At the Virginia Ratifying Convention in June 1788, James Madison and Patrick Henry debated the proposed Constitution.  The vote was going to be close.  If Virginia said no,George Washington could not become the first president and support for the Constitution would quickly erode.  The excerpt below is about Madison's first speech to the delegates: (citations are omitted)

Madison then rose and began what was a very long and must have been for him a physically exhausting speech.  It was the first time he addressed the convention at length.  If he was to influence the handful of undecided and wavering delegates, he had to make a good impression, both with the logic of his arguments and in his personal appeal to those whom he was asking to set aside their reservations about the proposed plan and vote to approve the Constitution.

It was probably early afternoon when Madison began.  His voice, thin and quiet compared to Henry’s, immediately demonstrated how inadequate his speaking skills were for disseminating the work of his powerful mind.  The stenographer noted, as he would several times during the debates, that Madison “spoke so low that his exordium [introductory comments] could not be heard distinctly.”

Madison must have been nervous.  This was far from the ideal environment for the man from Orange County.  He had impressed the members of Governor Patrick Henry’s executive council in 1777-78 because he could work and interact with them as part of a small group.  He excelled as a member of small legislative bodies, especially in committee work, when he could display his understanding of history, government, and politics without having to give “public” speeches.  Edward Coles, who served as President Madison’s private secretary and later as the second governor of Illinois, wrote that Thomas Jefferson had often observed that if Madison had been a member of the House of Representatives after it had become a large body, “he never would have been distinguished.” Madison, Jefferson noted, needed to sit behind closed doors in small groups, where the proceedings were conducted “in a conversational manner.”  That “enabled him…to get the better of his modesty [and] take an active and distinguished part.”  Often Madison would shun the opportunity to speak on the floor of the state or federal legislature, preferring instead to work behind the scenes.

Those with a good view of Madison as he spoke to the delegates in the Quesnay Academy [where the convention was held] would likely have seen, in the words of Edward Coles written many years later, a man who was “in his dress not at all excentric or given to dandyism, but always appeared neat and genteel.”  Coles had heard that early in Madison’s life he sometimes wore light-colored clothes, but “from the time I [Coles] first knew him...when I was a child…I never knew him to wear any other colour but black.” At the Richmond convention, he likely wore “his breeches short with buckles at the knees, black silk stockings and shoes with strings,” as Coles had frequently seen him dress.  Madison often wore powder in his hair, “which was dressed full over the ears, tied behind, and brought to a point above the forehead, to cover some degree of his baldness.”

Coles says that Madison stood five feet six inches, several inches taller than most contemporaries and biographers have estimated to be his height.  He had a “small and delicate form” and “rather a tawny complexion, bespeaking a sedentary and studious man.”  He often wore a three-pointed black hat in which he would sometimes store his notes for speeches.  Madison’s hair was “originally of a dark brown colour; his eyes were bluish, but not a bright blue; [and although] his form, features and manner were not commanding…few men possessed so rich a flow of language.”

Madison began this important speech by trying to focus the debate in a way that would play to his strengths.  He decided not to confront Henry by challenging his general criticisms of the Constitution, which Henry had attempted to support with vague references to specific sections and misrepresentations of what the Constitution said or the Philadelphia delegates meant.  Instead, in a direct rebuff to the Anti-Federalists, Madison demanded that the opponents provide evidence and examples when they claimed that the Constitution would destroy the nation’s newly won liberty.  He encouraged “calm and rational investigation” and added, “I hope that Gentlemen, in displaying their abilities, on this occasion, instead of giving opinions, and making assertions, will condescend to prove and demonstrate, by a fair and regular discussion—It gives me pain to hear Gentlemen continually distorting the natural construction of language.”

Madison cautioned the delegates not to be misled by unsupported criticisms of the proposed plan, saying, in effect, that they should reject broad challenges to the Constitution unless supported by proof grounded in a reasonable interpretation of its words.  Madison observed that Henry “told us, that this Constitution ought to be rejected, because it endangered the public liberty…Give me leave to make one answer to that observation—Let the dangers which this system is supposed to be replete with, be clearly pointed out.  If any dangerous and unnecessary powers be given to the general Legislature, let them be plainly demonstrated, and let us not rest satisfied with general assertions of dangers, without examination.”

Madison challenged Henry’s argument that the nation was at peace and capable of prosperity:  “I wish sincerely, Sir, this were true.  If this be their happy situation, why has every State acknowledged the contrary?  Why were deputies from all the States sent to the General Convention? Why have complaints of national and international distresses been echoed and re-echoed throughout the Continent?  Why has our General Government been so shamefully disgraced, and our Constitution [the Articles of Confederation] violated?”

If Madison could show that Henry’s attacks on the Constitution were inconsistent and conflicting, some delegates would lose confidence in his argument that the proposed plan was unnecessary and dangerous. Demonstrating such contradictions would suggest that Henry’s criticisms were not well thought out and should be viewed suspiciously.

®Richard Labunski - may not be reproduced without permission

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