by Chris DeRose
James Madison of Orange had received 1,308 votes and won. James Monroe of Spotsylvania had received 972 votes and lost. At the end of the contest the candidates were separated by 336 votes, and a swing of only 169 voters from Madison to Monroe would have changed the outcome. The sheriffs sealed and certified the results and sent two duplicates to the Governor and Council of State.
The candidates had carried their home counties with varying degrees of decisiveness. The time Madison spent minimizing his losses in Spotsylvania had paid off. Monroe’s margin was only 74 votes. Monroe, by contrast, had failed to make any sort of dent in Orange, where the favorite son won by 207, nearly two-thirds of his margin of victory.
It seems that Madison spent the day of the election in Orange, resisting entreaties to campaign in a county more populous or persuadable. The heavy Baptist influence in Orange, and its decisive support for Madison, led by fellow resident Baptist minister John Leland, likely played a role in his decisive margin.
Monroe’s two best counties were Amherst and Spotsylvania, which turned out at 74 percent and 61 percent respectively. The next highest turnout came from Goochland, with only 51 percent participation, yielding a one-vote margin for Monroe. Madison won in Orange, Louisa, and Albemarle, which had turned out at 38 percent, 44 percent, and 33 percent. These figures are easy to explain: opponents of the new government released pent-up frustration while supporters, equating ratification with total victory, were lulled into complacency.
Edward Carrington added his to the many voices now congratulating Madison on his election: “It is an event which I am convinced would not have taken place a fortnight sooner, had it been then tried, and I am equally convinced, that had you stayed away, it would not have happened at all.” Carrington credited Madison’s letters to Amherst voters with minimizing his losses in the hotbed of Anti-Federalism, won by Monroe 246 to 145.
Culpepper, which Madison had called “the critical county,” provided a net gain to Madison of 153 votes, nearly half his margin of victory. Little Louisa, the only county in the district that had divided its vote at the Convention, had punched well above its weight. Its 44 percent turnout was the highest of all the counties won by Madison. Though its elections for the convention were the narrowest in the state, Louisa’s votes for Congress went overwhelmingly for Madison, who bested Monroe there by a margin of 228 to 124. Louisa was home to one of the churches founded by John Leland. There as elsewhere, the Baptists and other dissenters were the key to Madison’s triumph. Madison’s promises to fight for amendments, particularly for the protection of freedom of conscience, had secured their support. His career-long advocacy of religious freedom had served as a powerful deposit on that promise, which might otherwise have been dismissed as an election-year conversion of convenience.
Washington, relieved to have such a capable and trustworthy ally headed for the new First Congress, praised Madison for his “respectable majority of the suffrages of the district for which you stood.” Now it was time to get to work; Washington enclosed a draft of his first message to Congress; he was looking for Madison’s assistance with his speech.
True to form, Madison did not entirely share in the general’s enthusiasm. He wrote in response to Washington, “Whether I ought to be satisfied or displeased with my success, I shall hereafter be more able to judge. My present anticipations are not flattering. I see on the lists of representatives a very scanty proportion who will share in the drudgery of business. And I foresee contentions first between Federal and Anti-Federal parties, and then between northern and southern parties, which give additional disagreeableness to the prospect.”
On February 15, the defeated James Monroe wrote to Jefferson, expressing what may be his most complete thoughts on the election. The letter, a very late response to Jefferson’s of August 9, had no doubt been delayed by Monroe’s intense campaigning. Before addressing the campaign, he began by recapping the momentous and improbable events of the season. Eleven states had now ratified the Constitution, the New York Circular had called for a new constitutional convention, and Virginia had seconded New York’s call for a second constitutional convention. On the subject of the election, Monroe wrote,The Commonwealth was divided into 10 districts from each of which a member was to be placed in the House of Representatives. A competition took place in many, and in this, consisting of Albemarle, Amherst, Fluvanna, Goochland, Louisa, Spotsylvania, Orange, and Culpepper, between Mr. Madison and myself. He prevailed by a majority of about 300. It would have given me concern to have excluded him, but those to whom my conduct in public life had been acceptable, pressed me to come forward in this government on its commencement, and that I might not lose an opportunity of contributing my feeble efforts, in forwarding an amendment of its defects or shrink from the station those who confided in would wish to place me, I yielded. As I had no private object to gratify, so a failure has given me no private concern.10
On March 29, Madison sent Jefferson his own election recap:It was my misfortune to be thrown into a contest with our friend, Colonel Monroe. The occasion produced considerable efforts among our respective friends. Between ourselves, I have no reason to doubt the distinction was duly kept in mind between political and personal views, and that it has saved our friendship from the smallest diminution. On one side I am sure it is the case.
It surely heartened Jefferson to know that his own dear friends were still friends, though they were no longer political allies.
Baptist minister John Leland offered his congratulations to Madison with characteristic modesty. He began by suggesting that his own efforts had earned at least one vote for Madison—his own.11 Then Leland touched on religious liberty, where he trusted Madison to look out for the rights of dissenters. There was, he said “no danger to the destruction of liberty where the community is well informed. Ignorance always brings on, either mutiny or lethargy, which equally pave the way for tyranny.... One thing I shall expect; that if religious liberty is anywise threatened, that I shall receive the earliest intelligence.”
The Reverend James Madison, who had been so concerned for his cousin’s success, also joined the chorus of well wishers. He wrote,It afforded me great satisfaction to hear of your election.... I rejoice that you are in a situation which enables you to be extensively useful and that we who are to receive the law may at least be assured, one voice will always utter what wisdom and virtue dictate. I believe no people have ever experienced a more important crisis than this at which America is now arrived. For whatever may be said of the perfection or imperfection of the general plan upon which you are to proceed—certain it is that the prosperity of the Federal government will depend in a great measure upon the wisdom of the laws and arrangements first proposed. If they should fortunately, as I trust they will, bear the evident stamp of wisdom and justice, they may gradually eradicate opposition, and thus in its stead establish the affections of the people, the strongest attachment to the general government and perhaps within the period of one century, the world may see a republic composed of at least 60 million of free men, for such will be the population of America, within that time, provided it continues nearly at the rate it hath hitherto observed. The only chain by which such a multitude will be bound together is that of a wise and just law. May your beginning promise such a blessing.
Meanwhile, William Jackson, Secretary of the Congress of the Confederation, was busy keeping up appearances. On October 10, 1788, the Confederation Congress had mustered seven states to reach a quorum for the last time. But New York, thrilled to be the first capital of the new government, happily went about refurbishing City Hall for the new Congress under the Constitution. The banging of hammers prevented those left in the old Congress from carrying on their business, adding insult to injury in the dying hours of a rejected government. So the Confederation Congress moved its temporary quarters to the Fraunces Tavern, the popular bar from which Washington had said farewell to his troops at the end of the war.
From February 19 until March 2, no
t one single delegate attended the “meetings.”12 On March 3, the day before the new Congress was to meet, Phillip Pell was walking down a bustling street when he was approached by Secretary Jackson. Jackson insisted that Pell accompany him to their temporary meeting space. The two of them sat in an otherwise empty chamber, the last remaining members of the old government. As one historian noted, “The faithful secretary had fought the good fight to preserve the ‘visible head’ of the union; he had persevered to the end, he had won the victory. The spark of life had been kept in the body of the dying Congress until its heir and successor was crossing the threshold.”13
And the clock counted down the final minutes of the hapless first government of the free American people.
It was finished.
In the meantime Madison, who had left New York for Virginia burdened by the likely prospect of defeat at the polls, returned again triumphant along his well-worn path to the city of New York. He once again carried the weight of the nation on his shoulders.
Heading north to New York, Madison had time to consider the events that had brought him here. The Virginia Convention of 1776, the Revolutionary War, the tedious days of the Confederation Congress and the Virginia House of Delegates, Annapolis, Philadelphia, ratification, and his recent election to the House of Representatives.
It all seems so inevitable.
Chapter Sixteen
THE “FIRST MAN” OF THE HOUSE: PASSING THE BILL OF RIGHTS
“He is our first man.”
—FISHER AMES
At the end of his life, Chief Justice John Marshall was asked to name the most eloquent orator of his age, for he had heard them all. “Eloquence has been defined to be the art of persuasion,” he replied. “If it includes persuasion by convincing, Mr. Madison was the most eloquent man I ever heard.” Jefferson agreed that Madison was unmatched as a speaker and debater, calling him “the first of every assembly of which he was a member.”1
James Madison was the preeminent member of the first House of Representatives, leader of the dominant Federalist Party—a position he held because of his remarkable record of public service, but even more because of his remarkable powers of mind and unparalleled command of the issues facing the United States.2
Madison was soft-spoken; his audience sometimes had to strain to hear him. But in making his first official address to Congress,i he had every member’s attention as he sounded the alarm on the perilous state of the nation’s finances: “I take the liberty, Mr. Chairman, at this early stage of business to introduce . . . a subject, which appears to me to be of the greatest magnitude; a subject, Sir, that requires our first attention, and our united exertions.”3
To raise revenue, Madison presented a plan to adopt the long-sought impost. It was essentially the same tax on imports that had been urged by the Confederation Congress for years but had repeatedly failed to gain the unanimous consent of the states required under the Articles of Confederation. 4
The national debt was estimated to be a staggering 54 million dollars, 12 million of which was owed to foreign governments.5 Madison’s remedy was moderate. His highest estimate was that the impost would generate revenue of just under 3 million dollars, which would be enough to fund the essential functions of the federal government and make payments on the debt. It would keep the tax burden on the average American at about one-eighth the tax burden of an average Englishman.
Madison believed that taxes were an evil that should be instituted only to prevent a greater evil—such as the failure of a country to protect its citizens or honor its financial obligations. “I wish we were under less necessity than...to shackle commerce with duties, restriction, and preferences,” he told Congress.6
On May 4 Madison had gingerly broached the topic of amendments to the Constitution. He made it known that he would be revisiting the issue on June 8, but meanwhile he wanted the House to have time to consider the subject and to finish the impost bill. By making this advance announcement, Madison could begin to satisfy the Anti-Federalists’ concerns about amendments and temporarily prevent them from acting against the government or offering their own amendments. It would be Madison’s amendments that were considered—ones that protected fundamental liberties but did not damage the foundation of the new government. And the Federalists would get credit for proposing these amendments on their own, in a spirit of accommodation, rather than seeming to react to the Anti-Federalists’ initiative. But by delaying further discussion until June 8, he would not force the issue until the Federalists, who were more concerned with setting up the mechanics of the government, were ready.
There was much to be done. The new Congress was concerned with issues ranging from oaths of office to immigration policy to the establishment of the judiciary. Even what title the president would use had to be determined. The Senate recommended “His Highness, the President of the United States of America, and Protector of their Liberties.”7 Fortunately, the republican instincts of Madison and others prevailed—it would be simply, fittingly, “The President of the United States.”
Launching the ship of state was paramount on the Federalist agenda—not messing around with a Bill of Rights. And two other issues—the president’s authority to remove executive officers who had been confirmed by the Senate, and the permanent location of the nation’s capital—would prove just as contentious. Both threatened the security of the new Constitutional Union; both were resolved differently because Madison, and not Monroe, won the election of 1789.
At the end of May 1789, Madison offered the House of Representatives a proposal for three departments—foreign affairs, treasury, and war—each headed by a secretary, “to be nominated by the President, and appointed by him, with the advice and consent of the Senate and removable by the President.”8
Madison had unexpectedly touched off a constitutional crisis. To his surprise, many expressed doubts whether the president could constitutionally remove department heads. Some believed impeachment was the only proper method of removal. Others held that the president’s power to remove officers, just like his authority to appoint them, required the concurrence of the Senate. And others believed that the Constitution was silent on the matter and that presidential removal power could be granted by Congress.9
Madison defended the removal power as essential to the balance of powers on which the new government depended. Madison, unlike Monroe, supported a strong and independent executive. He won this critical debate by joining his adversaries in striking out language making the Secretary of Foreign Affairs “removable by the President.” He then narrowly won passage of an amendment creating a clerk who would become acting head of the department “whenever the principal officer shall be removed from office by the President of the United States, or in any other case of vacancy.”
Thus Madison won the unequivocal vindication of the president’s removal power, but in a manner no one would mistake for a grant by Congress.
The location of the national capital was another contentious issue, and it too was decided by the election of 1789. Madison and his fellow Virginians had long dreamed of winning the seat of government. But, over Madison’s opposition, the House actually passed a bill to place the capital in Pennsylvania, on the Susquehanna River.10 It would have become law had the Senate not amended it to make it more specific. This sent the bill back to the House, where Madison’s quick maneuvering saved the day. Since the new Federal district would initially have no laws, Madison passed an amendment making Pennsylvania’s laws the laws of the district until Congress could write its own. Thus the session ended without resolving the capital question.
In the next session, Madison emerged as the principal opponent of Hamilton’s plan to assume the debts of the states. This issue, like the location of the capital, was highly contentious and dangerously sectional; Northern states badly wanted assumption, Southern states, which had largely paid off their debt, were dead set against it. Both sides threatened secession. And the compromise by Madison that resolved it was a
delicate one. Over dinner at Thomas Jefferson’s, Madison and Hamilton agreed to the first great compromise that preceded the Civil War. Madison “would not be strenuous” in trying to stop assumption. The Virginians would find the votes to pass Hamilton’s plan for the states’ debts. And Hamilton would leverage Northern support for assumption into a capital on the Potomac site. Monroe, like all Virginia leaders, opposed federal assumption of the states’ debts. But Madison’s position as the leader of the Federalists made him the man to be reckoned with by assumption supporters. If Monroe had been there in place of Madison, Hamilton would have won assumption outright or bargained with another delegation for the capital.11
James Madison was the great conciliator of the First Congress. And he would need all of his political capital to win the battle for the Bill of Rights.
Madison took the floor to introduce his draft on June 8, 1789. “This day, Mr. Speaker, is the day assigned for taking into consideration the subject of amendments to the Constitution. As I considered myself bound in honor and in duty to do what I have done on this subject, I shall proceed to bring the amendments before you as soon as possible, and advocate them until they shall be finally adopted or rejected by a constitutional majority of this House.”12
Madison’s amendments are familiar to us all, and so fundamental to our national identity that we cannot imagine America without them: the freedom of speech and of the press; the right to assemble peaceably and petition the government; the right to keep and bear arms; protection against the quartering of soldiers in private homes and against being tried twice for the same crime; the right against self-incrimination, and the protection of due process of law for life, liberty, and property; protection against cruel and unusual punishment, excessive bail, and unreasonable searches and seizures; the right to a speedy trial by a jury; and the right to be represented by an attorney. The amendments included a declaration that the enumeration of particular rights in the Constitution could not be construed to deny other rights not mentioned, as well as a reservation of power to the states and the people of all those rights not expressly given to the federal government.
