James Madison: A Life Reconsidered

by Lynne Cheney

  3.PMC, 11:311, from Francis Corbin, Oct. 21, 1788.

  4.PMC, 11:267, to John Brown, Sept. 26, 1788; 11:275, from Pendleton, Oct. 6, 1788.

  5.PMC, 11:296, to Jefferson, Oct. 17, 1788.

  6.Ibid., 297; DHRC, 10:1507, speech of James Madison, June 24, 1788.

  7.PMC, 11:297–99, to Jefferson, Oct. 17, 1788.

  8.PMC, 11:356, from Henry Lee, Nov. 19, 1788.

  9.PMC, 11:388, from Henry Lee, Dec. 8, 1788; 11:352, from Carrington, Nov. 18, 1788; 11:386, from Burgess Ball, Dec. 8, 1788.

  10.PMC, 11:351, from Washington, Nov. 17, 1788; 11:329, to Randolph, Nov. 2, 1788.

  11.PMC, 11:418, to Washington, Jan. 14, 1789; Brant, Madison, 3:240; PMC, 11:404–5, to Eve, Jan. 2, 1789; 11:428–29, to a Resident of Spotsylvania County, Virginia Herald, Jan. 27, 1789.

  12.Hunt, Life of James Madison, 165.

  13.PMC, 11:442, from Leland, ca. Feb. 15, 1789.

  14.PMC, 11:446, 447n1, from Washington, Feb. 16, 1789; 12:120–21, “Address of the President to Congress: Editorial Note.”

  15.Brant, Madison, 3:243; PMC, 12:3, to Washington, March 5, 1789.

  16.McCullough, John Adams, 402; Baker, Washington After the Revolution, 131; Freeman, Washington, 564–65; Gordon S. Wood, Empire of Liberty, 64n35.

  17.“Farewell to New York,” Aug. 12, 1790, U.S. Senate, 1787–1800, http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Farewell_NY.htm; PMC, 12:123, “Address of the President to Congress,” April 30, 1789; Madison, Writings, 2:410, “Origin of the Constitutional Convention.”

  18.PMC, 12:120–23, “Address of the President to Congress,” April 30, 1789; 12:131–32, from Washington, May 5, 1789; 12:166, from Washington, May 17, 1789.

  19.Gordon S. Wood, Empire of Liberty, 55; Documentary History of the First Federal Congress, 12:xiii–xiv; Ames, Works, 1:36, to George Richards Minot, May 3, 1789.

  20.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 107, April 9, 1789.

  21.Ibid., 233–36, April 28, 1789.

  22.Ames, Works, 1:35, 48–49, to Minot, May 3 and 29, 1789; PMC, 12:54, “Madison at the First Session of the First Federal Congress: Editorial Note.”

  23.Remini, House, 25.

  24.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 385, 387, May 19, 1789.

  25.PMC, 12:268–69, to Jefferson, June 30, 1789; Bemis, Jay’s Treaty, 31–32; Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 247, May 4, 1789.

  26.PMC, 12:269–70, to Jefferson, June 30, 1789; Bemis, Jay’s Treaty, 54.

  27.Maclay, Journal, 248, April 26, 1790.

  28.Ibid., 24–26, May 8–9, 1789; PMC, 12:182, to Jefferson, May 23, 1789 (most words encoded); 12:315, from Jefferson, July 29, 1789 (all words encoded).

  29.Farrand, Framing of the Constitution, 163; Sullivan, Public Men of the Revolution, 120; “After-Dinner Anecdotes of James Madison,” 257–58.

  30.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 257, May 4, 1789.

  31.PMC, 11:404, to Eve, Jan. 2, 1789.

  32.PMC, 12:175–76, to Trist, May 21, 1789. Bland would die a little over a year later.

  33.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 441, 444–45, June 8, 1789.

  34.Ibid., 448–49.

  35.Ibid., 450.

  36.Ibid., 453–55.

  37.Ibid., 451–52.

  38.Ibid., 452–53.

  39.PMC, 12:283, from Peters, July 5, 1789; 12:347, to Peters, Aug. 19, 1789.

  40.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 731, Aug. 13, 1789.

  41.Ibid., 741.

  42.Ibid., 747–57, Aug. 14, 1789.

  43.Ibid., 759, Aug. 15, 1789.

  44.Ibid., 759–61.

  45.Ibid., 774; Goldwin, From Parchment to Power, 124.

  46.Creating the Bill of Rights, xv, 278–79n1, 279, Elbridge Gerry to Samuel Gerry, June 30, 1790, and Leonard to Sylvanus Bourne, Aug. 16, 1789.

  47.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 784, Aug. 17, 1789.

  48.Goldwin, From Parchment to Power, 130–39; Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 790–92, Aug. 18, 1789.

  49.PMC, 12:301–2, from Peters, July 20, 1789; 12:346–47, to Peters, Aug. 19, 1789; 12:348, to Pendleton, Aug. 21, 1789.

  50.The amendment concerning congressional pay was finally ratified in 1992.

  51.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 62.

  52.Annals, 1st Cong., 1st sess., 816, 868, Aug. 27 and Sept. 3, 1789.

  53.Ibid., 876, 890, Sept. 3, 1789.

  54.Ibid., 912, Sept. 5, 1789; Ames, Works, 1:69, to Minot, Sept. 3, 1789; PMC, 12:402, to Pendleton, Sept. 14, 1789; Bowling, Creation of Washington, D.C., 138–39.

  55.Maclay, Journal, 166, Sept. 25, 1789.

  56.Brant, Madison, 3:281.

  57.PMC, 12:402–3, to Pendleton, Sept. 14, 1789; 12:433, to Jefferson, Oct. 8, 1789.

  58.PMC, 12:452, to Washington, Nov. 20, 1789; Bowling, Creation of Washington, D.C., 168.

  59.Taylor Diary, Nov. 15 and Dec. 3 and 24, 1789; Meteorological Journals, Nov. and Dec. 1789.

  Chapter 9: THE EARTH BELONGS TO THE LIVING

  1.“First Monticello” and “House Transition,” Monticello, http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/first-monticello and http://www.monticello.org/site/house-and-gardens/house-transition.

  2.PJ, 15:305, to Cosway, July 25, 1789; PMC, 12:304, from Jefferson, July 22, 1789.

  3.PMC, 12:382–87, from Jefferson, Sept. 6, 1789.

  4.PMC, 13:18–21, to Jefferson, Feb. 4, 1790; 12:386, from Jefferson, Sept. 6, 1789.

  5.Rush, Autobiography, 181; Koch, Jefferson and Madison, 95–96; Jefferson, Writings, 15:470–71, to Thomas Earle, Sept. 24, 1823.

  6.John Quincy Adams, Jubilee of the Constitution, 111.

  7.PMC, 13:4, to Jefferson, Jan. 24, 1790.

  8.John C. Hamilton, History of the Republic of the United States, 4:29n; Maclay, Journal, 194–95, Feb. 11, 1790; Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1235–36, Feb. 11, 1790.

  9.Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1250, 1265, Feb. 15, 1790, 1308–14, Feb. 18, 1790; Leibiger, Founding Friendship, 22; PMC, 3:124, “Motion on Impressment of Supplies,” May 18, 1781.

  10.Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1314, Feb. 18, 1790.

  11.Maclay, Journal, 201–2, Feb. 22, 1790; Cutler and Cutler, Life, Journals, and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler, 1:458.

  12.Maclay, Journal, 178, 332, Jan. 15 and July 17, 1790; “James Madison’s Autobiography,” 203–4.

  13.Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, 176.

  14.McCoy, Elusive Republic, 121–32.

  15.Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1225, 1240, Feb. 11–12, 1790.

  16.Ibid., 1246, 1241, Feb. 12, 1790.

  17.Ohline, “Slavery, Economics, and Congressional Politics, 1790,” 337, 346–51; Documentary History of the First Federal Congress, 12:727–28, Daily Advertiser, March 18, 1790; Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1505, March 17, 1790; PMC, 13:110, to Edmund Randolph, March 21, 1790.

  18.Pennsylvania Abolition Society Collection, John Pemberton to James Pemberton, March 8 and 17, 1790; PMC, 13:109, to Rush, March 20, 1790.

  19.Pennsylvania Abolition Society Collection, John Pemberton to James Pemberton, March 9, 1790; Ohline, “Slavery, Economics, and Congressional Politics, 1790,” 346–51; Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1525, March 23, 1790; Pennsylvania Abolition Society Collection, John Pemberton to James Pemberton, March 20, 1790.

  20.Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1524, March 23, 1790; Ellis, Founding Brothers, 118; Wiecek, Sources of Antislavery Constitutionalism, 16.

  21.Ellis, Founding Brothers, 115; Farrand, Records, 1:135, Madison’s notes, June 6, 1787; Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1505, March 17, 1790; PMC, 12:437–38, “Memorandum on an African Colony for Freed Slaves,” ca. Oct. 20, 1789.

  22.Ohline, “Slavery, Economics, and Congressional Politics, 1790,” 354; Pennsylvania Abolition Society Collection, John Pemberton to James Pemberton, March 16 and Feb. 23, 1790; Sedgwick Family Papers, Sedgwick to Ephraim Williams, March 17, 1790; microfilm edition of Adams Papers, Adams to Colon
el Ward, Jan. 8, 1810; Maclay, Journal, 196, Feb. 15, 1790; microfilm edition of Adams Papers, Adams to Thomas Crafts, May 25, 1790; Ames, Works, 1:76, to George Richards Minot, March 23, 1790.

  23.PMC, 13:175, “Motion on the Death of Franklin,” April 22, 1790; Maclay, Journal, 246–47, April 23, 1790; Franklin, Writings, 10:87–91, to the editor, Federal Gazette, March 23, 1790.

  24.PH, 6:106, “Report Relative to a Provision for the Support of Public Credit,” Jan. 9, 1970; PMC, 13:148, to Lee, April 13, 1790.

  25.Maclay, Journal, 209, March 9, 1790; Huger had suffered a fracture: “Letters of William Loughton Smith to Edward Rutledge,” South Carolina Historical Magazine, Jan. 1968, 11.

  26.Maclay, Journal, 237, April 12, 1790; PMC, 13:151, to Monroe, April 17, 1790; 13:89, 137, from Lee, March 4 and April 3, 1790.

  27.PMC, 13:222, to Randolph, May 19, 1790; Abigail Adams, New Letters, 49, to Mary Cranch, May 30, 1790.

  28.Jefferson, Works, 7:224–27, “The Assumption,” Feb. 1793; Jefferson, Complete Anas, 33–34; Maclay, Journal, 292–93, June 14, 1790; Virginia’s allowance was increased by $500,000 in the bill that finally passed; Ferguson, Power of the Purse, 321.

  29.Maclay, Journal, 311, June 30, 1790; Bowling, Creation of Washington, D.C., 185–86, 196; “Letters of William Loughton Smith to Edward Rutledge,” South Carolina Historical Magazine, April 1968, 125.

  30.Shippen Family Papers, Thomas Shippen to William Shippen, Sept. 15, 1790.

  31.Peirce, Meteorological Account, 212; PMC, 13:404–5, from Jefferson, March 13, 1791; 13:405, to Jefferson, March 13, 1791.

  32.PMC, 13:336, “Excise,” Dec. 27, 1790.

  33.PMC, 13:374–76, “The Bank Bill,” Feb. 2, 1791.

  34.PMC, 10:424, Federalist 44, Jan. 25, 1788.

  35.Annals, 1st Cong., 3rd sess., 2008, Feb. 8, 1791; PMC, 10:41, “Power of the Legislature to Negative State Laws,” June 8, 1787; Farrand, Records, 3:534, N. P. Trist Memoranda, Sept. 27, 1834.

  36.PMR, 1:603, “Detatched Memoranda,” ca. Jan. 31, 1820.

  37.PMC, 13:93, to Rush, March 7, 1790; PJ, 19:351, to Freneau, Feb. 28, 1791.

  38.PMC, 14:23, to Jefferson, May 12, 1791; PH, 8:478, from Troup, June 15, 1791 (italics added); John C. Hamilton, History of the Republic of the United States, 4:506.

  39.Vermont Historical Gazetteer, 1:170–71; Maxwell, Portrait of William Floyd, 35; Annals, 1st Cong., 2nd sess., 1755, July 26, 1790.

  40.PMC, 10:264, Federalist 10, Nov. 22, 1787; 10:477, Federalist 51, Feb. 6, 1788; Hofstadter, Idea of a Party System, 54–55.

  41.PJ, 20:463–64, to Martha Randolph, May 31, 1791; PMC, 14:27, “Notes on the Lake Country Tour,” June 1, 1791; 13:303, “Instructions for the Montpelier Overseer and Laborers,” ca. Nov. 8, 1790; Brant, Madison, 3:380.

  42.PJ, 20:568, to Martha Randolph, June 23, 1791; 20:297, to James Monroe, July 10, 1791; PMC, 14:39, 46, to Jefferson, July 1 and 13, 1791; 14:51, from Edmund Randolph, July 21, 1791; Tucker, “Autobiography,” in Life and Philosophy of George Tucker, 1:70.

  43.PMC, 14:43, to Jefferson, July 10, 1791.

  44.PMC, 14:73–74, from Lee, Aug. 24, 1791.

  Chapter 10: THE SPIRIT OF PARTY

  1.PWP, 9:111, to the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, Oct. 25, 1791.

  2.PMC, 14:86, “Address of the House of Representatives to the President,” Oct. 27, 1791; 14:183, from Lee, Jan. 8, 1792.

  3.Irwin and Sylla, Founding Choices, 14–15; Haggard, MacIntyre, and Tiede, “Rule of Law and Economic Development,” 206–9, 213.

  4.PMC, 14:193–94, to Lee, Jan. 21, 1792.

  5.PMC, 14:245–46, “Republican Distribution of Citizens,” National Gazette, March 3, 1792; 14:258, “Fashion,” National Gazette, March 20, 1792.

  6.PH, 10:267, 253, “Final Version of the Report on the Subject of Manufactures,” Dec. 5, 1791.

  7.Annals, 2nd Cong., 1st sess., 388, Feb. 6, 1792; PMC, 14:180, to Henry Lee, Jan. 1, 1792.

  8.PMC, 14:263, to Pendleton, March 25, 1792; Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 278–79.

  9.PMC, 14:274, “The Union: Who Are Its Real Friends?,” National Gazette, March 31, 1792.

  10.PMC, 14:208, “Universal Peace,” National Gazette, Jan. 31, 1792; Annals, 2nd Cong., 1st sess., 504, March 30, 1792; PMC, 4:154n14, from Pendleton, April 15, 1782.

  11.PH, 11:426–39, to Carrington, May 26, 1792.

  12.PMC, 14:197, “Parties,” National Gazette, ca. Jan. 23, 1792.

  13.PMC, 14:301–4, “Memorandum on a Discussion of the President’s Retirement,” May 5 and 9, 1792.

  14.PH, 12:107, “T. L. No. 1,” Gazette of the United States, July 25, 1792; 12:124, 124–25n3, “T. L. No. 2,” Gazette of the United States, July 28, 1792; 12:159, “An American No. 1,” Gazette of the United States, Aug. 4, 1792.

  15.PH, 12:191, “An American No. 2,” Gazette of the United States, Aug. 11, 1792; 12:394, “Catullus No. 2,” Gazette of the United States, Sept. 19, 1792; 12:160, “An American No. 1,” Gazette of the United States, Aug. 4, 1792.

  16.Brant, Madison, 3:362; PMC, 14:368–70, 387–92, for Dunlap’s American Daily Advertiser, Sept. 22 and Oct. 20, 1792.

  17.Marsh, “Freneau and Jefferson,” 187; Jefferson, Complete Anas, 159.

  18.PMC, 14:370–72, “A Candid State of Parties,” National Gazette, Sept. 22, 1792.

  19.Kaminski, George Clinton, 230–31; PMC, 14:383–85, from Beckley, Oct. 17, 1792.

  20.PMC, 14:421, to Pendleton, Dec. 6, 1792.

  21.PMC, 14:384, from Beckley, Oct. 17, 1792.

  22.PH, 21:258, “Printed Version of the Reynolds Pamphlet,” 1797; Annals, 2nd Cong., 2nd sess., 836, Jan. 23, 1793; PH, 14:34, “Report Relative to the Loans Negotiated Under the Acts of the Fourth and Twelfth of Aug. 1790,” Feb. 13–14, 1793; PJ, 25:280–86, “Jefferson and the Giles Resolutions: Editorial Note.”

  23.PJ, 25:284–88, “Jefferson and the Giles Resolutions: Editorial Note.”

  24.Jefferson, Complete Anas, 113–14; PMC, 14:472, to George Nicholas, March 15, 1793.

  25.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 265–66.

  26.PMC, 15:4, to the Minister of the Interior of the French Republic, April 1793.

  27.Schama, Citizens, 782–89; PMC, 15:7, to Jefferson, April 12, 1793; Brackenridge, Incidents of the Insurrection, 52.

  28.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 335; Washington Irving, Life of George Washington, 5:197–98; PMC, 15:12, to Jefferson, May 8, 1793.

  29.PWP, 12:472, “Neutrality Proclamation,” April 22, 1793; PMC, 15:12, to Jefferson, May 8, 1793; 15:37, from Jefferson, June 23, 1793.

  30.National Gazette, June 1 and 5, 1793; PMC, 15:33, to Jefferson, June 19, 1793; Leibiger, Founding Friendship, 172; PJ, 26:522–23, “Notes on James Cole Mountflorence and on Federalist Intrigues,” July 18, 1793.

  31.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 360; PH, 15:33, “Pacificus No. 1,” June 29, 1793.

  32.PMC, 15:43, from Jefferson, July 7, 1793; 15:51, to Jefferson, Aug. 5, 1793.

  33.PMC, 15:44, 48, to Jefferson, July 18 and 30, 1793; 15:56, from Jefferson, Aug. 11, 1793; 15:65, “Madison’s ‘Helvidius’ Essays: Editorial Note”; 15:94–95, to Jefferson, Sept. 2, 1793. Thanks to J. C. A. Stagg for pointing out the possibility that Madison’s pen name was a comment on the Washington administration.

  34.PMC, 14:111, “Madison’s National Gazette Essays: Editorial Note”; Cunningham, Jeffersonian Republicans, 69.

  35.Malone, Jefferson, 3:150, 156–57.

  36.Drinker, Extracts from the Journal, 194–207; PMC, 15:90, from Jefferson, Sept. 1, 1793.

  37.Drinker, Extracts from the Journal, 209–10.

  Chapter 11: DOLLEY

  1.Murphy, American Plague, 99; PMC, 15:xxviii, Madison Chronology; 15:167, “Commercial Discrimination,” Jan. 3, 1794.

  2.Bemis, Jay’s Treaty, 210–68; Varg, Foreign Policies of the Founding Fathers, 101; ASP-FR, 1:428–29, letters communicated to Congress, March 25, 17
94.

  3.Annals, 3rd Cong., 1st sess., 433, Feb. 6, 1794.

  4.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 392; PMC, 15:288, 294–95, to Jefferson, March 24 and 26, 1794.

  5.“After-Dinner Anecdotes of James Madison,” 257.

  6.PMC, 15:57, from Jefferson, Aug. 11, 1793; 15:338, to Jefferson, May 25, 1794.

  7.Cutts, Queen of America, 94–95.

  8.Holly Shulman, “History, Memory, and Dolley Madison,” in Cutts, Queen of America, 46; UVA, Papers of James Madison Project, Anonymous, Essay Prepared for Mrs. George Hammond, June 1809.

  9.Allgor, Perfect Union, 21–23; Cutts, Queen of America, 91–92.

  10.Cutts, Queen of America, 95; PDM, from Coles, June 1, 1794.

  11.PDM, from Wilkins, 1794.

  12.PDM, to Elizabeth Lee, Sept. 16, 1794.

  13.PDM, from James Madison, Aug. 18, 1794; Cutts, Queen of America, 97.

  14.PDM, to Lee, Sept. 16, 1794; Brant, Madison, 3:410, 501n15; De Coppet Collection, Madison to Delaplaine, memo, Sept. 1816.

  15.Brant, Madison, 3:411.

  16.Elkins and McKitrick, Age of Federalism, 462–63.

  17.Malone, Jefferson, 3:121; ASP-FR, 1:24–25, “Speech of President Washington,” Nov. 19, 1794.

  18.PMC, 15:153, “Madison in the Third Congress: Editorial Note”; 15:396, to Jefferson, Nov. 30, 1794; 15:406, to Monroe, Dec. 4, 1794.

  19.Annals, 3rd Cong., 2nd sess., 899, Nov. 24, 1794; PMC, 15:391, 388n1, Addresses of the House of Representatives to the President, Nov. 27 and 21, 1794; 15:397, to Jefferson, Nov. 30, 1794; ASP-FR, 1:27, president’s reply.

  20.PMC, 15:397, to Jefferson, Nov. 30, 1794.

  21.PMC, 15:428, from Jefferson, Dec. 28, 1794; 15:479, to Madison Sr., Feb. 23, 1795; 15:473, to Jefferson, Feb. 15, 1795; Ketcham, Madison, 384; Aurora General Advertiser, Feb. 25, 1795.

  22.PMC, 15:479, 415, 16:228, 434, to Madison Sr., Feb. 23, 1795, Dec. 14, 1794, Feb. 21 and Dec. 19, 1796.

  23.PMC, 15:153, “Madison in the Third Congress: Editorial Note”; 15:432, “Naturalization,” Jan. 1, 1795.

  24.PMC, 15:488, to Monroe, March 11, 1795; 16:15, from Butler, June 12, 1795.

  25.PMC, 16:94, to Henry Tazewell, Sept. 25, 1795.