Kevin R. C. Gutzman calls them “the Jeffersonians” in his new book of that title.¹One might also call them “the Virginia Dynasty,” but there have been other presidents from Virginia: Harrison, Tyler, Taylor, Wilson, and of course Washington. But Jefferson, Madison, and Monroe were something unique in our history: three men who immediately succeeded each other as president—for a total of six terms, twenty-four years—and who were also longtime friends, cronies, confidants, and political allies. They were even neighbors, an easy ride from each other’s houses in Virginia’s Piedmont. Present-day pilgrims to Albemarle County can visit Jefferson’s Monticello, Madison’s Montpelier, and Monroe’s Highland in a single weekend—in a single day, even, if they wanted to get up early enough. The alliance between Jefferson and Madison, which dated back to as early as 1779, was particularly meaningful. “There has been no other such relationship in American history,” Gutzman asserts: “Jefferson and Madison not only were the closest of political allies, but each was the other’s best friend. . . . Their minds were so closely in tune as to seem indistinguishable to anyone in their own day.” Jefferson, throughout his career a canny spider at the center of a very large web, was the trio’s “chieftain,” as Gutzman puts it; Madison, for all the legal and political virtuosity he had displayed during the American Revolution and Constitutional Convention, turned out, when he ascended to the presidency, to lack natural authority, leadership skills, and on-the-spot judgment. A surprising