Montesquieu

(1689 - 1755)

After serving in the Parlement of Bordeaux and gaining election to the French Academy, Montesquieu began a comprehensive study of law, history, economics, geography, and political theory that culminated in the writing of The Spirit of Laws, which was published in 1748. In 1792, five years after fathering the U.S. Constitution, James Madison wrote that Montesquieu “had lifted the veil from the venerable errors which enslaved opinion and pointed the way to those luminous truths of which he had but a glimpse himself.”