SOURCE: Ketcham, Ralph L. “James Madison and Judicial Review.” Syracuse Law Review 8, no. 2 (spring 1957): 158-65.

In the following essay, Ketcham discusses Madison's changing position on which branch of the government should possess the ultimate power to review laws and interpret the Constitution.

The problem which most concerned the framers of the Constitution in the summer of 1787 and which most vexed those who put the new government into operation in the succeeding years was that of final interpretation of the Constitution. As a leader in the drafting, ratification, and implementation of the Constitution, James Madison's view on the question of interpretation was of special interest. Furthermore, the particular nature of Madison's political theory made the matter of where the final decision rested of crucial importance. Madison's cardinal tenet was that unchecked power in human hands was liable to abuse, and hence that government was “least imperfect” which kept a...