| 摘要 | Until a few decades ago, James Madison, the fourth president of the United States, was probably the least appreciated great figure in American history. He was, after all, the father of the Constitution, the father of the Bill of Rights, and a founder, with Thomas Jefferson, of what is now the Democratic party. But it was only some time in the 1950s that scholars began to rediscover his skills as a political leader and his profundity as a political thinker.
Madison played the leading role in the convention that produced the Constitution, and kept the notes of the proceedings that give us the best account ever produced of the writing of a constitution. Along with Alexander Hamilton he wrote the Federalist Papers, to this day the most illuminating analysis of our Constitution and considered by many to rank among the world’s great political tomes. He played a major role in achieving ratification of the Constitution when the outcome was very much in doubt in his home state of Virginia and elsewhere.
Then, once elected to the first Congress, Madison initiated the deliberations on amendments to the Constitution, against determined opposition in the House of Representatives that ended in the adoption and ratification of the Bill of Rights. He accomplished all of this before his 40th birthday, with his career as secretary of state and president still ahead of him.
Though he was a man of action, the intellectual qualities that made this giant of American statesmanship unique are best reflected in his writings, and this Library of America volume is a treasure trove of the best of Madison’s thought – 197 letters, speeches, messages, resolutions, memoranda and essays (including all 29 of his contributions to The Federalist), written over a period of more than 60 years, selected by Jack N. Rakove, a Stanford professor and recent winner of the Pulitzer Prize for history.
For the purposes of historians and other scholars, Madison’s writings are abundantly available. There is an early nine-volume set of writings (1900-1910), and a more recently completed massive 17-volume set (1962-1991), covering his writings up to the time of his appointment as secretary of state. Publications of his papers as secretary of state (four volumes to date) and as president (three volumes to date) are ongoing, and a series is planned to contain the papers from the long period of his retirement.
The present single-volume collection, a handy, sturdy and handsomely produced book, suits well the purposes of the non-scholarly general reader with a desire to acquaint himself with the thought of this extraordinarily influential political mind. The selections have been made thoughtfully, and the editing has been careful and restrained. The reader can rely on the accuracy of the texts.
But I do have one serious complaint. These writings are presented with almost no historical context. There are brief explanatory notes at the back of the book, but there is no signal (for instance an asterisk or a superscript number) anywhere in the texts to alert the reader when there is a note. For example, Madison’s speech in the House of Representatives on June 8, 1789, introducing his proposal for the amendments that would become the Bill of Rights, is one of the most skillful orations in American legislative history, and certainly one of the most consequential.
Without background explanation, the opening sentence is puzzling: “I am sorry to be accessory to the loss of a single moment of time by the house.” There is no indication that the editor has provided a note, some 500 pages away, explaining that three representatives “had all expressed continued opposition to considering amendments while more pressing business was before the House.” In fact, full appreciation of this speech is possible, in my opinion, only with more historical context, which Mr. Rakove would have been exceptionally capable of providing.
The two factions in the First Congress, the Federalist supporters of the new Constitution, and the Anti-Federalist opponents of the Constitution, were both determinedly opposed to considering Madison’s amendments, but for opposite reasons. A brief editor’s note, explaining what the procedural and substantive objections were, on both sides, would have greatly enhanced the chance that readers could realize the political wizardry of Madison as he addressed and overcame his double difficulties with this one extraordinary oration.
That criticism aside, this book is a valuable addition to any personal library; a debt of gratitude is owed to both the editor and the publisher.
Robert A. Goldwin, a resident scholar in constitutional studies at the American Enterprise Institute, is the author of From Parchment to Power: How James Madison Used the Bill of Rights to Save the Constitution. |
