First Inaugural Address

Summary

James Madison took the oath in the House chamber on 4 March 1809, three days after Congress had replaced Jefferson's failed Embargo with the Non-Intercourse Act. British orders in council and Napoleon's decrees were seizing American ships and sailors, and the new President had been Jefferson's Secretary of State through the whole quarrel. His address is barely twelve hundred words. Madison begins with a contrast: the world's situation is "without a parallel," and the country's difficulties sting the more because they arrived at a height of prosperity. He then defends the record. The United States had cultivated peace "by observing justice" and kept its neutral obligations with scrupulous impartiality; the belligerents answered with "arbitrary edicts" contrary to reason and law. Responsibility for the crisis, he insists, lies abroad, not in American councils. The center of the speech is a single sentence of more than a dozen infinitive clauses that works as a creed for the administration: cherish peace, keep sincere neutrality, prefer "amicable discussion" to an appeal to arms, exclude foreign intrigue, support the Constitution "as well in its limitations as in its authorities," respect powers reserved to the States, leave conscience and religion outside civil jurisdiction, protect the press, pay down debt, and keep the standing army small because a trained militia is "the firmest bulwark of republics." The author of the First Amendment and of Federalist No. 41 is visible in nearly every clause. He closes by relying on the "intelligence and virtue" of citizens and on the "Almighty Being whose power regulates the destiny of nations." Three years later Madison asked Congress for war against Britain, so the 1809 creed reads now as the last full statement of the Jeffersonian hope that a commercial republic could win its rights without fighting for them. Whether that hope was prudence or wishful thinking is the live question for a seminar.

Plot or Argument

• An honor made heavier by the times

  Madison thanks a "free and virtuous nation" for its confidence and says the solemnity of the period enlarges both the honor and the responsibility of the oath.

• Prosperity interrupted

  He contrasts the unrivaled growth of agriculture, commerce, manufactures, and revenue under peaceful neutrality with the distress that followed when warring powers turned on American trade.

• A creed in one sentence

  A single long sentence lists the principles of the coming administration: peace, neutrality, negotiation before arms, constitutional limits, States' reserved rights, religious liberty, a free press, economy, debt payment, a small army and strong militia, and support for science and commerce.

• Reliance on citizens and Providence

  Madison praises Jefferson, then rests his hopes on the intelligence and virtue of the people, the other branches of government, and the Almighty Being who governs the destiny of nations.

Lessons

• Innocent injury and the temptation to retaliate

  Madison argues that the United States had done nothing to provoke the belligerents and had kept its neutral duties strictly. His point is that being wronged does not by itself settle what a just nation should do next; he still prefers negotiation. Students should notice that the claim of blamelessness and the choice of restraint are separate steps in the argument.

  • What evidence does Madison give that American policy had been impartial?
  • Why does he call the belligerents' principles of retaliation "contrary to universal reason and acknowledged law"?
  • Does a nation that has been wronged gain any duties as well as rights?

• Limits as well as powers

  The phrase about supporting the Constitution "as well in its limitations as in its authorities" compresses Madison's whole constitutional philosophy. A President promises here to defend the restraints on his own office and on the federal government as zealously as its powers.

  • Which clauses of the creed restrain the federal government, and which empower it?
  • Why would a President name the reserved rights of the States in an inaugural?
  • Where does the clause on conscience and religion echo the First Amendment Madison drafted?

• Militia, armies, and the safety of republics

  Madison repeats a founding conviction: large standing armies endanger liberty, and a trained militia is the "firmest bulwark of republics." Within three years the country would test that conviction in a war with Britain in which militia performance was uneven. The lesson is a chance to compare a principle with its trial.

  • What danger does Madison see in a large standing army?
  • What does the sentence assume about the character of ordinary citizens?
  • How would you test this principle against the record of the War of 1812?

Context

The Napoleonic Wars made neutral trade both lucrative and perilous. Britain's orders in council and France's Berlin and Milan decrees each forbade trade with the other, and British impressment of sailors added insult. Jefferson's Embargo of 1807 had damaged American commerce more than either empire, and was replaced by the Non-Intercourse Act just before Madison took office.

Composition

Madison delivered the address in the House chamber of the Capitol on 4 March 1809. The text here follows the Project Gutenberg #4938 transcription, with its spelling and punctuation.

Reception

The speech is usually read as a statement of Jeffersonian Republican principles at the end of their peacetime confidence. Madison's war message of June 1812 gives it an ironic sequel, and historians still debate whether his patience in 1809 was wise statesmanship or delay.

Comparisons

• First Inaugural Address (Jefferson)

  Jefferson's 1801 list of "essential principles" is the model for Madison's creed-sentence; set the two lists side by side and see what the neutral-rights crisis added or dropped.

• Second Inaugural Address

  By 1813 Madison is a wartime President defending a war he had hoped to avoid; compare his tone toward Britain with the restraint of 1809.

• The Federalist Papers

  Federalist No. 41 and No. 46 give Madison's earlier reasoning on standing armies and the militia that the 1809 creed repeats in a single clause.

Quotes

For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

• The contrast between "a height not before attained" in prosperity and the sudden distress that followed.
• How Madison assigns blame for the crisis to the belligerents and clears American councils.
• The single long sentence that lists his principles, and the pledge to support the Constitution "as well in its limitations as in its authorities."
• The closing order of trust: citizens, their representatives, then "that Almighty Being."

Key terms and names

Neutral rights

The claim that a nation at peace may trade freely with nations at war; Madison defends it against British and French edicts.

Belligerent powers

Britain and France, then at war with each other, whose retaliatory decrees seized American ships.

Orders in council and decrees

British and French measures forbidding neutral trade with the enemy; Madison calls them "arbitrary edicts."

Militia

Citizen soldiers trained by the States, which Madison calls "the firmest bulwark of republics" in place of a large standing army.

Reserved rights

Powers kept by the States and the people under the Tenth Amendment, which Madison pledges to respect.

Seminar Questions

1. Comprehension What two conditions does Madison say make the country's difficulties "the more severely felt"?
2. Comprehension List four principles from Madison's long sentence of intentions.
3. Interpretation Why does Madison spend a full paragraph insisting the crisis is not "chargeable" on American errors?
4. Interpretation What does it mean to support the Constitution "as well in its limitations as in its authorities"?
5. Interpretation Why does religious liberty appear in a speech about foreign danger?
6. Big Question Is restraint under injury a virtue in nations as it is in persons, or do nations have different duties?
7. Big Question Knowing that war came in 1812, was Madison's 1809 creed refuted by events or simply defeated by them?

Faith Connections

• Romans 12:18 (Scripture)

  Paul's "as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men" frames Madison's preference for negotiation, and the limiting phrase invites the question of when peace no longer lies within a nation's power.

• Augustine, City of God XIX.7 (Church Fathers)

  Augustine laments that even a wise ruler forced into a just war should grieve its necessity; set this beside Madison's reluctance to appeal to arms.

• The Federalist No. 41 (Great Conversation)

  Madison's own earlier essay on the dangers of standing armies supplies the reasoning behind the militia clause of the 1809 creed.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: Because the United States has kept its neutral duties with strict impartiality and suffered injury anyway, Madison argues, it should hold to peace, negotiation, constitutional restraint, and civic virtue rather than answer foreign edicts with war, trusting citizens and Providence to carry it through.

Rhetorical device: Periodic sentence. The creed paragraph suspends its main clause through more than a dozen infinitives ("To cherish peace... to maintain sincere neutrality... to prefer in all cases amicable discussion...") before arriving at "they will be a resource which can not fail me."

Debate: Resolved: That a commercial republic suffering unprovoked injury should exhaust negotiation before resorting to war.

Memory Work

present situation of the world is indeed without a parallel and that of our own country full of difficulties

benign influence of our republican institutions

Writing Prompts

Essay: Explain how Madison uses the claim that the United States gave the belligerents no provocation to justify a policy of patience, and evaluate whether the argument holds.

Comparison with First Inaugural Address (Jefferson): Compare Jefferson's 1801 list of essential principles with Madison's 1809 creed-sentence: what did eight years of neutral-rights conflict add to the list?

Medical Lens

Presidential inaugurals concern constitutional politics and national crisis; they have no medical content for this library's lens.

Creative Prompts

• Classroom

  Break Madison's long creed-sentence into its separate infinitive clauses and sort them into foreign policy, constitutional limits, rights, finance, and defense; then decide which clause the War of 1812 tested hardest.

• Dialogue

  Write a 20-line exchange in March 1809 between a New England shipowner ruined by the Embargo and a Virginia planter who trusts Madison's patience.

• Essay

  Using two quotations from the address, argue whether Madison's preference for negotiation in 1809 was prudence or postponement.

Further Reading

• Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States, Avalon Project / GPO

  Parallel official texts for classroom comparison.

• The Rhetorical Presidency, Jeffrey K. Tulis

  A study of how inaugural and other presidential speech reshaped the office.

• American Political Oratory, Survey histories of U.S. public address

  Place this inaugural among other civic speeches of its decade.