Title : 5.) Madison: The Records of the Consututional Convention of 1787.vol 1 On-Line Library of Liberty
link : 5.) Madison: The Records of the Consututional Convention of 1787.vol 1 On-Line Library of Liberty
5.) Madison: The Records of the Consututional Convention of 1787.vol 1 On-Line Library of Liberty
Madison↩
It was well known that James Madison had taken full and careful notes of the proceedings in the Convention, and he had often been urged to publish them. He had, however, decided that a posthumous publication was advisable.14 Madison died in 1836. His manuscripts were purchased by Congress, and shortly afterwards, in 1840, under the editorship of H. D. Gilpin, The Papers of James
Madison were published in three volumes.15 More than half of this work was given over to his notes of the debates in the Federal Convention,16 and at once all other records paled into insignificance.[xvi]
In a preface to the Debates, written before his death, Madison had explained with what care the material was gathered and written up:17
“I chose a seat in front of the presiding member, with the other members, on my right and left hand. In this favorable position for hearing all that passed I noted in terms legible and in abbreviations and marks intelligible to myself what was read from the Chair or spoken by the members; and losing not a moment unnecessarily between the adjournment and reassembling of the Convention I was enabled to write out my daily notes during the session or within a few finishing days after its close.”
Indeed Madison was evidently regarded by his fellow-delegates to the Convention as a semi-official reporter of their proceedings, for several of them took pains to see that he was supplied with copies of their speeches and motions.18 And from the day of their publication until the present, Madison’s notes of the Debates have remained the standard authority for the proceedings of the Convention.
Madison’s correspondence and the manuscript itself reveal the fact that Madison went over his notes after the publication of the Journal in 1819.19 He not only noted differences between his own record and that of the Journal, but also in many cases corrected his own notes from the Journal. In the wording of motions, this is not to be wondered at, for Madison, during the sessions of the Convention, in his haste to note what the speaker was saying could do no more than take down the substance of motions and resolutions, while these would be copied into the journal in full. Nor is it surprising, when we remember that Madison accepted the printed Journal as authoritative, to find him in not a few cases copying from it proceedings of which he had no record. But the importance of this fact is evident at once, for these items have been accepted upon the double record of the Journal and Madison, [xvii] whereas they are in reality to be stated upon the authority of the Journal alone.
But Madison went even one step farther and actually changed his records of votes in the Convention in order to bring them into conformity with the Journal. This might involve the change of the vote of a single state, or of several states, or even reverse his record of the decision of the Convention. On what basis or for what reasons Madison felt justified in changing his records of votes is not to be ascertained conclusively. Sometimes it seems to have been done because the records of Journal and Yates were in accord in their disagreement with him; sometimes he probably saw that subsequent action in the Convention proved the record of Journal to be correct, and his own to be wrong; sometimes it was done because the vote of a state as recorded in Journal harmonized better with the sentiments of the delegates from that state as expressed in their speeches; and sometimes there is no apparent reason.
The matter might be merely of antiquarian interest, were it not for the fact that the printed Journal is itself unreliable, and that there are not a few cases in which Madison has made corrections from the Journal that are undoubtedly mistaken: Votes ascribed in the Journal to the wrong questions were used, in several cases, to change records that were probably correct as first made. Questions and votes were copied into his manuscript from the printed Journal without observing that these same questions and votes were recorded in other places, sometimes even on the same day; an examination of the original records shows that in most of these cases the questions were not to be found in the body of the Journal, but were incorporated into the text by John Quincy Adams; they are only to be found in the Detail of Ayes and Noes, and their relative position in the proceedings could only be inferred from the order in which the votes happened to be recorded.
It is not surprising, indeed, to find that Madison was thus misled by the mistakes in the printed Journal, for if his own records were correct, these would be the very points in which the discrepancies would occur. It is only necessary then to recognize Madison’s evident acceptance of the Journal as [xviii] authoritative, to expect him to incorporate these mistakes in his Debates.20
Another extensive set of corrections is to be found in the speeches made in debate. These are generally in the form of additions to Madison’s original record. Because of misquotations of his own remarks, Madison condemned Yates’s notes severely, as being a “very erroneous edition of the matter”.21 It is more than surprising, then, to discover that these additions were taken from Yates. Such proves to have been the case, however, and in over fifty instances. There were a number of speeches or remarks, including several of his own, that Madison failed to note in any form, but later thought worthy of inclusion. And there were also new ideas or shades of thought which Yates had noticed but which Madison failed to catch.
The fact of these changes being made does not rest merely upon the wording of the text and Madison’s statement in 1821 that he was intending to prepare his notes for posthumous publication. The manuscript22 shows that most of the changes thus made are easily recognizable. The ink which was used at the later date has faded quite differently from that of the original notes, so that most of the later revisions stand out from the page almost as clearly as if they had been written in red ink.23
[xix]In the present edition such changes — except in trivial instances — are indicated by enclosing them within angle brackets 〈 〉, and in foot-notes the original readings are given, wherever they have any significance, and the editor expresses his opinion as to the probable source of the change, wherever it is possible to trace it.24
In view of the fact that the Journal is so imperfect and not altogether reliable, and that Madison made so many changes in his manuscript, all other records of the Convention take on a new importance. Formerly they have been regarded only in so far as they might supplement our information; now it is seen that they may be of service also in determining what the action really was in doubtful cases.
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