The Business of May Next: James Madison and the Founding"Good fortune offered this nation an unusual chance at ideal nation-forming and... some honorable leaders seized that chance", writes William Lee Miller in The Business of May Next, and none among the founders made more of the opportunity than did James Madison, subject of this engaging work. Madison is depicted during the critical years between 1784 and 1791, when he was so active in articulating the governmental aims of the fledgling nation that he sometimes found himself in official dialogue with himself. More than simply a historical and biographical account, the book traces Madison's political and theoretical development as a means of illuminating its larger theme, the moral and intellectual underpinnings of the American nation. With a sound grasp of his material and a refreshing style Miller reveals how Madison's research into republics and his influence on the writing of the Constitution are central to the values for which the nation stands. From an examination of Madison's notes, Miller traces Madison's early research into other republics and their weaknesses. He reveals how Madison's thinking shaped the Virginia Plan, which, in turn, shaped the United States Constitution and the nation's institutions. The author writes that Madison sought the strands of Republicanism in history and gave republican ideals new and lasting institutional expression. He shows how the making of republican institutions became a collaboration, and how the newly created institutions contained within themselves provision for their own continuing alteration and for the involvement and influence of collective humanity down through the years. Miller follows Madison through the Constitutional Convention("the business of May next") to the great national argument on behalf of the Constitution, notably through the Federalist papers. Of particular interest are his discussions of the constitutional deliberations over religious freedom and the institution of slavery. |
Contents
Big House in Orange County | 1 |
A Child of the Revolution Reads Some Books | 7 |
The People Can Act Unjustly | 22 |
Beginning the World Anew to a Certain Extent | 34 |
The Great Seminar in Print or Founding Scribblers | 43 |
The Business of May Next | 61 |
The Inadvertent Origins of the American Presidency | 78 |
Supreme Law Unfinished Parts | 93 |
The Peculiar Federalist Paper | 171 |
Traveling toward the Constitution or Never Turn the Hands Backward | 185 |
Rocking Cradles in Virginia | 194 |
Was the United States Founded on Selfishness? | 217 |
No Just Government Should Refuse | 235 |
As Sincerely Devoted to Liberty 217 235 | 244 |
Bulwarks and Palladiums Acknowledgments | 277 |
Notes | 281 |
Common terms and phrases
Alexander Hamilton amendments American antifederalists argument Articles Articles of Confederation bill of rights Carolina century clause colonies Committee of Detail compromise confederacies Confederation Congress Constitutional Convention debate declaration of rights defending delegates Edmund Randolph essays executive factions Federal Convention Federalist Federalist papers founders framers George Washington Gouverneur Morris Henry's House human Hume idea important included interest issue James Madison James Wilson Jefferson in Paris Jersey John Adams June king later leaders legislative legislature letter liberty majority memo ment Montpelier moral notes opponents Orange County Papers Patrick Henry perhaps person Philadelphia phrase political president proposed protection provision Randolph ratifying convention religion religious representatives republic republican republican government Revolution revolutionary Senate side slave trade slaveholding slavery small-state South speech Thomas Jefferson tion union United vices Virginia Plan vote wanted whole Witherspoon words writing written wrote York