James Madison by Jay Cost

James Madison by Jay Cost

Author:Jay Cost [Cost, Jay]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-11-02T00:00:00+00:00


Unfortunately, George Washington found himself caught in the middle of this fight—literally, for he had brought both Jefferson and Hamilton into his cabinet. The president saw himself as a symbol of American resolve and a tribune of national unity, and it grieved him tremendously to see partisanship grow during the second half of his first term.

Yet this partisanship was an inevitable result of the evolution of normal politics, which the country had so sorely lacked since its founding. Men of goodwill of all different socioeconomic and ideological stripes had come together to frame an effective government; now that they had succeeded, they had the luxury of disagreeing, as the debate shifted from how to build a government that could do things to what things such a government should do. And while Washington lamented the collapse of unity, there was still an underlying thread of commonality, a shared commitment by Madison and Hamilton, Republicans and Federalists, to the Constitution as a framework for resolving policy disputes. Politics in the 1790s was no doubt played with rough elbows, but neither side ever contemplated breaking the oath of loyalty to the Constitution, a fact that was quite extraordinary considering how untested the new government was.

Over the rest of the decade, partisan differences would become especially sharp. Britain and France returned to war with one another in 1793, and the United States would find itself caught between these two powers, with no obvious way to extricate itself from the dilemma. The foreign tumult only made the squabbling worse, as Republicans and Federalists accused each other of betraying the country, and Madison would find himself in a rhetorical battle against Hamilton in the newspapers.



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