The life of Alexander Hamilton, by John T. Morse, Jr

Front matter

m

CORNELL

UNIVERSITY

Preface

It is now many years ago that I first conceived the purpose of writing a " Life of Alexander Hamilton." The undertaking was repeatedly postponed with the intention of awaiting some period of leisure ; but as from year to year the prospect of that period seemed to recede rather than to approach I at last despaired of its ever arriving, and some four years ago entered upon my task without farther delay, and have since prosecuted it in such intervals as I could snatch from professional occupation. Doubtless the work could have been much better done by some student of American history who could have devoted his unbroken days to the topic, and made it the sole object of his reading and reflection. But as none such has appeared in nearly three-quarters of a' century, I have ventured to make my effort.

The object which I have had in view has been not so much to produce a learned and elaborate biography as a narrative which persons with no more than the average desire for information concerning the history of their country might be willing to read.

Vm PREFACE.

For the more painstaking few the seven volumes of Mr. John C. Hamilton's history cannot be improved upon. But the ordinary reader has not the courage to accomplish the perusal of so voluminous a work. As from time to time there have appeared the lives of many of the distinguished contemporaries of Hamilton, who were his rivals or opponents in politics, it has seemed that the people of subsequent generations were to hear only the side of those rivals and opponents, and so might come by degrees to entertain a most imperfect and unjust opinion concerning him. To aid the general reader in obtaining an accurate knowledge of his genius, character, and labors has been the end constantly held in view in the composition of these volumes. It was no easy task to make the chapters concerning the Constitution of the United States and the financial schemes of the treasury department popular and attractive reading ; probably I have not succeeded in doing so, but so far as I could I have made the attempt.

I frankly acknowledge that I began tliis work with a deep admiration both for the character and the intellect of Hamilton, and that sentiment has strengthened as I have proceeded in the study of his career. Yet I have striven to be impartial; and when I thought him in error I have openly acknowledged the fact, without attempting to give any false color or plausible defence. The " Life " has at least been

PREFACE. IX

written with thoroughly honest intentions. I have endeavored to avoid panegyric ; and thougli I have praised him often and highly, yet I can assure the reader that in the original and contemporary authorities of the highest respectability, which I have used, there continually occurs laudation so unlimited that I have refrained from reproducing it. I should be sorry to deprive my words of the appearance of veracity by giving them the semblance of extravagance. But Hamilton was a man who excited no moderate feelings either of affection or animosity. His adherents worshipped him as a kind of human deity ; his opponents assailed him as if he had been an incarnate fiend. He was loved as man has seldom been loved, and hated as a man fi'ee from the charge of any fearful crime against his fellow-men has seldom been hated. The language of moderation has never yet been used concerning him. How far I have succeeded in achieving it must be determined by those who may have the patience to journey to the end of my pages. To them I must leave it ; yet with the presentiment that perchance I shall succeed in pleasing neither the ardent admirers nor the strenuous enemies of the great statesman, and so may obtain the least agreeable of all proofs of impartiality — the disapprobation of both the opposing parties.

John T. Moese, Je.

9 Faikfield Street, Boston, March 4, 1876.

CONTENTS OF VOLUME I.

Chapter. Pages.

I. Youth 1-19

II. Vthe Revoltjtion 20-63

ni. The Law 64-77

IV. The Congkess of the Confederation . 78-140

V. Professional Xife 141-154

VI. The Constitution :

Part I. Before the Convention .... 155-176

,, II. . The Convention 176-237

1 „ III. Adoption of the Constitution . 238-275

VII. Organization oe the New Government 276-286

Vin. First Report on Public Credit . . . 287-332

IX. The First National Bank 333-347

X. The Excise and the Mint 348-356

XI. Manufactures and Protection . . . 357-369 Xn. The Treasury Measures and Federalism 370-425

Alexander Hamilton, lived to mature years. He was born upon the island of Nevis, on the eleventh day of January, 1757. He was still very young when he had the roislortune to lose a mother, who is represented to have been no ordinary woman. It was her rare beauty that had attracted^the attentions of her first husband ; but the child, Alexander, had a precocious appreciation of her higher charms of mind and character. Of her cultivation, her noble and generous spirit, and her refined and elegant manners, he ever retained and was wont often to express the most lively and tender memory.

It would be an interesting speculation for one fond of such obscure studies, to inquire how far the peculiar qualities of the mind and character of Hamilton were due to this intermingling of the blood of two widely different races, and to the superadded effect of his tropical birthplace. It seems possible, without becoming over-fanciful, to trace quite clearly these diverse and powerful threads of influence. Thus, there are plainly to be noted in him many of th e most . marked and familiar traits of the genuine Scot. The intensity and ardor of his nature bnng"at once to mind the phrase in which one of their writers described what seemed to him the most striking characteristic of his countrymen, the perfervidum ingenium Scotorwm. He manifested also, in a rare degree, the shrewdnes s, the lo gical habit of mind , and the taste for .discussion basedupon„abs.trac^nd general principles^ with- wETch^Ee^ Waverley Novels have made us familiar as distinguishing aptitudes of the Scottish intellect. At a time, too, not very many years after the Scotchman, Adam Smith, was first enlightening the world upon the principles of political economy, and changing the policy and legislation of nations,^ Hamilton was rendering himself famous, in circumstances of a nnvpl arnj pprplpving rlp^iPTiption, as the leading financier of h is age .

If his mental traits were Scotch, his moral traits carry us back to'^his French,„and Huguenot ancestry. He had_the_eaae_ of manner, JiiS-Jivelineaa and vivacity, the desire and the a bility to please. which Frenchmen claim as^ their_^£ecial heritage*, He evinced the firm moral courage, the persistence in noble and generoTis_e.ndea Yor, the power pf_self^ sacrifice_and the elements of a grand heroism, which might be expected^ in the descendantTfom one of the high-spirited Protestant exiles of France, a band of men the~exampIe"oT" whose "courage and resolution it' would be difficult -to -find surpassed in the pages of history. His warm, eager tempe rament, his whole-souled enthusiasni, and his affectionate nature, may perchance have been due in a measure to the influence of the fervid and luxuriant climate which his parents had adopted as their home, and where he himself was born and passed the susceptible years of boyhood. At least the astonishing precocity of his ambition and the early development of his mind may not unreasonably be supposed to have been stimulated by this cause. Vague and very possibly erroneous as all surmises of this kind must be considered, it is yet impossible to resist the temptation to indulge in them. Sojnany rare and_yarious qualities were united in Hamilton, so wonderful is the tale of his mature youth, "so" interesting and i The "Wealth of Nations " was first published in 1776.

attractive is his career, that one cannot but ask with more than ordinary curiosity whence came these unwonted and remarkable traits ; and speculation, becoming thus aroused, turns naturally to contemplate his parentage and his birthplace with peculiar care.

Before the death of his mother, his father had fallen, "through a too generous and easy temper," into financial diiSculties. By reason of this poverty, Alexander, who was the only child surviving the mother, was taken charge of by her relatives. They lived at Santa Cruz ; and there he was put to school, and received such meagre rudiments of education as were accessible in the neighborhood. These, it is presumed, went little farther than a thorough instruction in English and French, with both of which languages he had an equal and perfect familiarity ; though one odd, and not very useful, acquirement was the learning to repeat by rote the Decalogue in Hebrew, — a feat which he accomplished when a very young child at the school of a Jewess. The narrow routine of his studies he fortunately supplemented by a generous course of miscellaneous reading, guided in some measure by the advice of one Doctor Knox, a Presbyterian clergyman. But he was only between twelve and thirteen years old when he was removed from school altogether, and placed in the countinghouse of Mr. Nicholas Cruger. Under the guidance of this successful merchant and excellent man, the boy made such rapid advances in a knowledge of affairs, that his employer ventured to leave the island for a time, and to place the whole management of the business in the sole charge of Hamilton, who had not at the time completed his fourteenth year. Yet this distinction was achieved by him in spite of a distaste for a mercantile career, and apparently only by the assistance of that thorough and energetic temper, which prevented him, throughout his whole life, from ever doing any thing, no matter how slight or contrary to his native inclination, with less than his whole strength. A letter written by him to a young friend and schoolfellow during this time of his mercantile novitiate, dated November 11, 1769, may be read with a smile, but is certainly a remarkable expression of his juvenile sentiments and aspirations. It win be observed from the dates, that he was not quite thirteen years old when he wrote as follows :

"As to what you say respecting your soon having the happiness of seeing us all, I wish for an accomplishment of your hopes, provided they are concomitant with your welfare, otherwise not ; though doubt whether I shall be present or not. For to confess my weakness, Ned, my ambition is prevalent, so that I contemn the grovelling ambition of a clerk, or the like, to which my fortune condemns me, and would willingly risk my life, though not my character, to exalt my station. I am confident, Ned, that my youth excludes me from any hope of immediate preferment, nor do I desire it ; but I mean to prepare the way for futurity. I'm no philosopher, you see, and may be justly said to build castles in the air ; my folly makes me ashamed, and beg you'll conceal it. Yet, Neddy, we have seen such schemes successful, when the projector is constant. I shall conclude by saying, I wish there was a war."

What ultimately proved the best of all possible openings for the "prevalent ambition 'y of the young clerk came at last in the year m2r In August, a hurricane of more than the ordinary violence, even in tropical latitudes, swept over the Leeward Islands. The wreck and devastation were wide and fearful.

Forthwith, ere the terror and excitement had subsided, there appeared in a newspaper published at St. Christopher's an account so powerful and so vivid, that even the Governor of St. Croix became curious, and exerted himself to discover the unknown writer. By this investigation the article was traced to Hamilton. The unusual capacity which it displayed, taken in connection with his age and prior opportunities, led to farther and more serious consideration as to his proper career. He was himself consulted, and his own desires, made known under these circumstances, were very kindly allowed to prevail over the schemes previously designed concerning him. By this turn of good fortune it happened that in October, 1772, he set sail for Boston, aided by such liberal financial arrangements as would amply enable him to pursue his studies upon the most extended scale then afforded in the colonies. The voyage was not accomplished without an incident which, in heathen or superstitious days, would have been viewed, in the light of his subsequent career, as an omen or even a miracle. Shortly before the vessel made port, she was discovered to be on fire. The extreme peril of the position of a ship in flames in mid-ocean may be conceived. Whether it was due to the fact that she bore Alexander Hamilton and his fortunes, or whether, without this temptation to Providence to intervene, the exertions of the crew would have been equally effective in subduing the conflagration, may be an open question ; but certain it is that the peril was wonderfully escaped, and though hope might have seemed impossible, yet the craft was saved and brought into Boston harbor.

Thence Hamilton proceeded at once to New York and placed himself at a grammar-schoo l oFh i gh re ^ pute, established at Elizabethtown, under the patronage of Governor Livingston and Mr. BoudinoL_He^ had the excellent good fortune to become intimate in the families of these gentlemen ; and he brought letters from his good friend, the clergyman, Dr. Knox, to other agreeable and distinguished persons in New- York. He appears_ to have lived for some lime at the house of Governor Livingston ; nor is it easy to overrate the advantage attendant upon a free and cordial reception into such society, occurring at once upon his first advent without friends or connections in a new country.

Meantime, Hamilton was assiduous in his toU. Time, opportunity, and the money of his friends were all improved with the native zeal of his temperament. In the winter Jie-^Hcas -wont -to-prolong his studies untBPmidnight. In the summer he began, them even with the dawn. Such a tremendous pace devoured the road. A full twelvemonth had_ not, elapsedj„ when the master of the school, Francis Barber, — a man of considerable note in his calling, and afterward a distinguished officer in the War of the Revolution, — declared this energetic pupil to Jae^in every re^eetfitted to enter col lege^ Forthwith he repSireatoPnnceEon, ana called upon Dr. Witherspoon, then the president of the college there, a native of Edinburgh, a scholar and a gentleman, whose reputation has come down to our own day. Many years afterward the doctor and his would-be pupil sat together in the Congress of the United States. To him the young applicant now preferred the novel request, that, having been placed in the outset in any class for which by his examination he should prove himself qualified, he might be allowed to advance thence as rapidly as he was able, untrammelled by the regulations of the established curriculum. The request was too startling to find favor with the sober trustees of the institution and was refused.

Disappointed here, he next had recourse to Columbia (then called King's) College, in New York. The more liberal principles of that foundation led to a conciirrence in his plan, and he went through the > regular course at his own rapid pace, under the in- / struction of a private tutor and not as a member of any particular class. Nor did he even confine himself to the allotted studies, but added a series of lectures upon anatomy, and was likewise an energetic member of a debating club, where he is said to have especially distinguished himself. ~ The country to which Hamilton had come in search of a collegiate education was in bi^t indifferent condition to afford days of uninterrupted and studious leisure for the tranquil pursuit of learning, especially to a youth who was troubled with a " prevalent ambition," and nourished longings for a war. The revolutionary storm had been already brewing for several years when he first landed. In 1766, the stamp act had been passed. Iji 1768, the famous circular letter of Massachusetts was sent forth among her sister colonies. In the winter of 1769-1770, there were mabs in New York City, and more or less frequent and serious collisions between the patriot populace and the British soldiery. On the fifth of March, 1770, took place the famous Boston massacre on King i

Street. It was not till October, 1772, that Hamilton first arrived in the country, and it was in the autumn of 1773, or early in the ensuing winter, that he entered college.

Tumultuous as was the state of public affairs around him, he for a short time steadfastly pursued his studies, and seems by his undisturbed and thoughtful demeanor, so singular in those months of universal excitement, to have attracted attention. He had come to New York to fulfil a specific purpose, which with his usual tenacity he was resolved to carry out. He had not expected to act at once ; he intended to fit himself to act in the future. Preparation was his immediate object. Moreover, he had just emerged from a loyal neighborhood ; the history and traditions of his new home were novel to him ; the long series of indignities and aggressions, which had nearly wrought the colonists up to fighting heat, had been unfelt by him. For a few months after his advent upon the soil of the States he felt himself a sojourner and a foreigner ; nor was it certain that he would ever be a citizen. His destiny was undeveloped; even his wishes, for aught that appears, were undetermined. It naturally took some little time to impregnate him with the sentiments of the strangers amongst whom he had suddenly alighted. Nor was he at once pressed to choose his course. The results of the universal agitation were still embryotic and uncertain. Discontent and anger were rife ; but private discussions, interspersed with an occasional public meeting, address, or street disturbance, were thus far the only forms of action. There was no opening for Hamilton to take any important part in

10 LIFE OF ALEXAKDER HAMILTON.

any movement promising to have permanent consequences, even if his youth and his incomplete training were obstacles which he would have been inclined to overlook. To some of the same causes may be attributed the fact that his earliest prejudices in the matter, formed evidently upon a very imperfect examination of the questions at issue, and deserving to be called impressions rather than opinions, leaned ,to the side of the British Gov^^ment.

But in the spring of 1774 he made a visit to Boston. Only a few months had elapsed since the raid had been made upon the tea-ships in Boston harbor ; and Hamilton came among the citizens while the "teaparty " and its probable consequences, more especially the famous " Boston Port bill," were the subject of animated discussion upon every side. Away from his tutor and his books, and the shade of the great placid trees of his favorite promenade on Batteau Street, he gave more thought to the affairs of the passing hour. He was in a good neighborhood to obtain thorough enlightenment ; and the result of his investigations was a complete change of his previous vague notions, and a zealous enlistment in the ranks of the colonists.

The rapidity with which, having once begun an examination of the subject, and still not neglecting his collegiate studies, he became master of all the arguments which had been or could well be advanced upon either side must excite admiration. On July 6, a great meeting of the patriots of the city of New York was summoned to meet in the suburbs. Those among the inhabitants of this State who were inclined to resist the British pretensions had grave and peculiar flifficulties to encounter. The lower house or Assembly was controlled by politicians in the Tory interest ; and when it became desirable to act upon the proposition for holding a general congress, to be composed of delegates from all the colonies, it seemed but too likely that this hostile majority would succeed in preventing the patriots of New York from obtaining any representation in the national body. It was in the hope of effecting a choice of delegates by the people at large, that " the great meeting in the fields " was convened. A vast midtitude assembled, and was addressed by many speakers of note.

Hamilton stood by and listened. But with listening his blood warmed. To all which had been said he felt that he could add something of value, and, eager to add it, at last gathered courage to rise and address the people. He was only seventeen years old, and of such short and slight stature, that he presented the appearance almost of a boy. The throng of grown men was astonished. It was, indeed, a daring experiment that was made before them ; but the courage which had incited Hamilton to the undertaking carried him bravely through it. He faltered for a moment ; but the people before him were kindly attentive and patient ; he promptly collected himself and soon forgot all else in the ardoj of oratory. It is related that the speech was a brilliant success, and secured admiration and applause. If it had been not altogether a failure, the wonder would have been great enough. For it was not an harangue delivered to a promiscuous crowd, but an argumentative address made to a body of the best persons on the patriot side in the city, who had come

12 I/IPE OF ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

together to transact some very serious business. That he held the ear of such a body of men was enough at once and by itself to confer upon Hamilton no inconsiderable reputation.

At this point it must be considered that not only the boyhood but even the youth of Alexander Hamilton have been brought to a close. Already he had presented himself in a conspicuous manner, before the people among whom he lived, as one capable of gidding and counselling. From this mature position, once assumed, there could be no retrogression. Those who love to study the unfolding of great powers, and to ponder upon the chrysalis stage of genius, may be disappointed that so few pages of meagre narrative are furnished for the gratification of their taste. But I believe that nothing more is known of the first seventeen years of Hamilton's life, than has been told in the foregoing pages. Few as these are, yet they have completed the tale, and here we must take leave of the youth. For the future we shall see only one treated as a grown man, doing the work of a grown man in the fashion of a grown man. He emerged from immaturity at least eight or ten years earlier than the generality even of distinguished men ; and he emerged from it so fully and decisively, that scarce a trace of it, save in his personal appearance, remained at any time afterward perceptible.

Hamilton was now both in the public expectation and by his own feelings fully committed to the colonial struggle, and he prosecuted his part therein with his wonted spirit and ardor. At that stage of the contest the pen was the chief weapon employed, and tliis "was actively wielded upon both sides, preeminently so in New York. Hamilton was a frequent contributor to the columns of a whig newspaper published in the city by John Holt and devoted to the patriot cause. Sometimes he sent grave and argumentative articles, sometimes he fell into the satirical vein, and occasionally he furnished burlesque and doggerel rhymes. But whatever form his writings took, they never failed to attract notice, and often to elicit the praise of such men as Jay, McDougall, and other literary combatants of established repute in the cause.

Shortly after the adjournment of the first Congress, there were published two essays written jointly by Dr. Seabury, afterward Bishop of Connecticut, and Mr. Wilkins, an able clergyman of Westchester County, N. Y. The first was entitled, " Free Thoughts on the Proceedings of the Continental Congress ; " the second was called, " Congress Canvassed; By a Westchester Farmer." These were really papers of much cleverness and force, stating the British side of the controversy in a clear, pungent style, yet in that homely form of argument which was especially desired. They were loudly cried up by the loyalists, were widely read and discussed, were gratuitously distributed by the party in whose cause they had been written, and altogether bid fair, if left unanswered or only feebly answered, to do serious injury to the popular cause. The dangerous character of these tracts was sufficiently proved by the wrath which they aroused in the breasts of the patriots, who proposed to indict the author and publisher for treasonable designs, and at a county meeting gave vent to their rage by tarring and feathering the printed sheets and nailing them to the pillory. Fortunately, protest and opposition soon took a more sensible and effectual form. A fortnight had not elapsed after the first appearance of the offensive pamphlets, ere there was pubhshed another broadside purporting to be "A Full Vindication of the Measures of Congress from the Calumnies of their Enemies, in Answer to a Letter under the signature of a W. Farmer, &c." This document was so forcible that the tory writers felt compelled to come to the rescue of the tracts, which they had already sent into the field, with still another of the like tenor. In this, the Westchester Farmer gave his " View of the Controversy." His temper evidently had not been improved by contact with an adversary. But neither the temper nor the arguments of that adversary seemed to have suffered in their turn ; for he promptly replied with a pamphlet entitled, " The Farmer Refuted, &c."

This last publication, which made quite a little volume, was thorough and exhaustive, and apparently discotiraged the clergymen from further prolonging a contest in which they had experienced an opposition of such unexpected force. For a time the patriot writer remained unknown, though much curiosity was expressed concerning him ; especially were the gentlemen amongst whom he had carried such an unpleasant fluttering desirous to discover who he was ; and for a few weeks the inquiry prosecuted with equal eagerness by both parties was as hot in the interested neighborhood, as ever it was for the author of "Waverley" or for the veritable Junius.

It was conceived to be impossible that a novice could bave achieved sucb distinction, nor was there noticeable any immaturity in thought or style promotive of this suspicion. The credit was at first divided between Mr. Jay and Governor Livingston, whose reputations received no small accretion from the belief. When by degrees the name of Hamilton, a lad whose eighteenth birthday only had occurred between the dates of the publication of his two tracts, was given as that of the writer, the incredulity expressed at first soon gave way, in the face of certain proof, to unlimited admiration and astonishment. Oddly enough it happened that Dr. Cooper, President of King's College, where Hamilton was still pursuing his studies, had occasionally been engaged in controversy with the student in the anonymous warfare of the newspapers. He was with difficulty made to believe in the identity of the distinguished patriot writer with the laborious young disciple. But to his credit it shoiild be recorded, that, when convinced by irrefragable testimony, he seems, in spite of the warmth which often signalized the contest, never to have sought an ignoble revenge by harassing his audacious pupil.

It is not probable that these essays will be read hereafter by any persons save patient and laborious students of the history of that era. Neither would an abstract, however brief, of the arguments advanced in them prove acceptable to the generality of readers. Such an abstract could not, indeed, be easily drawn ; for one of the distinguishing traits of the papers was their terse and pointed style. But the foresight displayed in some parts of the second pamphlet deserves a moment's notice. The writer ventures to speak of a possible condition of independence. He looks forward to and discusses the effect of the establishment of manufactures — especially of cotton fabrics — in this country. He foreshadows that system, since so zealously prosecuted, of making this continent sufficient unto itself and independent, if need should be, of all other nations of the globe. Referring to the chances of war, he depicts beforehand, with what proved to be perfect accuracy, the peculiar military character which that war must assume as one of defence, — the Americans availing themselves largely of the nature and extent of the country to harass, and by degrees to tire out, the enemy. He urged the probability that France, and perhaps also Spain, might see their own interest in taking even an active part in our behalf in any struggle with Great Britain. To us, who have seen these predictions fulfilled, and who are familiar with them as accomplished facts, this foresight may seem natural ; but it was not shared even by able colonial leaders at that day.

After the authorship was discovered, it was deemed by the royalists to be very desirable to enlist such a recruit in their own ranks. The fact that Hamilton was so young, and comparatively a stranger in the land, made it seem not improbable that he had been prompted in his labors by the desire of distinguishing himself in the quarter where the opportunities for distinction seemed most promising, rather than by any deep conviction or warm feeling in behalf of the colonists. He was accordingly approached with offers of liberal compensation and handsome treatment, if he would, as it was supposed that he easily might, change his opinions and embrace the British side. But so far as his undertakings had been due to the incitement of ambition, that ambition had been of a thoroughly honorable kind. He had taken no active or decided part, until he had made up his mind clearly and finally with which party the right lay. All inducements thereaftefward held out to him to desert that part were met with an unhesitating refusal.