Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 15.djvu/201

Rh MADISON 183 stitution was yet to be accepted by the people ; that it was accepted was due in an eminent degree to the efforts of Madison. In order to place the new constitution before the people in its true light, and to meet objections brought against it, he joined Hamilton and Jay in the publication of a series of essays, which were published in a collected form in 1783 under the name of The Federalist, and which are still worthy of careful study. In the Virginia convention for ratifying the constitution he was again called upon to defend that instrument, and against such staunch patriots as Patrick Henry and George Mason. Madison here appeared at his best. He answered every objection in detail, calmly, yet with an eloquence and zeal that carried conviction to his audience. The result was a victory against an adverse public opinion, as well as against the eloquence of his opponents. Although he remained in the public service for nearly twenty-five years longer, his greatest work was finished with the adoption of the constitution. He had gained the well-earned title of &quot;father of the constitution.&quot; The part he had taken, however, alienated from him the support of a majority of the people of his State, He was defeated as a candidate for United States senate, though he was chosen in his own district as representative to Congress. Taking his seat in the Lower House in April 1789, he assumed a leading part in the legislation necessary to the organization of the new government. To Hamilton s measures, how ever, for the funding of the debt, the assumption of the State debts, and the establishment of a national bank, he was opposed. On other questions, too, he sided with the Anti-Federalists, and gradually assumed the leadership of the opposition in the House of Representatives. One would have expected to find him advocating with Washington, Hamilton, Marshall, Jay, and others those measures which would strengthen still more the federal government. On the contrary, we find him labouring to confine the powers of the national government within the narrowest possible limits. Much has been said in regard to Madison s change of principles at this time. It has been intimated that he was influenced, perhaps unconsciously, by the decided attitude of his State, but espscially by the dominating mind of his most intimate friend v Jefferson. Probably there is something of truth in this charge, yet it must be said that Madison had shown on many previous occasions an aversion to a liberal construction of granted powers. Timid by nature, he was frightened at the bold and com prehensive measures of the secretary of the treasury. He thought he saw in them a constructive latitude of inter pretation and a centralization of interests dangerous to republican principles. Madison opposed also the foreign policy of the adminis tration in 1793-96, in its attempts to maintain a neutral position between Great Britain and France, then at war with each other. And under the signature of &quot; Helvidius &quot; he published in the public journals five papers of great power and acuteness, criticizing the &quot; monarchical preroga tive of the executive &quot; as exercised in the proclamation of neutrality of 1793, and the right of the recognition by the president of foreign states. So far as the question of inter national law was concerned, Madison was essentially right, but in regard to the authority of the executive, and the question of the expediency of Washington s neutral policy, the subsequent practice of ths Government and the general verdict of history condemn his view. In 1794 Madison introduced in the House of Representatives resolutions based upon Jefferson s report on commerce, advising retaliatory measures against Great Britain and a discrimi nation in commercial and navigation laws in favour of France. Again, in 1796 he strenuously opposed the appropriation of money for the purpose of carrying into effect the treaty of 1794 with Great Britain. He scouted the idea as visionary that Great Britain would go to war on a refusal to carry the treaty into effect. It was not conceivable, he thought, that she would &quot; make war upon a country which was the best market she had for her manu factures.&quot; It had been a favourite theory with Madison, as with Jefferson, that foreign nations could be coerced through their commercial interests. The fallacy of this doctrine was well exemplified by its utter inefficiency when put in practice by them in 1807-12. In 1797 Madison withdrew to private life, though not to a life of inactivity. In 1798 he was induced by Jefferson to join in a movement in opposition to the Alien and Sedition Laws passed by the Federalists in that year, and was himself the author of the Virginia resolutions, which declared &quot; That the constitution of the United States was a compact, to which the States were parties, granting limited powers of govern ment ; that in case of a deliberate, palpable, and dangerous exer cise of other powers, not granted by the compact, the States had the right, and were in duty bound, to interpose for arresting the pro gress of the evils and for maintaining within their respective limits, the authorities, rights, and liberties pertaining to them ; that the Alien and Sedition Laws were such infractions of the compact ;. . . . and finally that the State of Virginia declared those laws unconstitutional and not law, but utterly null, void, and of no effect, and invited the other States to join her in this action.&quot; These resolutions, with those of Kentucky drawn by Jefferson, met with decided objections from the other States. Upon these objections Madison made a report to the legislature of Virginia, consisting of an elaborate and carefully considered argument sustaining in every point the resolutions of 1798. Thirty years later these argu ments were freely made use of by Calhoun and his school of nullifiers as the basis of their doctrine. But Madison, in 1830, repudiated the idea that the resolutions of 1798 involved the principles of nullification. He wrote at that time many letters to public men, and especially one to Edward Everett, in August 1830, to prove this position. The nullifiers were not convinced, however, by this reason ing, and continued to use his arguments in favour of their doctrine, till it became a source of great annoyance to him. With the rise of the republican party to power in 1801, Madison became secretary of state in Jefferson s cabinet, a position for which he was well fitted both by his tempera ment and his training, well versed as he was in constitu tional and international law, and practising a calmness and fairness in discussion which are essential qualities of the diplomatist. In defending the neutral rights of the United States against the encroachments of European belligerents (1801-9), there was almost constant need of the use of all those qualities. The most important of his papers during this period was An Examination of tJie British Doctrine which subjects to capture a neutral trade not open in time of peace, that is, the so-called &quot; rule of the war of 1756,&quot; as extended by Great Britain in 1793 and 1803. This treatise, published in 1806, was an argument against the British doctrine, drawn from a careful inves tigation of authorities on international law, and was a valuable contribution to the discussion of a question which, for various reasons, has now lost its importance. In 1809 Madison was elected president to succeed Jefferson, whose peace policy a policy of commercial re strictions to coerce Great Britain and France he con tinued to follow until, in 1812, he was forced by his party to change it for a policy of war. He had been, under the lead of Jefferson, a great lieutenant ; he had for the most part furnished the arguments in support of the republican policy since 1790 ; but he did not possess the qualities of a leader. His cabinet was in part forced upon him in 1809 by a senatorial clique, and his administration lacked vigour,