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First Secretary of State

Alexander Hamilton vs. Thomas Jefferson

First Secretary of Treasury

Biographical Information

Alexander Hamilton crafted his reputation during the Revolutionary War, and became one of America's most influential Founding Fathers. He was an impassioned figure of a strong federal government, and played a key role in defending and ratifying the United States constitution. As the first secretary of the United States treasury, Hamilton built a financial foundation for the new nation, against fierce opposition from his arch rival Thomas Jefferson.

Alexander Hamilton admired British aristocracy and believed it should be a model for American Government. He also believed in a strong central government, and favored a broad interpretation of the constitution. With his favoring in restriction on speech and press, he believed America should break bonds with France and tie itself to Britain.

Political Views

Hamilton was born in either 1755 or 1757 on the Caribbean island of Nevis. His father, the Scottish trader James Hamilton, and mother, Rachel Faucette Lavien, weren't married. Rachel was still married to another man at the time of Hamilton's birth, but had left her husband after he spend much of her family fortune and had her imprisoned for adultery.

Family Life

Hamilton's father abandoned the family in 1766 and his mother died two years later. Hired as a clerk in a trading company on St. Croix when he was only 11, Hamilton gained wider attention after he published a letter describing a hurricane that had hit the island in 1772. Locals helped raise money to send him to America to study, and he arrived in New York in late 1772, just as the colonies were gearing up for a war for independence from Great Britain.

Working as an accounting clerk in a mercantile in St. Croix, Hamilton quickly impressed many of his employers. Through this early experience, Hamilton was first exposed to international commerce. This included the importation of enslaved people, and he also learned about the business of money and trade.

In 1773, Hamilton was 16 years old and he arrived in New York where he enrolled in King's College. Despite his gratitude towards patrons, Hamilton was drawn more to a political involvement than he was to academics. He wrote his first political article defending the Patriots cause against the interests of pro-British Loyalists in 1774. When he left King's College, he joined forces with the Patriots in their protest of British-imposed taxes and commercial business regulations.

As far as his military career goes, Hamilton became part of the New York Provincial Artillery Company and fought battles of Long Island, White Plains and Trenton. In 1777, Hamilton was promoted to lieutenant colonel of the Continental Army. During his early service in the fight for American Independence, he caught the attention for General George Washington, who made Hamilton his assistant and trusted adviser. During this occupation, Hamilton put his writing skills to work. he wrote about Washington's critical letters and composed numerous reports on the strategic reform and restructuring of the Continental Army.

Occupation

On December 14, 1780, Hamilton married Elizabeth "Eliza" Schuyler, the daughter of Revolutionary War general Philip Schuyler.

By all accounts, they enjoyed a strong relationship throughout their marriage and would have eight children together, despite the revelation that Hamilton had once conducted an extramarital affair with a married woman, Maria Reynolds.

In a letter to his wife dated July 4, 1804 (just days before his fateful duel with Aaron Burr), Hamilton wrote, “Fly to the bosom of your God and be comforted. With my last idea; I shall cherish the sweet hope of meeting you in a better world. Adieu best of wives and best of Women. Embrace all my darling Children for me.”

Eliza, who lived for 50 years after the death of her husband, would dedicate her life to preserving his legacy.

Significant Other

Views on Slavery

Hamilton opposed slavery, but he also made some compromises. Hamilton had been among the founders of the New York Manumission colony, which sought the gradual emancipation of enslaved people in the state. He served as the secretary for this organization, and aided in the passage of a 1799 state law that freed children of enslaved people. In 1774, he published his first major political essay, “A Full Vindication of the Measures of the Congress,” which drew direct comparisons between enslaved people and colonists oppressed by the British. And in 1779, he championed a plan proposed by his friend John Laurens to arm and enlist enslaved people in the Continental Army—and reward them with their freedom in return.

Economic Status

Alexander Hamilton was born into a very poor family, and they were not very wealthy during his earlier years. As he grew older, his writings and his political status led him to becoming one of the most financially stable man during the time period.

Alexander Hamilton believed that America should have a strong commerical society and alarge industrial sector. In addition to this, he believed that the government shoud foster business and capitalism as he favored a protective tariff to help manufacturers. Hamilton also believed in public debt, and he strongly suppported the National Bank.

Economic Views for the USA

On July 11th, 1804, Hamilton and a man by the name of Aaron Burr met at a duel. Both men drew their guns and shot, and the result of this was Hamilton missing, and getting severely wounded by Burr's bullet. Hamilton was brought back to New York City, where he died the next day on July 12th, 1804. Hamilton's grave is located in the cemetery of Trinity Church in downtown Manhattan, New York City.

Death

Overall, Hamilton was a Federalist who believed in a strong Federal Government. He did not think the bill of rights was necessary, and he also favored the wealthy. Because of his political views, he wanted the educated to run the government, and he also wanted an industrial nation that could pay off the Nation's debts. In order for this to happen, he believed in taxing the citizens, and he Favored the North and Eastern part of the United States. He favored a strong national defenser, and believed in a loost interpretation of the Constitution. Hamilton was a very ambitious man, and his hard work will be remembered as he was a nationalist, and a main writer of the Federalist papers.

Legacy

As a draftsman of the United States Declaration of Independence, the nation's first secretary of state and the second vice president. As the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson stabilized the United States econmoy,and defeated pirates from North Africa during the Barbary War. He was responsible for soubling the size of the United States by successfully brokering the Louisaiana Purchase. He also founded the University of Virginia.

Biographical Information

Thomas Jefferson wanted a more Democratic government than Britain. He also favored freedom of press and speech, and wanted to reduce the number of Federal Office Holders. Overall, he wanted to Increase the state's rights, and he had a tight interpretation of the constitution.

Political Views

Jefferson was born on April 13, 1743, at the Shadwell plantation located just outside of Charlottesville, Virginia. Jefferson was born into one of the most prominent families of Virginia's planter elite. His mother, Jane Randolph Jefferson, was a member of the proud Randolph clan, a family claiming descent from English and Scottish royalty. His father, Peter Jefferson, was a successful farmer as well as a skilled surveyor and cartographer who produced the first accurate map of the Province of Virginia. The young Jefferson was the third born of 10 siblings. As a boy, Jefferson's favorite pastimes were playing in the woods, practicing the violin and reading. He began his formal education at the age of nine, studying Latin and Greek at a local private school run by the Reverend William Douglas. In 1757, at the age of 14, he took up further study of the classical languages as well as literature and mathematics with the Reverend James Maury, whom Jefferson later described as "a correct classical scholar."

Family Life

Thomas Jefferson was a diplomat, lawyer, architect, philosopher, and Founding Father who served as the third president of the United States from 1801 to 1809. He had previously served as the second vice president of the United States between 1797 and 1801.

Occupation

From 1767 to 1774, Jefferson practiced law in Virginia with great success, trying many cases and winning most of them. During these years, he also met and fell in love with Martha Wayles Skelton, a recent widow and one of the wealthiest women in Virginia.

The pair married on January 1, 1772. Thomas and Martha Jefferson had six children together, but only two survived into adulthood: Martha, their firstborn, and Mary, their fourth.

Significant Other

Throughout his entire life, Thomas Jefferson was publicly a consistent opponent of slavery. Calling it a “moral depravity”1 and a “hideous blot,” he believed that slavery presented the greatest threat to the survival of the new American nation. Jefferson also thought that slavery was contrary to the laws of nature, which decreed that everyone had a right to personal liberty. These views were radical in a world where unfree labor was the norm. Jefferson’s belief in the necessity of abolition was intertwined with his racial beliefs. He thought that white Americans and enslaved blacks constituted two “separate nations” who could not live together peacefully in the same country. Jefferson’s belief that blacks were racially inferior and “as incapable as children,” coupled with slaves’ presumed resentment of their former owners, made their removal from the United States an integral part of Jefferson’s emancipation scheme. Influenced by the Haitian Revolution and an aborted rebellion in Virginia in 1800, Jefferson believed that American slaves’ deportation—whether to Africa or the West Indies—was an essential followup to emancipation.

Views on Slavery

Jefferson inherited a great deal of debt from his father-in-law, John Wayles, when Wayles died in 1774. Although Jefferson was wealthy in land and slaves, farming proved to be an unreliable and inadequate source of income. Also, although Jefferson himself was a major creditor, payments owed to him were unreliable and inadequate as well. Jefferson lived perpetually beyond his means, spending large amounts of money on building projects, furnishings, wine, etc. The financial panic that occurred in 1819 added a substantial burden onto his already-substantial debt. Also, he acquired a heavy debt from a friend late in life. In 1818, Jefferson endorsed a $20,000 note for Wilson Cary Nicholas. Nicholas died in 1820, and Jefferson was forced to take on his unpaid debt.

Economic Status

Economic Views for the USA

Thomas jefferson opposed the national bank, and encouraged state banks. He also believed that no special favors should be given to manufacturers. With a strong stance on national debt being paid off quickly, Jefferson preferred an agrarian society.

Jefferson died on July 4, 1826 — the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence — only a few hours before John Adams passed away in Massachusetts.

In the moments before he passed, Adams spoke his last words, eternally true if not in the literal sense in which he meant them, "Thomas Jefferson survives."

Death

Jefferson was the spokesman of liberty and a racist enslaved people owner, a champion of the common people and a man with luxurious and aristocratic tastes, a believer in limited government and a president who expanded governmental authority beyond the wildest visions of his predecessors, a quiet man who abhorred politics and arguably the most dominant political figure of his generation. The tensions between Jefferson's principles and practices make him all the more apt a symbol for the nation he helped create, a nation whose shining ideals have always been complicated by a complex history. Jefferson is buried in the family cemetery at his beloved Monticello, in a grave marked by a plain gray tombstone. The brief inscription it bears, written by Jefferson himself, is as noteworthy for what it excludes as what it includes. The inscription suggests Jefferson's humility as well as his belief that his greatest gifts to posterity came in the realm of ideas rather than the realm of politics: "Here was buried Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of American Independence of the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and father of the University Of Virginia."

Legacy

Differences and Similarities

- Both of these men helped shape the political party system of the United States.

- George Washington made Jefferson the first Secretary of State and Hamilton the first Secretary of the Treasury in spite of their opposing views.

- Washington thought that having these two men as his closest advisers would help shape a more well rounded government.

- Their opposing views became the basis for the two political factionas labeled the Federalists and the Republicans

- There were two opinions labeled as a title on each side. "Jeffersonians" agreed with Jefferson's ideas, and "Hamiltonians" agreed with Hamilton's ideas.

- Political parties emerged even though Washington advised against it in his Farewell Address.

- Although both of these men were very poor at a young age, both of them went their own ways in education and became very financially stable after their political and economical endeavors

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