What Does It Mean to Be Madisonian?

Jay Cost, What Does It Mean to be Madisonian? American Enterprise Institute, March 2026.

The word “Madisonian” tends to refer to the US constitutional system’s structure as being one designed to mitigate factional struggles for power and curb the excesses of democracy. Famed political scientist Robert Dahl, for example, wrote, “What I am going to call the “Madisonian” theory of democracy is an effort to bring off a compromise between the power of majorities and the power of minorities, between the political equality of all adult citizens on the one side, and the desire to limit their sovereignty on the other.” Jay Cost does not dispute that James Madison argued for that sort of theory. What he contends is that Madison himself became Madisonian after a bargain was struck to produce a final draft US Constitution. Prior to that moment Madison advanced additional ideas about self-governance in the debates.