Then, as now, members of Congress could be a prickly bunch more prone to tear one another down than engage in friendly conversation. Madison was politically astute, keeping a keen ear to the goings on in the capital to stay on top of who was saying what about whom. Then, with gentle but insistent grace, she made them talk to each other at her parties.

She engaged in various techniques to get people off their political guard, such as opening her small silver case of snuff and inviting select individuals to partake with her. It was an intimacy few would deny.

Writer Margaret Bayard Smith, a close friend of Madison's, once described her snuff box as having "magic influence." Madison held weekly "squeezes," so named because she would invite more people than her parlor could comfortably hold, forcing them to get close.

"They had to come to an agreement. They had to find consensus. Being physically in the same room at the same time has a lot to do with how that happens," said Michael Norris, executive director of Carpenters' Hall. "Hopefully we'll all learn a lesson from that, that we need to know today."

The weekly teas cost $85 and include a full menu of nibbles, such as scones, finger sandwiches, including cucumber and egg salad, savory bites like lobster puffs and smoked salmon, and an assortment of sweet tarts and pastries.

Barbara Coleman came to see Carpenters' Hall, the site of the original Continental Congress convening in 1774 and where the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania was created. Having tea amid that history was enough for her, but the icing on the scone was to have tea with Madison, who set the high bar for the role a woman could play in the new democracy.

"She was so important as Miss Congeniality. She just had a knack for pulling people together in bipartisanship," Coleman said. "She was amazing."