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(1751-1836), fourth President of the United States, was born in King George County, Va. He was well educated, graduated at Princeton in 1772, and was early distinguished for sound judgment, discretion, acquirements, industry and patriotism. In 1774 he was a member of the Committee of Public Safety of Orange County, and in 1776 became a member of the Virginia Convention. From 1780 to 1784 he was a member of the Continental Congress, and, in spite of his youth and modesty, had a leading share in its deliberations, and especially its committee-work, for which his sensible and methodical mind was peculiarly apt. In the Virginia Assembly (1784-87) he did great service in securing religious liberty and in promoting the movement toward a better union of the States. Probably no one else contributed more to this end in all America. He was a member of the Alexandria-Mount-Vernon Conference of 1785, of the Annapolis Convention of 1786, and of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, in which he had the most influential part, through his own talents for constructive statesmanship and also through his persuasive and conciliatory spirit. In 1788 he wrote a portion of the Federalist, and did more than any one else to secure the ratification of the Constitution by Virginia. From 1789 to 1797 he was a leading member of Congress, inclining more and more to the doctrines and party of Jefferson. He wrote the Virginia resolutions of 1798. From 1801 to 1809 he was Secretary of State in Jefferson's Cabinet, and from 1809 to 1817 he was President of the United States, being elected over C. C. Pinckney in 1808, and over DeWitt Clinton in 1812. The chief event in his administration was the War of 1812, which he managed feebly. His Cabinet consisted of Robert Smith (1811-17 James Monroe), Secretary of State; Albert Gallatin (1814 G. W. Campbell, 1814 A. J. Dallas, 1816 W. H. Crawford), Secretary of the Treasury; William Eustis (1813 John Armstrong, 1814 J. Monroe, 1815 W. H. Crawford), Secretary of War; Paul Hamilton (1813 William Jones, 1814 B. W. Crowninshield), Secretary of the Navy; Caesar A. Rodney (1811 William Pinckney, 1814 Richard Rush), Attorney-General. The Vice-Presidents were George Clinton, 1809-1813; Elbridge Gerry, 1813-1814. From 1817 to his death Madison lived in retirement at Montpelier, Va. Life by Rives.