CC Introduction

A COMPILATION OF THE MESSAGES AND PAPERS OF THE PRESIDENTS.

BY JAMES D. RICHARDSON

DOROTHY PAINE, a Friend, first married, at nineteen, John Todd, a young lawyer of Philadelphia. One year after his death, when twenty-two, she married James Madison. Her kind heart, frank and cordial manners, and personal beauty made her very popular. When she presided at the White House her tact, her ready recognition of every one, and her remembrance of events concerning them increased this feeling. Although her entertainments lacked the ceremony of past administrations, " Dolly " Madison was considered a charming hostess. Although she was extremely charitable, she always dispensed her husband's wealth with prudence and judgment. The war of 1812 showed her true nobility in many ways, and it was she who saved the Stuart portrait of Washington when the British were about to pillage and burn the White House. The Government bought from her Madison's Record of the Debates in Congress from 1782-1787, for $30,000.

THE BATTLE OF TIPPECANOE. November 7,  1811.

Willing tools in the hands of England, the Indians were, until 1840-1850, a very real and constant source of anxiety to the Presidents. From Washington's time onward the policy had been to utilize every opportunity of thrusting the tribes westward. Tecumseh, a chieftain of remarkable intelligence and ability, sought to block the westward progress of the white man by forming a confederacy of the Indian tribes. In 1809 the United States made a purchase of 3,000,000 acres of land on the Wabash, which Tecumseh declared was fraudulent. He gathered forces on Tippecanoe Creek to prevent the occupation of the territory ceded. William Henry Harrison, then Governor of Indiana Territory, which is now Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Wisconsin, decided to establish our title by building a fort in the disputed domain. When he came within four miles of the Indian encampment on Tippecanoe Creek he was met by a deputation of savages who requested him to abandon for the day his hostile plans, bivouac for the night on that spot, and in the morning parley with Tecumseh's brother, the Prophet. Although the spot seemed devised by nature to favor an Indian attack, Harrison complied. Two hours before daylight the Indians began picking off the troops made visible by the campfires. Unable to retaliate effectually, the troops waited doggedly for daylight. Then, at point of bayonet, they drove their foes into a swamp and wiped them and their village out of existence. The victory cost 188 men in killed and wounded, 34 of them being officers. Tecumseh's ambitious scheme of confederation was discredited and doomed from that time on.

THE  CHESAPEAKE CAPTURED BY THE SHANNON
No event in the Chesapeake's career contradicts the verdict of the seamen that she was hoodooed. After lying blockaded in Boston long enough to take on an entirely new crew, she sallied out to give battle to her enemy, the Shannon. On June x, 1813, at 5:50 p.m. the fight began. The ships were evenly matched in size and armament, but there was no comparison between the disciplined, efficient gallantry of the British and the unskilful but courageous tactics of the Americans. After seven minutes of broadside firing, the Chesapeake's sails were crippled. She drifted with her bows to the Shannon and her decks were raked from end to end. As soon as the vessels were grappled together the British captain boarded, at the head of his men. Almost simultaneously, Lawrence fell and was borne below, crying: "Don't give up the ship! Fight her till she sinks!" But the fight was already lost. The British buried Lawrence with all the honors due to a brave but unfortunate commander and gentleman.

The previous ill-fortune of the Chesapeake is told in the Encyclopedic Index, in the article entitled " Chesapeake, The."

BATTLE BETWEEN THE CONSTITUTION AND THE GUERRIERE.

The "Constitution" was built in 1797, and was a man-of-war of 1,576 tons and 44 guns. On August 19, 1812, under Captain Hull, she met the English battleship, "GuerriBre," and immediately opened fire. The battle resolved itself into a close-range struggle, and both sides were prevented from boarding only by the heaviness of the seas. In fifteen minutes, the grape of the "Constitution" had wrought horrible havoc in the "GuerriSre," tearing her rigging to shreds, shooting away her masts, and setting her on fire. Within half an hour, uncontrollable and sinking, she struck her flag to the American, who lost only seven men in the encounter.

BATTLE  OF  NEW  ORLEANS
Pakenham, with 8,000 British veterans of the Napoleonic wars, tried to wrest the city of New Orleans, with the control of the Mississippi, from Jack-sea's motley army of Creoles, French pirates, free negroes, San Domingans, French veterans, frontiersmen from Tennessee and Kentucky, and soldiers and sailors from the regular forces of the United States. Jackson's men fought behind a straight earthwork. The British Peninsular veterans advanced cheering. A redoubt on the far right was carried, but so terrible a fire opened on them from the line that they fled. The main attack was repulsed by riflemen from Kentucky and Tennessee. The British formed a column of sixty men front in a ditch 400 yards from the earthwork. They fell, says an eye-witness, like blades of grass before the scythe. They broke and fled; then reformed and charged. Pakenham was shot while leading them. Lambert, his successor, stopped the battle. The British had about 700 dead, of whom 85 were officers. 

THE  BATTLE  OF LAKE  ERIE September 10, 1813
Here for the first time fleets flying the British and American flags met in regular line of battle.
Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry summed up the occurrence in his report as follows: "We have met the enemy and they are ours."

Perry's flagship, the Lawrence, led his fleet of eight vessels, manned by 400 men, against the six British vessels under Barclay, which carried more than 500 men, flying as the signal for action a flag bearing the dying words of Captain Lawrence, "Don't give up the ship!" It was a stand-up fight to the finish, with the Americans at a disadvantage, and it ended in the surrender of the British.

SUGGESTIONS.
Madison's discussion of the powers of the Federal and State Governments is both instructive and interesting. 

Madison's administration was especially marked by the War of 1812.

MADISON

Not all great men were poor boys. The child of wealth has a harder task than the son of poverty. He lacks the compelling incentive of necessity. All things are at his hand. It is a heart of rare determination and a mind of uncommon virtue that can put luxury aside in youth and young manhood and depend alone on merit and on native force. Such a man was Sumner. Such in a lesser measure of fortune was Washington. And such, more than either, was James Madison, "Father of the Constitution," a? he was called. He was the child of wealth, and yet he used the leisure thus afforded in study, self-discipline and thought. His early condition and subsequent success are therefore an inspiration to all the heirs of fortune. And his method is a lesson to all who would achieve mightily in the day when learning and trained intellectual power is needed. That method was to employ each hour in storing up knowledge, thought and therefore wisdom. And so his mind became an intellectual storage battery, charged with power and ready for the instant when Circumstance should call, as it always does, with startling suddenness, for the man of the hour. Life's opportunity sends no couriers ahead to prepare men for its coming. It appears on the instant without warning and cries aloud, "Here am I, where is the man!"

This is the sole secret of Madison's success. He never strove for place. His character was not masterful. He was a follower of mightier men. He was easily influenced by such lordly wills as Hamilton, easily seduced by such subtle minds as Jefferson. Thus his public service was a series of contradictions, compromises, doubts and fears. And yet he was one of the superior figures of that age of giants and of storm. He was this solely because he was equipped. His mind was an arsenal which all factions and all parties needed in their warfare, and which each great political leader sought to capture. He had made himself, by sheer preparedness, indispensable. And thus it is that in spite of variable will and neutral character, his is one of the revered names of American history.
 
Madison was a middle ground. Between those tremendous mountain peaks of power, Hamilton and Jefferson, standing over against each ether, Madison was the valley. Under the influence of Hamilton he was a maker of the Constitution and the ablest aid of his great chief in forcing the idea of centralization on the Convention. Under the influence of Jefferson he was dissatisfied with his own immortal works, and advocated the amendments and the Bill of Rights. Under Hamilton's compelling hand he urged the power of National coercion to make effective National taxation and the National laws. Under the insinuating suggestions of Jefferson he swung back to the extreme of the States Rights view and drew the resolutions of the Virginia Legislature, declaring the Alien and Seditions laws "utterly null and void and of no effect." Thus, within a single decade, he secured the contradictory titles of "Father of the Constitution" and "Father of Nullification." Nothing so clearly shows the charitableness of Time than that to-day the mass of Americans willingly forget the last and remember with loving pride the first. But this is history, and in the realms of history truth alone should reign. However, in all and through all he was a patriot. His motives were absolutely pure. His intentions were exalted. Loftier love of country no man had; and Americans love him who loves America. All can be forgiven the patriot, and it should be so. This land of ours is the home of the master people of the world; our flag is sacred; our destiny is in the hand of God; and he who loves America and with a fervent faith serves this chosen people, shall be exalted in the chronicle of the Nation's great, and grow nobler, purer and dearer to American heart as generations come and go. Time with its erasing hand makes dim and finally obliterates all earthly fame save that of the patriot and saint. The luster of these grows brighter against the background of universal blackness where the pitying and remorseless years have blotted out the deeds and the follies of the race. So lives the name of Madison, and so it shall continue to live, made immortal by the magic power of patriotism.

James Madison

March 4, 1809, to March 4, 1817

James Madison

James Madison was born in King George County, Va., on the 16th of March,
1751. He was the son of James Madison, the family being of English
descent, and among the early settlers of Virginia. Was fitted for
college by private tutors, and entered Princeton College in 1769,
graduating in 1771; remained a year at college pursuing his studies.
After this he returned to Virginia and began the practice of law. In
1776 was elected a member of the general assembly of Virginia, and in
1778 was appointed a member of the executive council. In the winter of
1779-80 was chosen a delegate to the Continental Congress, of which body
he continued an active and prominent member till 1784. The legislature
of Virginia appointed him in 1786 a delegate to a convention at
Annapolis, Md., to devise a system of commercial regulations for all the
States. Upon their recommendation a convention of delegates from all the
States was held in Philadelphia in May, 1787. This Convention framed the
Constitution of the United States, and of it Mr. Madison was a leading
member. He was next a member of the convention of his State which met to
consider the new Constitution for the United States. Was a member of the
House of Representatives in the First Congress, taking his seat in
April, 1789, and continued to be a member of the House during both of
Washington's terms as President. He married Mrs. Dolly Paine Todd, of
Philadelphia, in 1794, she being the widow of a Pennsylvania lawyer. Her
father was a Quaker, and had removed from Virginia to Philadelphia.
Declined the office of Secretary of State, vacated by Jefferson, in
1793. He retired from Congress in 1797, and in 1798 accepted a seat in
the Virginia assembly. In 1801 was appointed by President Jefferson
Secretary of State, which office he held during the eight years of
Jefferson's Administration. In 1808 was elected President, and was
reelected in 1812. On March 4, 1817, he retired from public life, and
passed the remainder of his days at Montpelier, in Orange County, Va. In
1829 was chosen a member of the State convention to revise the
constitution of Virginia, and was also chosen president of an
agricultural society in his county. He died on the 28th day of June,
1836, and was buried at his home.