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'''James Madison'''<ref>James Madison did not have a middle name.</ref> was the 4th [[President of the United States of America]], serving from 1809-1817<ref>http://www.facts-about.org.uk/american-president-james-madison.htm</ref>. Madison took copious notes at the [[Constitutional Convention]] of 1787 and, contrary to the promise of secrecy, did not destroy them as everyone else did.  The records reflect that virtually every one of Madison's suggestions at the convention was rejected.  Nevertheless, [[liberals]] like to call Madison the "Father of the [[Constitution]]," perhaps because Madison was more critical of  religion in government than the other [[Founding Fathers]].

'''James Madison'''<ref>James Madison did not have a middle name.</ref> was the 4th [[President of the United States of America]], serving from 1809-1817<ref>http://www.facts-about.org.uk/american-president-james-madison.htm</ref>. He was the chief drafter of the Constitution of 178, advocating the Virginia Plan and many of the compromises that shaped the final document. Madison was the chief interpreter of the Constitution secretly coauthoring (with [[Alexander Hamilton]]) the ''Federalist Papers'' (1788) which remain the most influential commentary. As a leader in Congress in the 1790s created the national governmental structure, and wrote the [[Bill of Rights]].  Breaking with Hamilton and President George Washington, Madison worked with his close friend and ally (and Virginia neighbor) [[Thomas Jefferson]] to create an opposition party to Hamilton's [[Federalist Party]].  The opposition called itself the Republican Party; historians call it the [[Democratic-Republican Party]].  The opposition strongly favored France over Britain in the great wars that erupted in Europe. They also opposed Hamilton's fiscal policies, including his national bank.  When Jefferson was elected in 1800, Madison became Secretary of State, although he never traveled abroad.  The Administration deliberately cut off the friendly relations with Britain that Washington had promoted. Economic warfare against Britain failed, and Madison called for the [[War of 1812]].  His administration did a very poor job of preparing for war, and the first two years were filled with humiliations and defeats, culminating in the British raid that burned Washington in 1814 as Madison and his wife Dolley narrowly escaped.  However after the British invasions of New York (1814) and New Orleans (1815) were smashed, the war ended on an upbeat note, and the peace treaty  involved no major changes. With [[Napoleon]] defeated, there was no further need for war. Madison now realized that Hamilton had been right about the need for a national bank. Madison's Treasury Secretary [[Albert Gallatin]] had tremendous difficulty financing the war without one, and Madison sponsored the Second Bank of the United States in 1816.

Madison was born in March 16, 1751 on the estate of Blue Ridge in Virginia. Educated at Princeton--where he was the first graduate student, he became a lawyer and tobacco planter, operating a large plantation named "Montpelier" in Virginia based on slave labor. He died June 28, 1836 in Montpelier, Virginia at age 86.<ref>[[Encyclopedia of Presidents James Madison]] by Susan Clinton, Children's Press </ref>

Madison was born in March 16, 1751 on the estate of Blue Ridge in Virginia.  He is responsible for writing and proposing the Virginia Plan which would later become part of the Constitution.  He died June 28, 1836 in Montpelier, Virginia at age 86.<ref>[[Encyclopedia of Presidents James Madison]] by Susan Clinton, Children's Press </ref>

Madison was the main drafter of the Constitution at the 1787 Philadelphia convention; his Notes remain the best source of the debates at this secret meeting.  With [[Alexander Hamilton]] and one other he coauthored [[Federalist Papers]] of 1788, which helped convince New York to ratify the Constitution.  The ''Federalist Papers'' remain to this day the most important commentary of the Constitution.

== Views on [[Federalism]] and the Right to Bear Arms ==

Like other nationalists Madison was disgusted with the weak national government of the 1780s--it was badly organized (with no president and no courts), and lacked the power to raise taxes. It would be unable to defend the new nation in a major war.  Hamilton therefore was a strong proponent of powerful national government at this point. (He changed his mind in the 1790s.) 

Madison was a strong proponent of powerful local governments to prevent the usurpation of power by the new [[federal government]]. In the course of his explanation of that in the [[Federalist Papers]], he described how essential the right to bear arms (later embodied in the [[Second Amendment]]) is to overall freedom from tyranny:<ref>[http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/federal/fed46.htm Federalist No. 46] (emphasis added)</ref>

In the two greatest of all the Federalist Papers, numbers 10 and 51, Madison set forth his “republican remedy for the diseases most incident to republican government.” Those diseases, in his diagnosis, were the diseases attendant on factions. He feared, above all else, factions that might mobilize a plebeian majority capable of invading the rights, especially the property rights, of rich minorities. Since he saw no way to remove the causes of such factions, he set about to control their effects. The crux of that control was his brilliant realization that a large republic would forestall overbearing majorities more effectively than the small republics beloved of all previous democratic theorists. But the precondition of that realization was his distinction between two types of factions.

 

In the [[Federalist Papers]] #46, he described how essential the right to bear arms (later embodied in the [[Second Amendment]]) is to overall freedom from tyranny:<ref>[http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/federal/fed46.htm Federalist No. 46] (emphasis added)</ref>

:Besides '''the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation''', the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, '''the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms'''. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it.

:Besides '''the advantage of being armed, which the Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation''', the existence of subordinate governments, to which the people are attached, and by which the militia officers are appointed, forms a barrier against the enterprises of ambition, more insurmountable than any which a simple government of any form can admit of. Notwithstanding the military establishments in the several kingdoms of Europe, which are carried as far as the public resources will bear, '''the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms'''. And it is not certain, that with this aid alone they would not be able to shake off their yokes. But were the people to possess the additional advantages of local governments chosen by themselves, who could collect the national will and direct the national force, and of officers appointed out of the militia, by these governments, and attached both to them and to the militia, it may be affirmed with the greatest assurance, that the throne of every tyranny in Europe would be speedily overturned in spite of the legions which surround it.