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4th President James Madison, Jr.

Male 1751 - 1836  (85 years)    Has more than 100 ancestors but no descendants in this family tree.

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  • Name James Madison 
    Prefix 4th President 
    Suffix Jr. 
    Birth 16 Mar 1751  Port Conway, King George Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Gender Male 
    Prominent People 1809 
    Death 28 Jun 1836  Montpelier, Orange Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Burial Montpelier, Orange Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Siblings 11 Siblings 
    Person ID I74795  Geneagraphie
    Links To This person is also James Madison at Wikipedia 
    Last Modified 25 Mar 2001 

    Father James Madison,   b. 27 Mar 1723, Port Conway, King George Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 27 Feb 1801, Montpelier Cem. Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 77 years) 
    Mother Eleanor Rose Conway,   b. 4 Jan 1731, Port Conway, King George Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 11 Feb 1829, Montpelier, Orange Co., Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 98 years) 
    Marriage 15 Sep 1749  Prince William County, Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F30406  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

    Family Dolley Payne,   b. 20 May 1768, Guilford County, North Carolina, USA Find all individuals with events at this locationd. 12 Jul 1849, Washington, District of Columbia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location (Age 81 years) 
    Marriage 15 Sep 1794  Harewood, Nr Charles Town, Virginia, USA Find all individuals with events at this location 
    Family ID F30405  Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
    Last Modified 25 Mar 2001 

  • Photos Photos (Log in)Photos (Log in)

  • Notes 
    • - US President No. 4

      Was elected in 1808 by 122 to 47 electoral votes over Charles Pinckney. Was reelected in 1812 by 128 to 89 electoral votes over De Witt Clinton. During his first term 1809-1812 George Clinton served as vice-president; during his second 1813-1814 Elbridge Gerry. From 1814 to 1817 the speaker of the House of Representatives served as vice-president.
      At his inauguration, James Madison, a small, wizened man, appeared old and worn; Washington Irving described
      him as "but a withered little apple-John." But whatever his deficiencies in charm, Madison's buxom wife Dolley compensated for them with her warmth and gaiety. She was the toast of Washington. Born in 1751, Madison was brought up in Orange County, Virginia, and attended Princeton (then called the College of New Jersey). A student of history and government, well-read in law, he participated in the framing of the Virginia Constitution in 1776, served in the Continental Congress, and was a leader in the Virginia Assembly. When delegates to the Constitutional Convention assembled at Philadelphia, the 36-year-old Madison took frequent and emphatic part in the debates.
      Madison made a major contribution to the ratification of the Constitution by writing, with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, the Federalist essays. In later years, when he was referred to as the "Father of the Constitution," Madison protested that the document was not "the off-spring of a single brain," but "the work of many heads and many hands." In Congress, he helped frame the Bill of Rights and enact the first revenue legislation. Out of his leadership in opposition to Hamilton's financial proposals, which he felt would unduly bestow wealth and power upon northern financiers, came the development of the Republican, or Jeffersonian, Party. As President Jefferson's Secretary of State, Madison protested to warring France and Britain that their seizure of American ships was contrary to international law. The protests, John Randolph acidly commented, had the effect of "a shilling pamphlet
      hurled against eight hundred ships of war." Despite the unpopular Embargo Act of 1807, which did not make the belligerent nations change their ways but did cause a depression in the United States, Madison was elected President in 1808. Before he took office the Embargo Act was repealed. During the first year of Madison's Administration, the United States prohibited trade with both Britain and France; then in May, 1810, Congress authorized trade with both, directing the President, if either would accept America's view of neutral rights, to forbid trade with the other nation. Napoleon pretended to comply. Late in 1810, Madison proclaimed non-intercourse with Great Britain. In Congress a young group including Henry Clay and John C. Calhoun, the "War Hawks," pressed the President for a more militant policy. The British impressment of American seamen and the seizure of cargoes impelled Madison to give in to the pressure. On June 1, 1812, he asked Congress to declare war. The young Nation was not prepared to fight; its forces took a severe trouncing. The British entered Washington and set fire to the White House and the Capitol. But a few notable naval and military victories, climaxed by Gen. Andrew Jackson's triumph at New Orleans, convinced Americans that the War of 1812 had been gloriously successful. An upsurge of nationalism resulted. The New England Federalists who had opposed the war--and who had even talked secession--were so thoroughly repudiated that Federalism disappeared as a national party. In retirement at Montpelier, his estate in Orange County, Virginia, Madison spoke out against the disruptive states' rights influences that by the 1830's threatened to shatter the Federal Union. In a note opened after his death in 1836, he stated, "The advice nearest to my heart and deepest in my convictions is that the Union of the States be cherished and perpetuated."



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