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The Three Lives of James Madison
- Genius, Partisan, President
- Narrated by: John H. Mayer
- Length: 34 hrs and 12 mins
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Publisher's summary
A sweeping reexamination of the Founding Father who transformed the United States in each of his political "lives" - as a revolutionary thinker, as a partisan political strategist, and as a president
Over the course of his life, James Madison changed the United States three times: First, he designed the Constitution, led the struggle for its adoption and ratification, then drafted the Bill of Rights. As an older, cannier politician, he cofounded the original Republican party, setting the course of American political partisanship. Finally, having pioneered a foreign policy based on economic sanctions, he took the United States into a high-risk conflict, becoming the first wartime president and, despite the odds, winning.
In The Three Lives of James Madison, Noah Feldman offers an intriguing portrait of this elusive genius and the constitutional republic he created - and how both evolved to meet unforeseen challenges. Madison hoped to eradicate partisanship yet found himself giving voice to and institutionalizing the political divide. Madison's lifelong loyalty to Thomas Jefferson led to an irrevocable break with George Washington, hero of the American Revolution. Madison closely collaborated with Alexander Hamilton on the Federalist papers - yet their different visions for the United States left them enemies.
Alliances defined Madison, too. The vivacious Dolley Madison used her social and political talents to win her husband new supporters in Washington - and define the diplomatic customs of the capital's society. Madison's relationship with James Monroe, a mixture of friendship and rivalry, shaped his presidency and the outcome of the War of 1812.
We may be more familiar with other Founding Fathers, but the United States today is in many ways Madisonian in nature. Madison predicted that foreign threats would justify the curtailment of civil liberties. He feared economic inequality and the power of financial markets over politics, believing that government by the people demanded resistance to wealth. Madison was the first Founding Father to recognize the importance of public opinion and the first to understand that the media could function as a safeguard to liberty.
The Three Lives of James Madison is an illuminating biography of the man whose creativity and tenacity gave us America's distinctive form of government. His collaborations, struggles, and contradictions define the United States to this day.
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- Narrated by: Norman Dietz
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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Eminent historian Richard Brookhiser presents a vivid portrait of James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution” and one of America's greatest statesmen.
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OK book but not a biography
- By Joel Mayer on 08-05-12
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The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Founding Fathers
- By: Brion McClanahan Ph. D.
- Narrated by: Tom Weiner
- Length: 9 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
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Here to rescue the reputations of our Founding Fathers from the plague of modern political correctness is The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Founding Fathers. Author and Professor Brion McClanahan shows how patriots like Franklin, Madison, and Hamilton laid the foundations of American civil liberty and had a better understanding of the problems facing us today than our current Congress.
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Highly Recommended
- By Colleen H. on 08-13-09
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The Summer of 1787
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David O. Stewart presents this well-researched account of the U.S. Constitution's creation not as a dry analysis of events, but as a high-powered narrative filled with dramatic intensity and larger-than-life historical figures.
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Very well done!
- By Alan on 04-20-17
By: David O Stewart
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A Leap in the Dark
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- By: John Ferling
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It was an age of fascinating leaders and difficult choices, of grand ideas eloquently expressed and of epic conflicts bitterly fought. Now comes a brilliant portrait of the American Revolution, one that is compelling in its prose, fascinating in its details, and provocative in its fresh interpretations.
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Loved every minute!
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A Country of Vast Designs
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When James K. Polk was elected president in 1844, the United States was locked in a bitter diplomatic struggle with Britain over the rich lands of the Oregon Territory, which included what is now Washington, Oregon, and Idaho. Texas, not yet part of the Union, was threatened by a more powerful Mexico. And the territories north and west of Texas---what would become California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and part of Colorado---belonged to Mexico.
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A Decent Overview of Polk's Presidency
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Biography
- By Emily on 06-14-18
By: Stephen F. Knott, and others
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American Sphinx
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- By: Joseph J. Ellis
- Narrated by: Susan O'Malley
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- Unabridged
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For a man who insisted that life on the public stage was not what he had in mind, Thomas Jefferson certainly spent a great deal of time in the spotlight. Historian Joseph J. Ellis sifts the facts shrewdly from the legends and the rumors, treading a path between vilification and hero worship in order to formulate a plausible portrait of the man who still today "hover[s] over the political scene like one of those dirigibles cruising above a crowded football stadium, flashing words of inspiration to both teams".
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So: they did the DNA and … time to change appendix
- By Jamanosa on 11-03-21
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The Framers' Coup
- The Making of the United States Constitution
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Americans revere their Constitution. However, most of us are unaware how tumultuous and improbable the drafting and ratification processes were. As Benjamin Franklin keenly observed, any assembly of men bring with them "all their prejudices, their passions, their errors of opinion, their local interests and their selfish views." One need not deny that the Framers had good intentions in order to believe that they also had interests.
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Context Matters
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Jefferson
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From an eminent scholar of the American South, the first full-scale biography of Thomas Jefferson since 1970. Not since Merrill Peterson's Thomas Jefferson and the New Nation has a scholar attempted to write a comprehensive biography of the most complex Founding Father. In Jefferson, John B. Boles plumbs every facet of Thomas Jefferson's life, all while situating him amid the sweeping upheaval of his times. We meet Jefferson the politician and political thinker - as well as Jefferson the architect, scientist, bibliophile, paleontologist, musician, and gourmet.
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Makes Jefferson Human
- By MichaelBuffalo on 06-23-20
By: John B. Boles
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What listeners say about The Three Lives of James Madison
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- Diana Black Kennedy
- 06-15-18
Cogently organized, meticulously balanced
This is the first book I have listened to about Madison, so it is hard to be sure it is a balanced view of such a complex figure, but I can say that Noah Feldman works hard to explore the good, the bad and the hypocritical. He shares the historical, personal and partisan contexts of Madison's words, actions and beliefs. One gets the sense of Madison the complex, brilliant, evolving, contradictory human. I found the explanations of his growth and changes more subtle and plausible than the "he was great and then Jefferson ruined him" narrative. I am happy I chose this as my Madison biography. Still not sure if I am satisfied and ready to move onto Monroe or want to stay with Madison a bit longer. I'd be interested in hearing other people's feelings about the thoroughness of the book.
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17 people found this helpful
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- Irish Eyes
- 04-11-18
Fantastic
Loved this book! My only complaint is that it was read too slowly. I listened to it at 1.25x and that was perfect.
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12 people found this helpful
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- Victoria Cuneo
- 10-11-18
Intense and detailed
I am an avid reader and am American History teacher (Eighth grade). I confess this book took me four months to finish because the author's voice was so slow and deliberate that it drove me up the wall. Each word was carefully considered before it was uttered. I went weeks avoiding my Audible app because I just wanted to be done already. I did not need details on EACH and EVERY individual document in the Federalist Papers. Eegads. Finishing this book became my personal endurance test, and it pains me to say it. I wanted more information about his relationship with Dolley; I did appreciate the details on his step-son's travails. I feel giddy, now that I've finished it.
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11 people found this helpful
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- Kindle Customer
- 01-31-21
Nothing quite so fine as Virginian hypocrisy
Every bio of the Founding Fathers has to deal with the disconnect between the founding principles and the founders' practice. The most obvious example of this is with respect to the slavery question. This disconnect is felt most acutely with the Virginians (Washington, Jefferson, Madison, etc.) while Founders from the Southern colonies weren't as noteworthy/influential in contributions to the founding documents or in their declarations of universal liberty and Northern founders (Adams, Hamilton, Morris, etc.) were more consistently anti-slavery (or at least consistently anti-Virginia-getting-all-the-votes).
There are other areas of disconnect that bios often address including the Federalists' flirtation with pseudo-monarchy (Britain 2.0) and the Virginians' embrace of partisanship. These bios often take one of a few approaches: (1) hagiographic; (2) condemnatory; or (3) neutral.
Feldman's impressive 2017 bio of James Madison is mostly neutral but largely favorable in dealing with Madison's rather....complicated evolution from strict Constitutionalist to fierce partisan to "flexible" Executive. His views on slaves and slavery are mostly presented as willful or negligent blindness which is a slight mark in his favor as compares to Jefferson in that Madison can't really be accused of the hypocrisy that TJ in light of TJ's extreme rhetoric on liberty compared to his actual conduct. Madison was more concerned about the nuts and bolts of a functioning government and how to correct the problems of the Articles of Confederation and Feldman does an outstanding job of taking us through the Constitutional Convention and the lengths to which Madison went to get the bulk of his vision through.
Madison's spirit of compromise and conciliation takes a sharp turn once the Federalists come into power however. It's interesting to watch Feldman largely defend Madison's rather circuitous route from "unity government" to "f*ck the Federalists." I'm surprised that Lord Acton's famous quote about the corrupting influence of power never makes an appearance as the overall sense throughout Feldman's biography is that Madison felt more and more free to abandon what were previously bedrock principles if they interfered with immediate partisan needs.
Given that Jefferson was a friend and mentor of Madison's it is easy to see how this "evolution" came about given Jefferson's own flexible" view of Presidential authority (Jefferson also had a rather liberal view of veracity which didn't rub off quite as much on Madison, thankfully). Regardless, it's interesting to see both the similarities in Jefferson and Madison's approaches to Constitutional interpretation and governance and their differences in how they articulated them. Jefferson was a bomb-thrower while Madison was more measured--which makes "angry Madison" amusing to read.
The other aspects of Feldman's bio are well done, including a very engaging and sympathetic portrait of Dolly Madison. Madison's post-presidential life is given criminally short shrift, however and the book covers the last 20 years of his life almost as an afterthought.
While Feldman does rightfully place Madison in the upper pantheon of founding fathers and looks at his shifting positions regarding Executive vs Legislative vs Judicial authority favorably, he doesn't uniformly praise nor uniformly condemn Madison. The Founders weren't gods (or angels) and Feldman doesn't try to portray Madison as one. He places him within the context of his time and that's what makes this an outstanding and worthwhile history.
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- tdg
- 02-09-19
Interesting and informative
First let me praise Noah Feldman's performance. He is very easy to listen to, his voice, his intonation, and pronunciation.
Moving on to the book, Mayer paints a picture of the man that is nearly idyllic. Madison is flawless even in his loss of Washington DC and a stalemate war. I guess I have come to expect this in biographies, the author falls in love with his subject and deifies him.
That said, Mayer does delve into some of Madison's contradictions and political misdirections. Madison isn't exactly called out, rather it's just what a politician has to do. Probably, even admired in a politican one agrees with.
One thing became annoying after awhile, in every single example of Madison referring to religion, the author follows the line with assurances that Madison was not a Christian and did not in fact believe what he was saying. In some cases even stating that Madison was doing so for political reasons.
Mayer will always authoratively tell you how to interpret any quote that might make you think Madison had any religious beliefs. I find this laughable. Just because a man believes in religious freedom, (and this was a Madison hallmark), it does not follow that he therefore has no convictions of his own. If in youth we don't question our beliefs, we cannot have a firm basis upon which to believe later in life. Rarely do intelligent people carry their youthful opinions unchanged into old age.
Overall I did get a better idea of Madison as a leader and the times in which he lived.
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- Luke J Nemuras
- 10-29-18
1.3x for the win
I'm glad I could listen at 1.3x the speed, because the narrator was a little slow for my liking. Ultimately a great read. Thanks!
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- jonah
- 01-17-19
Favorite biography of James Madison!
I loved this biography! the depth in which the author pulls back the curtain to both James Madison's role at the constitutional convention and his presidency were incredible!
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- Peggy
- 02-01-19
Hard to follow
I found this to be a bit hard to follow with the way the author broke up Madison's life and I did not really get a good grasp on Madison as an individual person.
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- Anuwit
- 05-28-18
Not a straight biography
This is a beautifully crafted analysis of Madison’s life by a gifted legal scholar. It is informative, perceptive, and provocative. It is NOT a straight biography. Several important events are omitted or skipped over too quickly, a premier example being (Federalist) President John Adams calling George Washington to lead a national army to confront (Republican-supported) France.
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- Anonymous User
- 04-12-18
Not sure
This is the 7th biography I’ve listed to from George Washington to Monroe including Hamilton and Benjamin Franklin. I don’t see how the author can write such a glowing book about Madison when there wasn’t anything good from the perspectives of other authors. Monroe biography for example states Madison all but turned the Presidency over to Monroe during the War of 1812 and he appears in Jefferson and Hamilton as merely a puppet of Jefferson. Interesting...
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3 people found this helpful