislatures to be ratified, Madison teamed up with Hamilton and John Jay to write the Federalist Papers, 85 newspaper articles that answered critics.

Clinton Rossiter, a historian in the 20th century, called them "the most important work in political science that ever has been written, or is likely ever to be written, in the United States."

The fight was close, but in September 1788 the new federal government was approved and Washington became the first president the next year. Madison was elected to the House of Representatives.

"The Convention delegates had been mostly concerned about the structure of the federal government and its relationship with the states, so Madison voted with the majority to squelch a proposed Bill of Rights," David Stewart, author of "Madison's Gift," told IBD. "Among other reasons, he argued that enumerating those rights was dangerous because it would imply that any not specified were intentionally omitted. But he listened to other points of view and changed his mind, which was one of his strengths. He also hoped that by amending the Constitution, it would take the steam out of demands for structural changes to it and even for a second convention.

"At first he was the sole voice in Congress to add these amendments, but by 1791 the first 10 were ratified by the states."

Fit the Bill

The Bill of Rights guarantees freedom of speech, press, assembly and religion, the right to bear arms, freedom from unreasonable search and seizure, a speedy trial by jury in civil cases, and other protections fundamental to the American view of individual liberty.

Factions appeared in Congress.

Hamilton and Adams led the Federalists, who favored an even stronger central government than the Constitution mandated, the formation of a national bank and a more industrialized economy.

Madison, Jefferson and James Monroe led the Democratic-Republicans, who favored a smaller federal government, more states' rights and a farm-based economy.

Madison finally married in 1794, when he was 43 and Dolley Todd, a widow with one son, was 26. (They would have no children together.)

She became vital to his success because she had a sparkling personality and helped build friendships through the dinners she hosted — effectively creating the role of first lady when he became president.

He had an unusually high opinion of women's gifts for a man of his time, once commenting, "The capacity of the female mind for studies of the highest order cannot be doubted, having been sufficiently illustrated by works of genius, or erudition, and of science."

When Jefferson became president in 1801, he named Madison secretary of state. When Napoleon Bonaparte abandoned his dream of an empire in North America, he offered to sell the Louisiana Territory, which the U.S. bought in the bargain of all time — $15 million (worth $324 million now) — in 1803, doubling the nation's size.

The Presidency

Madison was Jefferson's heir apparent and was elected to two terms: 1809 to 1817.

Hamilton's Bank of the United States expired when its charter was up in 1811, making it tough to find funding to expand the military as relations with Britain heated up.

Sparking the trouble was the Royal Navy's seizure of U.S. ships trading with France, Britain's enemy.

Initially, the War of 1812 went badly for America, with a few victories at sea and on the Great Lakes, while British troops burned Washington, D.C.

A peace treaty was signed in February 1815, but before the news reached Gen. Andrew Jackson, he whipped the redcoats in New Orleans.

Though the war changed little, Americans felt proud that they had again stood up to the most powerful empire in the world, and several years of prosperity followed, making Madison popular.

Leaving the presidency at age 65, he returned to Montpelier with a lot of personal debt and focused on building up his finances.

In 1826, after the death of Jefferson, he was appointed the second president of the University of Virginia, a position that he would hold until his death 10 years later, the last of the Founding Fathers.

"Madison brought many gifts to his public career," said Stewart. "Among them was a deep understanding of political and economic forces and an inspiring vision of a strong government that could serve the public while protecting personal liberties.

"But ultimately, it was his ability to work well with others that enabled him to play an outsize role in creating the United States."

Source:http://news.investors.com/management-leaders-and-success/070115-759847-james-madison-was-fourth-us-president.htm?p=3

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