Founding Fathers: Complete Biographies, Their Articles, Historical & Political Documents. Emory Speer
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older men who made up that convention. Thomas Jefferson said of him: "Mr. Madison came into the House in 1776, a new member, and young. In 1777, he became a member of the Council of State. and from there went to Congress.
“His discriminating mind and extensive information rendered him the first of every assembly of which he became a member. With these powers was united a pure and spotless virtue which no calumny has ever ventured to assail."
While Virginia was adopting her constitution and choosing Patrick Henry first governor of the State, old Liberty Bell in Philadelphia rang out the Declaration of Independence, proclaiming Liberty to all the nation.
Then followed the long years of War, with all its horrors and suffering, its anxieties and disappointments. Years that tried not only the courage and patience of men but their honor and good sense also. Years when wise counsellors were as necessary as trained soldiers, and when the country needed brave statesmen as well as brave generals. Among those who were wise statesmen, James Madison ranked with the highest, although he lost one election to the Legislature of his State by refusing to follow the custom of that time and furnish an unlimited supply of liquor on election day. He was willing to ask men to vote for him, but refused to " treat" any one, saying that " the reputation and success of representative government depends on the purity of popular elections." But in November of the same year he was elected by a large majority a member of the Council of State. Madison`s education had much to do with his election to the Council, since no other member understood foreign languages and there were many letters from European nations to be answered, and many foreign military men who sought commissions in the little army of the new republic.
In 1779, James Madison was chosen as a delegate to Congress from Virginia, and on March 26, 1780, he arrived at Philadelphia and took his seat.
He was not quite thirty years old. but he had won the confidence of his own state and of the men from other colonies who conducted the government. The letters written to Thomas Jefferson by Madison, at this time, describe the many evils and failures of the new government, and show plainly that he was constantly studying, not how to increase his own wealth and importance, but how to remedy the mistakes, failures and disasters he saw around him. The republic was then a new experiment and Madison, with other brave, strong men of his day, worked constantly and faithfully to establish that "government of the people, by the people, and for the people," which we proudly preserve as our most precious heritage.
The new republic was greatly in need of money. There was none in the Treasury — in fact there was no Treasury, — and when men were sent to Europe to try to borrow money, the first question asked by the shrewd moneylenders was: “What security can you give? How do you propose to raise money to pay your national debt? What are your sources of revenue?" To these questions, alas! there was no answer. Congress now issued Continental money, but it was nearly worthless. Thomas Jefferson loaned the State of Virginia thirteen thousand dollars in gold, and when he received payment in Continental currency, the amount just bought him an overcoat.
The members of Congress were paid a salary by their respective states but the money had so little value it would not pay their board bills. and James Madison, with the others, was often greatly in need of a little money. Their country's need, however, was greater than their own and they made no complaint.
It has been said of James Madison that he was never a boy. Perhaps his ill health and delicate frame made him seem old. Although always cheerful and sociable, he was never carried away by tiery enthusiasm like Patrick Henry, never so hot-headed and impetuous as John Adams, and was more even-tempered and impartial than George Washington himself. In those debates in Congress, where so many lost their self-control, he was always cool, calm and courteous, and this ability to "keep cool," united with his knowledge of foreign laws, his foresight and intelligence. made him one of the wisest, most useful men in the Continental Congress.
There were a great many laws to be made for the new nation. When we think of all the different branches of our great system of government, from township officers to president, of all the foreign nations with whom we have treaties and the necessary laws relating to those treaties. and to our commerce with the whole world, we can form some idea of the great task the statesmen of our country found before them after the Declaration of Independence. Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison laid the foundation on which this great structure of civil government rests.
On January 20. 1788, a general treaty of peace was signed at Paris, and the United Colonies were left to adjust themselves on a new basis — that of Freedom. In 1784, Madison's term in Congress expired and he returned to Montpellier. He was immediately elected to the Virginia Assembly, and this time he had no need to solicit votes or buy election Whiskey. There was no other man in the country so competent to till the position and he soon became one of the ruling minds in the State Legislature. Patient, courteous, but persistent, he made many reforms in the laws of the Old Dominion; and in the autumn of 1785, the legislature passed an act "for the establishing of religious freedom." Jefferson was the author of this act and for several years had urged its passage, but to James Madison's untiring zeal was due its final triumph.
In February, 1785. the college of William and Mary conferred the degree of Doctor of Laws upon Madison, and during the same year he made a visit to General Washington at Mt. Vernon. He also Visited New York in company with the Marquis La Fayette and with him attended a gathering of the Six Nations at Fort Schuyler, New York. Later in the year La Fayette, accompanied by General Washington, visited Montpellier and the Legislature of Virginia at Williamsburg.
In 1786, Madison's term in the Virginia Assembly closed and he was again elected a delegate to Congress, where he took his seat in February, 1787.
The 14th of May, 1787, had been chosen as the date for a Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia. It had become necessary to form some kind of a government which would bind the states together with a common interest or they would soon be at war among themselves. James Madison was a delegate to this convention and he had given so much study to the subject, that when he started for Philadelphia he carried with him a written outline of a constitution. He said afterward that this was "the earliest sketch on paper, of a constitutional government for the Union, to be sanctioned by the people."
Framing a constitution was slow work. It seemed impossible to draw up a paper to which all the delegates would agree. But at last the parchment copy was prepared and one after another the delegates signed it, until the final words were written:
"Done in convention by the unanimous consent of the States present, this 17th day of September, in the year of our Lord 1787, and of the Independence of the United States of America the twelfth."
The Constitution was then laid before Congress, and again James Madison spoke long and often in favor of its adoption.
During that summer a series of papers called the “Federalist" was printed in a New York Journal and they are still considered standard authority on the Constitution. Of these papers Alexander Hamilton wrote forty-six, James Madison twenty-nine and John Jay five.
When the Constitution was ratified by Congress, the country was called on to elect a president, and George Washington was unanimously chosen the first President of the United States, with John Adams as Vice-President.
James Madison remained in Congress until the spring of 1793, when he returned to Montpellier, determined to rest for a time. This, however, he was not allowed to do, for he was immediately re-elected to the Congress which was to meet in Philadelphia in December, 1793.
A young lawyer named John Todd, living in the city of Philadelphia, was married in the year 1790 to a very beautiful young girl named Dorothy Payne. Their home was a very happy one until in September, 1793, the terrible yellow fever broke out in the city, and proved so fatal that the death-rate reached two hundred in one week. John Todd sent his wife and babies to Gray's Ferry tor safety, but remained in the city himself to look after his aged father and mother. They soon sickened and died and then John Todd hastened to join his family. But he had delayed too long and in the very hour of his arrival at Gray's Ferry, he was taken ill and in a few hours died. Mrs. Todd and her two children were the next to suffer, and the youngest child, a month old baby, died. Mrs. Todd and her little son recovered and as soon as the danger was over,