Like other founding fathers, Hamilton inhabited two diametrically opposed worlds. There was the Olympian sphere of constitutional debate and dignified discourse—the way many prefer to remember these s...
Like most people, Hamilton and Adams were preternaturally sensitive to flaws in the other that they themselves possessed.
July 10, 1790, the House approved the Residence Act, designating Philadelphia as the temporary capital and a ten-mile-square site on the Potomac as the permanent site.
Julia’s brother Lewis, who remained in California, allowed them to use his house Wish-ton-wish—an Indian term meaning whip-poor-will—
Jefferson must have regretted having arrived so late. He had no doubt that the original holders of government paper had been cheated of rightful gains by speculators who were fraudulent purchasers of...
It was, Eliza Hamilton Holly noted pointedly, the imperative duty that Eliza had bequeathed to all her children: Justice shall be done to the memory of my Hamilton.
It often happens that our zeal is at variance with our understanding.
It is the food of my hopes, the object of my wishes, the only enjoyment of my life - Alexander Hamilton
It is puzzling that Aaron Burr is sometimes classified among the founding fathers. Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Adams, Franklin, and Hamilton all left behind papers that run to dozens of thick volu...
In the standard telling of his life, Hamilton boards a ship in October 1772 and sails off to North America forever.
In mid-February 1804, Hamilton journeyed to Albany and pleaded for a new trial before the state supreme court.
In general, however, their two voices blended admirably together.
In a significant decision, he decided that customs revenues could be paid not just in gold and silver but with notes from the Bank of New York and the Bank of North America, an innovation that began t...
In a country riven by quarrels, Hamilton produced a vision of harmonious parts. Agriculture and commerce were mutually beneficial. North and south, the western frontier and the eastern seaboard, enjoy...
IN APRIL 1860, Ulysses S. Grant, cloaked in his old blue army cape, arrived in Galena aboard the Mississippi steamer Itasca. Clasping in each hand chairs that had served the family as deck seats, Gran...
Henceforth he would project himself into opponents’ minds and comprehend their fears and anxieties instead of blowing them up into all-powerful bugaboos, giving him courage when others quailed.
Hamilton saw America’s essential nature being forged in the throes of battle, and that made honest action imperative.
Hamilton never carried out his plans for Louisiana or Florida, much less for Spanish America. As the original rationale for his army—defense against a French invasion—was increasingly undercut by peac...
Hamilton lent his opinion the erudition of a treatise and the warmth of a manifesto. The essence of it was that government must possess the means to attain ends for which it was established or the bon...
Hamilton induced Philip Schuyler to renege on his pledged support for Duane in favor of King.