James Monroe, the nation’s fifth president (1817–1825), was a complex thinker whose reasoning tended to be dense. As a consequence, his public writings—as a U.S. senator, governor of Virginia, ambassador to France and Great Britain, U.S. secretary of war and secretary of state, and president—require careful reading. His thoughts on the Constitution were typical. He attended the Constitutional Convention, and he was unhappy with the way some of its deliberations had gone. At the time, he was identified as an Antifederalist—that is, as someone who objected to a national government with powers stronger than those of the individual states. But as was typical for him, he did not fit in very well with all the Antifederalist views, and he eventually played an important role in persuading Virginia to ratify the Constitution. Deeply troubling for him was the absence of a bill of rights; he wanted the Constitution to specifically protect the civil liberties of individual citizens. Further, he thought that by giving each state an identical number of senators, the Senate would too often deadlock the government. He wanted the number of senators to be apportioned by population, somewhat like the House of Representatives. He objected to senators being chosen by state legislatures; instead, he wanted senators to be elected by a direct vote of the people to make them more beholden to the best interests of the people of their states. In addition, he thought that the president of the United States should be chosen by a direct popular vote.