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d785781
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If he had wanted to impose a monarchy upon America, Hamilton said, he would follow the classic path of a populist demagogue: "I would mount the hobbyhorse of popularity, I would cry out usurpation, danger to liberty etc. etc. I would endeavour to prostrate the national government, raise a ferment, and then ride in the whirlwind and direct the storm."
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Ron Chernow |
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17639c8
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Because Conway persisted in maligning Washington, he was summoned to the dueling ground by General John Cadwalader, who fired a ball through Conway's mouth that came out the back of his head. Cadwalader showed no regret. "I have stopped the damned rascal's lying tongue at any rate," he observed as his opponent lay in agony on the ground."
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Ron Chernow |
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298a2b6
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As too much power leads to despotism, too little leads to anarchy, and both eventually to the ruin of the people.
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Ron Chernow |
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3d55cf9
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This falling-out was to be more than personal, for the rift between Hamilton and Madison precipitated the start of the two-party system in America. The funding debate shattered the short-lived political consensus that had ushered in the new government. For the next five years, the political spectrum in America was defined by whether people endorsed or opposed Alexander Hamilton's programs.
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Ron Chernow |
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59462f0
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The prolific Hamilton was now writing pseudonymous commentaries on his own pseudonymous essays.
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Ron Chernow |
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eaf1505
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Abigail Adams, who did not set sail until November, seemed miffed by the enforced southward shift, swearing that she would try to enjoy Philadelphia but that "when all is done it will not be Broadway."
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Ron Chernow |
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6ba884e
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In his self-serving view of events, Lee believed that he had performed a prodigious feat, rescuing his overmatched army from danger and organizing an orderly retreat. "'The American troops would not stand the British bayonets," he insisted to Washington. "You damned poltroon," Washington rejoined, "you never tried them!" Always reluctant to resort to profanities, the chaste Washington cursed at Lee "till the leaves shook on the tree," recal..
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Ron Chernow |
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83ac25e
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Both Hamilton and Jefferson believed in democracy, but Hamilton tended to be more suspicious of the governed and Jefferson of the governors.
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Ron Chernow |
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968c5e9
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This fierce defender of private property--this man for whom contracts were to be sacred covenants--expressly denied the sanctity of any agreement that stripped people of their freedom.
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Ron Chernow |
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9f5ac15
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Hamilton's relatively short life robbed him not only of any chance for further accomplishment but of the opportunity to mold his historical image.
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Ron Chernow |
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d493dc4
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Again and again in his career, Hamilton committed the same political error: he never knew when to stop, and the resulting excesses led him into irremediable indiscretions.
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Ron Chernow |
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6e1b969
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The task of government was not to stop selfish striving--a hopeless task--but to harness it for the public good.
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Ron Chernow |
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594f14d
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This, I confess, hurts my feelings, and if it obtains credit will require a contradiction,
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Ron Chernow |
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2bb5fc9
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Clearly, this ambivalent twenty-year-old favored the Revolution but also worried about the long-term effect of habitual disorder, especially among the uneducated masses. Hamilton lacked the temperament of a true-blue revolutionary. He saw too clearly that greater freedom could lead to greater disorder and, by a dangerous dialectic, back to a loss of freedom. Hamilton's lifelong task was to try to straddle and resolve this contradiction and ..
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Ron Chernow |
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bc113f6
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In mid-May, he dictated a message for a reunion of the Grand Army of the Republic that had a touching, patriarchal tone: "Tell the boys that they probably will never look into my face again, nor hear my voice, but they are engraved on my heart, and I love them as my children."
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Ron Chernow |
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2a2cf92
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I think that we Americans, at least in the Southern col[onie]s, cannot contend with a good grace for liberty until we shall have enfranchised our slaves," Laurens told a friend right before the signing of the Declaration of Independence.64"
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Ron Chernow |
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07e28e0
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The intellectual spoilsport among the founding fathers, Hamilton never believed in the perfectibility of human nature and regularly violated what became the first commandment of American politics: thou shalt always be optimistic when addressing the electorate. He shrank from the campaign rhetoric that flattered Americans as the most wonderful, enlightened people on earth and denied that they had anything to learn from European societies. He..
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Ron Chernow |
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b85754c
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Hamilton's critics seriously underrated his superhuman stamina. He enjoyed beating his enemies at their own game, and the resolutions roused his fighting spirit. By February 19, in a staggering display of diligence, he delivered to the House several copious reports, garlanded with tables, lists, and statistics that gave a comprehensive overview of his work as treasury secretary. In the finale of one twenty-thousand-word report, Hamilton int..
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Ron Chernow |
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bd1f494
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Since both Eliza and Angelica were pregnant, sister Peggy crept downstairs to retrieve the endangered child. The leader of the raiding party barred her way with a musket. "Wench, wench! Where is your master?" he demanded. "Gone to alarm the town," the coolheaded Peggy said.24 The intruder, fearing that Schuyler would return with troops, fled in alarm."
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Ron Chernow |
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f326095
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In theory, Jefferson could have fathered all of Sally Hemings's children. Fawn M. Brodie has written, "Jefferson was not only not 'distant' from Sally Hemings but in the same house nine months before the births of each of her seven children and she conceived no children when he was not there."54 Jefferson freed only two slaves in his lifetime and another five in his will, and all belonged to the Hemings family, though he excluded Sally. On ..
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Ron Chernow |
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fcfb7dd
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avowed preference for an elite based on merit was misconstrued by enemies into a secret adoration of aristocracy.
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Ron Chernow |
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6ea923d
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Light reading (by this, I mean books of little importance) may amuse for the moment, but leaves nothing solid behind.
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Ron Chernow |
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a6504c9
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Many observers were disturbed by all the uniformed men striding the White House corridors. In a broad-brush indictment, Charles Sumner disapproved of the way the White House "assumed the character of military head-quarters. To the dishonor of the civil service and in total disregard of precedent, the President surrounded himself with officers of the army, and substituted military forms for those of civil life."
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Ron Chernow |
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bb0e1d9
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Washington quibbled with Hamilton on one or two points but otherwise stood in perfect agreement. His letter to Hamilton again corroborates what the Jeffersonians found difficult to credit: that Washington never shied away from differing with the redoubtable Hamilton but agreed with him on the vast majority of issues.
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Ron Chernow |
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87ec05f
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If those who 'gain all they can' and 'save all they can,' will likewise 'give all they can,' then the more they will grow in grace.
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Ron Chernow |
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0d917a7
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Cornwallis had grown so desperate that he infected blacks with smallpox and forced them to wander toward enemy lines in an attempt to sicken the opposing forces.
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Ron Chernow |
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b1dbec2
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A lifelong Methodist, he had always viewed religious excess with a certain irony, having once told a clutch of ministers that America boasted three parties: Democrats, Republicans, and Methodists.
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Ron Chernow |
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30a1c68
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Willful waste makes woeful want.
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Ron Chernow |
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f6a25b9
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For Washington, parties weren't so much expressions of popular politics as their negation, denying the true will of the people as expressed through their chosen representatives.
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Ron Chernow |
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0b7c781
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The unflappable Washington then continued with the session as if nothing had happened. It was a classic performance: he exercised the greatest self-control when roiled by the most unruly emotions.
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Ron Chernow |
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6947a75
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In one glowing passage, Hamilton invoked the colonists' natural rights: "The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature by the hand of the divinity itself and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power."
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Ron Chernow |
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8f3791d
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a dangerous ambition more often lurks behind the specious mask of zeal for the rights of the people than under the forbidding appearance of zeal for the firmness and efficiency of government.
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Ron Chernow |
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ccf2dae
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The ability to deal with people is as purchasable a commodity as sugar or coffee," he once said, "and I pay more for that ability than for any other under the sun." --
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Ron Chernow |
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d995ef3
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As to why God had singled out John D. Rockefeller for such spectacular bounty, Rockefeller always adverted to his own adherence to the doctrine of stewardship--the notion of the wealthy man as a mere instrument of God, a temporary trustee of his money, who devoted it to good causes. "It has seemed as if I was favored and got increase because the Lord knew that I was going to turn around and give it back."73"
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Ron Chernow |
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0ebb53f
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A journalist named C. E. Meade, a nephew of George Gordon Meade, claimed Grant puffed on his last cigar while visiting a horse farm in Goshen, New York. "Gentlemen," Grant announced to his companions, "this is the last cigar I shall ever smoke."
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Ron Chernow |
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ef401d7
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in the end he required political pull to do so. After years of wandering, Grant had popped up in the right congressional district in the right state. Lincoln had the power to appoint brigadier generals of volunteers, and the Illinois caucus enjoyed such sway that six Illinois brigadiers were selected, two more than any other state.
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Ron Chernow |
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33a7c32
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shall pass through this world but once. Any good thing therefore that I can do, any kindness I can show to any human being, let me do it now; let me not defer it nor neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.
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Ron Chernow |
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a3c3038
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It is easy to snicker at such deceit and conclude that Hamilton faked all emotion for his wife, but this would belie the otherwise exemplary nature of their marriage. Eliza Hamilton never expressed anything less than a worshipful attitude toward her husband. His love for her, in turn, was deep and constant if highly imperfect. The problem was that no single woman could seem to satisfy all the needs of this complex man with his checkered chi..
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Ron Chernow |
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a8bfa17
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He wondered why he cared so desperately about the fate of his adopted country and others seemingly so little. "To see the character of the government and the country so sported with, exposed to so indelible a blot, puts my heart to the torture. Am I then more of an American than those who drew their first breath on American ground? Or what is it that thus torments me at a circumstance so calmly viewed by almost everybody else? Am I a fool, ..
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idealism
politics
government
patriotism
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Ron Chernow |
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35501bc
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Whoever considers the nature of our government with discernment will see that though obstacles and delays will frequently stand in the way of the adoption of good measures, yet when once adopted, they are likely to be stable and permanent. It will be far more difficult to undo than to do." 93"
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Ron Chernow |
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7c96a80
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Thus, Hamilton triumphed posthumously over Burr, converting the latter's victory at Weehawken into his political coup de grace. Burr's reputation perished along with Hamilton, exactly as Hamilton had anticipated.
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Ron Chernow |
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00007e0
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Over a period of nearly six months, he published twenty-eight glittering essays, strengthening his claim as arguably the foremost political pamphleteer in American history. As with The Federalist Papers, "The Defence" spilled out at a torrid pace, sometimes two or three essays per week. In all, Hamilton poured forth nearly one hundred thousand words even as he kept up a full-time legal practice. This compilation, dashed off in the heat of c..
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Ron Chernow |
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942f9f3
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If a charge was made often enough, people assumed in the end "that a person so often accused cannot be entirely innocent."
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Ron Chernow |
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d19d53d
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The three terms of Federalist rule had been full of dazzling accomplishments that Republicans, with their extreme apprehension of federal power, could never have achieved. Under the tutelage of Washington, Adams, and Hamilton, the Federalists had bequeathed to American history a sound federal government with a central bank, a funded debt, a high credit rating, a tax system, a customs service, a coast guard, a navy, and many other institutio..
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Ron Chernow |