Madison taught philosophy and mathematics at the college from 1773 to 1775, when he went to England to be ordained a priest of the
Church of England. He returned to the
Colony of Virginia, and was serving as an instructor at William and Mary as the hostilities which led to the
American Revolutionary War broke out. He was a cousin of
James Madison, Jr. (1751–1836), who was a member of the
Virginia General Assembly,
U.S. Representative in the first four sessions of the
United States Congress, and the fourth
President of the United States. Both Madisons were heavily involved in the issues of
freedom of religion and the
separation of church and state. In 1777, Madison served as chaplain of the
Virginia House of Delegates and organized his students into a militia company. The same year,
Loyalist sympathies of the college's
president, the Reverend
John Camm (who had been the initial litigant in the Parson's Cause case 1758–1764), brought about Madison's removal from the faculty. But later, Madison became the eighth president of the College of William and Mary in October 1777, the first after the outbreak of the
American Revolutionary War. As the college's president, Madison worked with the new leaders of Virginia, most notably
Thomas Jefferson, on a reorganization and changes for the college which included the abolition of the Divinity School and the Indian School, which was also known as the
Brafferton School. The 1693 royal charter provided that Indian School of the college educate American Indian youth. The college's founder,
Reverend Dr. James Blair had arranged financing for that purpose using dedicated income from England which was interrupted by the Revolutionary War. By 1779, the Brafferton School had permanently closed, although "The Brafferton", as it is known in modern times, remains a landmark building dating to the Colonial Period on the campus. Along with establishment of new, firmer financial footing, the creation of the
graduate schools in law and medicine officially made the "College" a school meeting the contemporary definition of a "
university" by 1779, notwithstanding the retention of the word College in the original name (as set forth in the 1693 Royal Charter). The Reverend Dr. Madison also presided over the first convention of the newly formed
Diocese of Virginia of the
Episcopal Church in the United States of America in 1785 and was consecrated as a
bishop on September 19, 1790, in the
Lambeth Palace in
London. Despite the concerns of some patriots, the Right Reverend Dr. Madison, or Bishop James Madison, as he came to be known, successfully served both the College of William and Mary and the Diocese of Virginia separately during the important transitional period. Madison sought to step down from his duties as bishop in 1805; whether an assistant bishop was chosen, as he appears to have wished, is somewhat unclear. He remained as President of the College of William and Mary for 35 years, serving until his death, although quite infirm in his last years and unable to attend the General Convention. Bishop Madison died in Williamsburg on March 6, 1812, about a year after he ordained future bishop
William Meade as a deacon. Bishop Madison is interred in the chapel of the college in Williamsburg. == Heritage ==