James Madison was born into a well-to-do Virginia family. As a boy, he studied under a private tutor. He also attended private school. Madison entered the College of New Jersey (Princeton) at 12 years of age. He graduated in 1771. Five years later, Madison was elected to the Virginia Constitutional Convention. In 1780, he was elected to the Continental Congress.
After 1784, Madison served in the Virginia House of Burgesses. He became an early supporter of religious freedom. He also wanted to create a system of free public schools in Virginia. In 1787, Madison became a member of the Constitutional Convention. He recorded its proceedings, and he wrote parts of the new federal Constitution. In 1789, Madison was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives.
As a young man, Madison was one of the original Federalists. He wrote portions of The Federalist, a collection of essays explaining the Constitution. (Alexander Hamilton and John Jay wrote some of the essays.) Between 1787-1788, The Federalist essays were published in New York City newspapers. They are still the best source for the Founding Fathers' views on the federal Constitution.
In the first federal Congress, Madison grew critical of President GEORGE WASHINGTON's policies. He especially disliked the Federalist economic program of Alexander Hamilton. (Hamilton was Washington's secretary of the treasury.) Madison accused Hamilton of favoring a small group of eastern bankers. Disenchanted with the national government, Madison retired to his Virginia estate in 1798.
JOHN ADAMS became president in 1796. He signed the Alien and Sedition Acts. Madison opposed the Sedition Act. He allied himself with THOMAS JEFFERSON. In 1798, Jefferson and Madison published resolutions condemning the Sedition Act. They believed it was unconstitutional. They argued that it infringed on the right of the states to govern themselves.
In 1800, Jefferson was elected president. He appointed Madison secretary of state. Madison later won the presidency himself. He was elected president in 1809. By then, U.S.-British relations were poor. In 1812, Congress declared war on Britain. Opponents of the War of 1812 called it "Mr. Madison's war." But Madison was reelected in 1813. The War of 1812 ended in 1815.
In 1817, Madison retired from the presidency. He returned to Montpelier, his Virginia plantation. In retirement, Madison pursued his hobbies and experimented with scientific farming techniques. He became president of the American Colonization Society. (The society was formed to return African-American slaves to Africa.) After Jefferson's death in 1826, Madison replaced him as the rector of the University of Virginia.
In his final years, Madison assembled his large collection of papers. (His notes on the Constitutional Convention were published in 1839. The volume was entitled the Journal of the Federal Convention.) James Madison died at his Virginia estate in 1836. He is buried at Montpelier in Orange County, Virginia.
