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JAMES MADISON, FOUNDER |
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James Madison was the fourth President of the United States. He is considered the Father of the Constitution, since he was the major backer for the Constitutional Convention as well as the developer of the Virginia Plan. Madison co-authored the Federalist Papers with Hamilton and Jay and brilliantly opposed Patrick Henry in the Virginia Congress debates. Initially, he opposed the concept of a "Bill of Rights," afraid that the national government would find implied powers to arise from specified limitations. Later, as he informed his good friend Thomas Jefferson, he changed his mind and introduced amendments, during the First Congress, which became the Bill or Rights. Madison's focus was on balance. He wanted to set up a system wherein factions balance each other in the branches of government, which were to balance each other as well. Finally, the people's liberty was to be protected by balancing the interests and powers of the National and States' governments. During the Constitutional Debates, Madison focused on the danger to the proposed national government from the States. When the national government threatened the people's liberty, Madison supported States Rights. It is true, however, that Madison often thought the national government was becoming too |
strong when he was in the opposition, while he considered the States to be encroaching on the powers of the national government when the Democratic Republican Party was in charge of the Executive Branch. During the Constitutional Convention debates and in the Federalist Papers Madison explained that the role of the States was to inform the People when the National government attempted to deprive them of their liberties. Thus warned, if the national government did not change its policies, then the people, as a majority of the whole rather than various states or a majority of various states, would be bound to threaten non-compliance and an end to the government, relying on their own weaponry for defense and as a deterrent. Some years later the national government passed a law preventing the Aurora newspaper from printing news contrary to the government's interest. The Supreme Court members, largely supporters of a strong national government, held that the law did not violate the Constitution. Madison led Virginia in the Virginia Resolutions, engaging in exactly the policy outlined above. Thomas Jefferson, whose views were slightly different, pushed forward the Kentucky Resolution which provided the basis for the later debate on Nullification and Interposition (supported by John C. Calhoun and the secessionists), concepts vigorously opposed by Madison. Madison was an admirer of Benjamin Franklin, and, like Jefferson, an amateur scientist and philosopher. With his death, the age of the Founders came to an end. |