The extent of James Madison’s political career makes it difficult to write a complete assessment of his political thought. As Greg Weiner points out in his book, Madison was the last surviving signer of the U.S. Constitution when he died in 1836, and “he was present at or a respected commentator on virtually every major political event” (pp. 11–12) from the Philadelphia Convention until his death. He was also a prolific writer, leaving us plenty of material by which to evaluate where he stood. Many scholars and biographers have taken Madison as a subject, enough that one might question the value of one more interpretation of his political thought. Weiner’s contribution is nonetheless a worthwhile one. Madison’s Metronome is not an effort to explain Madison’s thought, just one aspect of it. In this sense, the focus of the book is modest and narrow, but nonetheless important.

Weiner’s central argument is that Madison’s understanding of government was one of “temporal republicanism,” that majorities ought to rule only after they have proven to be resilient. This is a deceptively simple yet maddeningly difficult idea. On the surface, as the most prominent advocate of separation of powers and checks and balances in the Constitution, Madison looks nothing like a majoritarian. He championed bicameralism, a strong executive, and an absolute congressional veto power over state laws. Each of these seemingly would have raised a barrier to majorities, or at least an obstacle to be overcome. He was the chief proponent in Congress of the constitutional amendments that would become the Bill of Rights, the revered safeguard of individual liberty against majority rule. At times, Madison seems fearful of majorities, most prominently in his celebrated Federalist #10. On this point, though, Weiner contends that Madison has been misunderstood: He fears mob rule, not democracy. He objects to majorities acting precipitously, not majorities acting after careful deliberation. “Madison’s challenge was not how to divert power from an interested majority to an impartial authority,” Weiner writes, but “how to ensure the interested majority ruled as impartially as possible” (p. 85). A fair majority should produce consistently positive results; what is necessary is for the majority to be made to consider all sides of an issue, and to persevere in its position before it may rule. In short, a majority must endure over time in order to achieve any kind of impartiality; majority tyranny emerges from intemperate majorities acting on impulse.

Time, then, is the crucial element to Madison’s version of majoritarianism; a majority built on a temporary whim or political passion will fall apart before it can cause any problems in a well-constructed political system. The perspective of temporal republicanism, Weiner explains, “is lateral rather than vertical. The issue is not whether, but rather when, the majority should rule. If the point of decision could be deferred until passions had cooled and immediate appetites had ebbed, the interested majority was likelier to rule in accordance with both justice and the public good” (p. 85). Thus we have bicameralism, checks and balances, an independent president and judiciary, and various impediments to quick majority action. The idea is to force the majority to act with circumspection rather than be driven by passion. This can only be accomplished by slowing down the pace; thus Weiner’s comparison of the Constitution to a metronome, setting the pace for a polity that might otherwise always operate at a brisk allegro.

The American political system, as understood by Madison, ultimately rests on the patience of majorities. The idea is to “compel majorities to cohere for an interval sufficient to dispel passions” (p. 130). The need for majorities to slow down creates the impression that minorities are winning out over majorities, but this is misleading because in the long run any coherent majority will prevail. Patience, concludes Weiner, has become the “central constitutional virtue” in Madison’s system, but unfortunately, it seems to be a lost virtue (p. 137). The pace of politics has sped up, but the pace of constitutional change remains ponderous, which has led to substantial displeasure with Madison’s metronome. On this point Weiner appears to be on the mark; patience as a political virtue has never been widely practiced. As a nation we remain impatient, and thus we are often displeased with the temporal republican system. Nonetheless, throughout American history we see examples of major policy changes adopted after a long and arduous process, through the agency of patient leaders willing to persevere.

Weiner is diligent in his efforts to apply Madison’s majoritarianism to as much of his thought as possible. Madison proposed a national veto power over state laws at the Philadelphia Convention, for example, in order “to ensure an issue was decided by the largest majority that shared an interest in it” (p. 93). In other words, national majorities were to trump state majorities. This is perfectly reasonable on national issues, but the congressional veto over states was to extend to “all cases whatsoever.” Thus, national majorities might overrule state majorities on state issues. Madison did not believe that Congress would do so, but he wanted to make sure that Congress had the power.

This is not an especially strong point for Madison as majoritarian. Weiner argues that the Bill of Rights, which was passed by Congress largely through Madison’s efforts, was not intended to protect rights against majorities but merely to slow the majority down and make it think twice. The mere fact that Madison introduced amendments in response to public demand, in fact, is reflective of his majoritarianism (p. 112). This argument goes a bit too far. By the time Madison was proposing amendments in the House, the clamor for amendments had become decidedly muted. The Federalists had won a decisive victory in the first federal elections over the opposition Anti-Federalists, who ran essentially on a pro-amendment platform. Some Federalists, including Madison, had been elected by promising amendments, but there was no reason to believe that there was still a national majority in favor of such. In fact, the clamor for amendments, and even for a bill of rights, seems to be reflective of just the sort of transient majority that Madison wanted to prevent from enacting policy. Furthermore, several of Madison’s proposals, especially a clause preventing states from infringing on certain rights, had not only not emerged as significant objections during the ratification debates but, in fact, ran counter to the general tendency of the amendments suggested during those debates.

Although Madison as a consistent majoritarian is a more sympathetic and perhaps admirable figure, Weiner is clearly swimming against the current here. That he does so effectively is doubt; Madison’s own words are used to great effect in this book. But one gets the sense that there is something selective in any analysis of Madison, who seems to show many different sides at different times and places. Madison described as a sort of procedural democrat does not fit at every point of his impressive and lengthy career. It is remarkable, though, how much of that career can be explained through temporal republicanism; in this, Greg Weiner has made a noteworthy contribution to our understanding of Madison and the Constitution.