"The Antidotes of Truth": The First Editions of Thomas Jefferson's and James Madison's Papers.

This article looks at the first editions of Thomas Jefferson's (1829) and James Madison's papers (1840). Both editions exhibit some peculiar features regarding content and structure. This article argues that the selection and editing of materials for these editions have to be seen in the context of Jefferson and Madison's combined efforts to provide an interpretation of the American founding from their (Republican) perspective. For example, the dates covered by the material in Madison's edition nicely complement the dates covered by the material of Jefferson's historical writings as left by him at the time of his death. Taken together, the two friends' documentary editions crafted a history of the United States' founding that, Madison and Jefferson hoped, would combat the mostly Federalist accounts of the era published in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and would thus help to preserve the "republican experiment" in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]