The Federalist Papers in the context of "Columbia Law School"

James Madison (March 16, 1751 [O.S. March 5, 1750] – June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison was popularly acclaimed as the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting and promoting the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights.

Madison was born into a prominent slave-owning planter family in Virginia. In 1774, strongly opposed to British taxation, Madison joined with the Patriots. He was a member of both the Virginia House of Delegates and the Continental Congress during and after the American Revolutionary War. Dissatisfied with the weak national government established by the Articles of Confederation, he helped organize the Constitutional Convention, which produced a new constitution designed to strengthen republican government against democratic assembly. Madison's Virginia Plan was the basis for the convention's deliberations. He became one of the leaders in the movement to ratify the Constitution and joined Alexander Hamilton and John Jay in writing The Federalist Papers, a series of pro-ratification essays that remain prominent among works of political science in American history.

In the United States, a recess appointment is an appointment by the president of a federal official when the U.S. Senate is in recess. Under the U.S. Constitution's Appointments Clause, the president is empowered to nominate, and with the advice and consent (confirmation) of the Senate, make appointments to high-level policy-making positions in federal departments, agencies, boards, and commissions, as well as to the federal judiciary. A recess appointment under Article II, Section 2, Clause 3 of the Constitution is an alternative method of appointing officials that allows the temporary filling of offices during periods when the Senate is not in session. It was anticipated that the Senate would be away for months at a time, so the ability to fill vacancies in important positions when the Senate is in recess and unavailable to provide advice and consent was deemed essential to maintain government function, as described by Alexander Hamilton in No. 67 of The Federalist Papers.

In modern times, the Senate is in session nearly year-round, making the recess appointment mechanism far less necessary or useful for upkeep of government function. Nonetheless, in recent times this power has also been controversially used as a political tool to temporarily install an unpopular nominee by sidestepping the Senate's role in the confirmation process; the Senate has taken measures from time to time to prevent a president from making recess appointments, specifically by holding pro forma sessions. The Supreme Court affirmed that pro forma sessions are sufficient to prevent recess appointments and addressed other intricacies of the practice in NLRB v. Noel Canning (2014). Appointments made during a recess must be confirmed by the Senate by the end of the next session of Congress, or the appointment expires. In current practice, this means that a recess appointment must be approved by roughly the end of the next calendar year and thus could last for almost two years, if made early enough in the year. In situations where a recess appointment is prevented, a lower official frequently assumes the duties of the position in an acting role.

James Madison (March 16, 1751 – June 28, 1836) was a Founding Father and the 4th president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting and promoting the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. Disillusioned by the weak national government established by the Articles of Confederation, he helped organize the Constitutional Convention, which produced a new constitution. Madison's Virginia Plan served as the basis for the Constitutional Convention's deliberations, and he was one of the most influential individuals at the convention. He became one of the leaders in the movement to ratify the Constitution, and he joined with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay in writing The Federalist Papers, a series of pro-ratification essays that was one of the most influential works of political science in American history.
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The militia of the United States, as defined by the U.S. Congress, has changed over time. During colonial America, all able-bodied men of a certain age range were members of the militia, depending on each colony's rule. Individual towns formed local independent militias for their own defense. The year before the U.S. Constitution was ratified, The Federalist Papers detailed the Founding Fathers' paramount vision of the militia in 1787. The new Constitution empowered Congress to "organize, arm, and discipline" this national military force, leaving significant control in the hands of each state government.

Today, as defined by the Militia Act of 1903, the term "militia" is used to describe two classes within the United States:

Federalist No. 67 is an essay by Alexander Hamilton, the sixty-seventh of The Federalist Papers. This essay's title is "The Executive Department" and begins a series of eleven separate papers discussing the powers and limitations of that branch. Federalist No. 67 was published under the pseudonym Publius, like the rest of the Federalist Papers. It was published in the New York Packet on Tuesday, March 11, 1788.

In this paper, Hamilton distinguishes between the president's constitutionally limited executive powers and the far more extensive powers of a monarch as a ruler. He also chastises opponents of the Constitution who claim the U.S. President is granted excessive power by being allowed to fill vacancies in the U.S. Senate. Hamilton points out that this is a misreading, as the President's power applies to vacancies of executive officers, which does not include the Senate.