 lead in shaping it and passing it successfully through the convention. Professor Kaminski asked, "How did a tiny twerp from Virginia decide he wants to save the country? He was 36 years old. He should be deferring to the older delegates like George Mason, who was in his 60s, or Roger Sherman or Benjamin Franklin." Madison understood that the Constitution wasn't perfect, but it was better than the Articles of Confederation. He was not only a politician, but a scholar. Professor Kaminski said that had Madison not become a politician, he would have made a wonderful professor of government and history.
In the afternoon, we had a wonderful walking tour of Montpelier's Landscape by Sandy Mudrinich, Horticulturist at Montpelier. She was very passionate about the landscape of Montpelier and knew all the history behind most of the trees that were planted on the grounds. She also told us a very interesting story about the fence in front of Madison's house. You'll remember how the archaeologist told us that they found where the fence posts were located by finding the char remains of the bottoms of the posts, indicating where the holes were. Then they installed the fence two feet away from the original post holes so as not to disturb the original holes. So the fence is not in its exact historical location. Sandy Mudrinich told us that this is not the only thing historically incorrect about the fence. The archaeologists and restorers had a few different historical engravings and paintings of Madison's house that also showed the fence. One painting was done by a Baroness (I didn't get her whole name). In her picture, both the tops of the fence points and the cross piece below them are scalloped. When the restorers went to create this scalloped cross piece, they had to use a 2" x 12" piece of wood. They threw away the extra wood they didn't use. Sandy Mudrinich said that Madison would not have done this. He was actually an early environmentalist and conservationist and believed it was important to take care of the trees and not waste wood. This was an uncommon view back then because it appeared to the early Americans that the wood supply -- stretching as it did across the entire continent -- was virtually limitless. Hence, she argued that Madison would not have wasted wood in this way and so the cross piece was probably straight across. She said the Baroness drew it curved because it was more artistic to do it that way. Also in the Baroness's engraving there is a small picture of a female slave near the fence. The fence comes up about to her chest. Today, people are taller than they were back then, so to be proportional, the restorers made the new fence taller than it actually was. Sandy also said she didn't think Madison would have painted his fence green -- "That's a duPont green." So the fence is two feet away from where it actually was, it actually had a straight cross piece, it is taller than it really was, and it wasn't green. Other than that, it's entirely historically accurate! See the pictures below:
OK! Although today is July 8, I would like to add a few more notes about David Marion's lecture from Wednesday, June 30, 2010. Professor Marion explained that James Madison is a "great founder, not just a significant founder" because in helping to draft both the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, he understood what he was trying to do and the significance of what he was trying to do. Madison "paid attention to human nature -- he didn't ask what you would ask of angels or of gods." He studied and learned from other governments throughout history and, in the tradition of enlightenment philosophers, he believed that "humans could control their own destiny." (All of the quotations in this blog entry are paraphrases from Professor Marion that I wrote down in my notes -- I was attempting very hard to be a good note-taker, just like James Madison!). Madison also wanted to create a civic culture that would support the new government.
Professor Marion asked us (a room full of teachers), "How do you justify spending time in the classroom