When James Madison entered the House of Representatives
in 1789, he found himself playing a singular role in America's
new regime. Alongside President George Washington, Vice President John
Adams, Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, and Secretary of the
Treasury Alexander Hamilton, Madison was viewed as a leader in
the government. In the House, he often served as Washington's floor
leader and right-hand man. In Congress, he was known by his colleagues
as "our first man."
In addition to his important work for the drafting and
passage of the Bill of Rights, Madison also had many important
objectives for the government regarding commerce and trade. First,
he wished to fight British influence over American trade. He also
wished to encourage American shipping and navigation and to see
new markets open up as part of the free trade situation spurred
on by America's alliance with the French. He believed it was the
duty of the national government to pursue these objectives.
Madison's ambitions for American commerce and trade, however,
were severely checked after Alexander Hamilton presented his very
ambitious Report on Public Credit to the Congress early in 1790.
Hamilton proposed that the national government assume all the debt
which had been incurred by the governments of the thirteen states,
and Madison thought that this plan went much too far in the extent
to which the government would be involved in economic matters. Although
he had firmly supported Hamilton's elevation as Secretary of the
Treasury, Madison soon found himself acting as the primary voice
of opposition to the Hamiltonian Federalists. To his dismay, a
modified version of Hamilton's proposal for national assumption
of state debts was passed by both houses of Congress in July 1790.
Madison's fight with Hamilton was just beginning. In the
fall of 1790, Hamilton proposed the setting up the First National
Bank, after the model of Great Britain's, which would harness the
interests of private enterprise for the benefit of the public welfare.
It would circulate large quantities of paper money in order to
stimulate the nation's economy. Madison objected outright to the
plan, arguing that it plan was unconstitutional–that the legislature
did not have the power to form such an incorporated institution
as a national bank. He led the opposition to the bank proposal
in the House of Representatives. The bill passed and became law,
however, on February 25, 1791, after President Washington had rejected
the Madison's strict constructionist interpretation of the Constitution
in favor of Hamilton's doctrine of implied powers.
Hamilton followed up his success with the bank with his
presentation of the Report on Manufactures to the Congress, which
proposed a centralized system of economic development whereby the national
government would actively encourage trade and manufacturing throughout
and American nation which was still very largely agricultural.
Madison led the opposition to this idea. He argued that Hamilton's
doctrines subverted "the fundamental and characteristic principle"
of the federal government, which was the limitation of mixed powers.
"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by
money," he wrote, "and will promote the General Welfare, the Government
is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an
indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions."
These controversies over finance and commerce laid the
groundwork for partisan divisions in the government. Madison, finding himself
in a very different role from the one he played at the Constitutional
Convention, was now arguing for a less active federal government.
By 1792, congressmen were speaking of "Mr. Madison's party," and
the Federalists were condemning him for his opposition to Hamilton's
influence over the Administration. He felt a very strong need,
however, to defend his conception of republican government against
the "powerful combination" of financial speculation, mercantilism,
manufacturing, and Anglican religion in the government of which
Hamilton was a chief representative. Madison's old friend Thomas
Jefferson, the Secretary of State, found himself sympathizing.
He and Madison created a new political party, the Democratic- Republicans,
in opposition to the Federalists.
Party divisions were deepened by differing ideological
interpretations of the French Revolution which was raging on the
other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Madison and Jefferson saw the
French Revolution as similar to the American Revolution, a position
that conflicted with that of John Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and President
Washington. Despite Federalist opposition to the French revolutionary
ideology, however, enthusiasm for the French Revolution spread
around the country, and in 1792, the Madisonian and Jeffersonian
Republicans scored major gains.
By the beginning of 1793, the French were at war with
Great Britain, and the two American parties were split over which
side they should favor–if any at all–in the fight. The following
year, on April 22, President Washington issued the Proclamation
of Neutrality, which prevented the Americans from taking sides
in the Anglo-French conflict. Madison was incensed by the decision,
since he felt that the policy gave an "anglified complexion" to
the government. His confidence in Washington's leadership was shaken
by this disappointment.
Over the next several years, Madison became more embittered by
the Administration's foreign policy. In November 1794, his former
ally from the Constitutional Convention, John Jay, signed a treaty
with the British over trade questions. In this treaty, Britain was
granted "most favored nation" status, even after the country had
been breaking agreements in its heavy-handed treatment of American
merchant ships on the high seas. The Senate approved the treaty
in June 1795. After long months of waiting for President Washington
to send it to the House, Congress gave its stamp of approval in
March 1796. Madison had been a key figure in the Republican opposition.
The long fight over Jay's treaty split open partisan hostilities,
and the atmosphere surrounding the fall presidential election was
very strained. The Federalists chose John Adams as their candidate. Thomas
Jefferson tried to persuade Madison to run as the Republican candidate,
but Madison would not. Jefferson got the Republican nod, but was
defeated by Adams in November.
Tired, and disgusted with politics, Madison left Congress
in 1797. He returned home to Virginia, where represented his state's opposition
to the Adams Administration. That administration eventually became
the target of widespread Republican opposition with the passage
of the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798. These acts inspired Madison
to draft the Virginia Resolutions, which denounced Adams's statutes
as violations of the First Amendment of the Constitution, and which
also claimed a right for the states "to interpose for arresting
the progress of the evil" which he perceived in the national government's
actions. These strong words which suggested a doctrine of states'
rights would come back to haunt Madison during his retirement,
when the nation was experiencing the first pangs of pre-Civil War
sectionalism.
