Donald Trump sits atop national polls for the Republican nomination, with supporters arguing he is precisely the person to fight special interests, return power to the people, and “make America great again.” If he were alive today, James Madison would surely disagree. The writings of the nation’s fourth president offer several strong admonitions against rallying to the Trump banner.
Judging the Trump candidacy by Madison’s standards is worthwhile, for two reasons. First, some of Trump’s biggest fans consider themselves constitutionalists—and nobody was more important in the design, ratification, and defense of the Constitution than Madison. For 30 years, from 1787 until 1817, he was at the center of every constitutional debate, and his views usually prevailed.
Second, Madison would not be unsympathetic to Trump’s supporters; they feel like politicians are unresponsive to their interests, and Madison had similar concerns. As he writes in “Vices of the Political System of the United States,” “Representative appointments are sought from 3 motives. 1. ambition. 2. personal interest. 3. public good. Unhappily the two first are proved by experience to be most prevalent.”
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