The fact the 'we the sheeple' allow the federal government to run rough-shod over our Constitution does not mean Mr. Madison was 'dead wrong'.
In my studies of Mr. Madison I have found him to be quite perceptive in his analysis/predictions of the abuses which could/would be perpetrated against our Constitution by unenlightened 'statesmen'.
He was laughably wrong, as he found out during the first Congress, when Hamilton and Washington used implied powers to create a national bank (something Madison opposed at the time, but then supported later as president when saddled with his own war debts.)
When you speak of "legitimate" powers, you beg the question. If Hamilton and Washington couldn't agree with Madison and Jefferson on what was or wasn't a legitimate power, what makes you think it's cut and dried? It isn't. And the resolution of such questions resides with its own power structure. First the Congress, then the president judge for themselves, finally the federal judiciary can chime in and negate or amplify or amend prior judgements.
Obamacare is a case in point. Is it constitutional? You say no. But your voice doesn't count. In reality, we won't know until it gets to the SCOTUS. The president and Congress have already said it is. Few and defined? What a joke.
Huck writes as if Madison forced our Constitution on an unwilling country.
The fact is he was one of 55 delegates, three of whom were sitting governors, many had Revolutionary War experience and nearly all had held state political offices. Several were sitting members of the Confederate Congress.
To think Madison pushed them around is laughable.