Alexander Hamilton

by Charles A. Conant

"The general government must not only have a strong soul, but strong organs by which that soul is to operate. I despair that a republican form of government can remove the difficulties; I would hold it, however, unwise to change it. The best form of government, not attainable by us, but the model to which we should approach as near as possible, is the British constitution, praised by Necker as 'the only government which unites public strength with individual security.' Its house of lords is a most noble institution. It forms a permanent barrier against every pernicious innovation, whether attempted on the part of the crown or of the commons."

Hamilton made little concealment of his belief that the new government should not be exclusively republican. He said on June 26, 1787:—

"I acknowledge I do not think favorably of republican government; but I address my remarks to those who do, in order to prevail on them to tone their government as high as possible. I profess myself as zealous an advocate for liberty as any man whatever; and trust I shall be as willing a martyr to it, though I differ as to the form in which it is most eligible. Real liberty is neither found in despotism nor in the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments. Those who mean to form a solid republic ought to proceed to the confines of another government. If we incline too much to democracy, we shall soon shoot into a monarchy."

In pursuance of these views, Hamilton urged that all branches of the new government should originate in the action of the people rather than of the states. In this respect he came closer to democracy than some of his opponents, but he proposed to give strength and permanence to the government by providing that the Senators and the executive should hold office during good behavior. He contended that by making the chief executive subject to impeachment, the term monarchy would not be applicable to his office. Another step differing radically from the Constitution as adopted, and showing the unswerving purpose of Hamilton to give supremacy to the central government, was the proposal that the executive of each state should be appointed by the general government and have a negative on all state legislation.

Hamilton had no expectation that his plan would be adopted. What he sought was to key the temper of the delegates up to a pitch which would bring them as nearly to his ideal of what the new government should be as was possible under the circumstances of the times. His long speech was attentively listened to, and even Yates reported that it "was praised by everybody, but supported by none." Notwithstanding these criticisms, the Constitution, as it was finally adopted, embodied many of the features of the project which was outlined by Hamilton. A legislative body of two houses, the choice of the executive by electors, a veto for the executive over legislative acts, the grant of the treaty-making power to the executive and the Senate, the confirmation of appointments by the Senate, the creation of a federal judiciary, and the provision that state laws in conflict with the Constitution should be void; these and many other features of the existing Constitution were parts of the plan of Hamilton.

It was not the open preference which Hamilton expressed for the British form of government which caused distrust of his plan. This was neither startling nor offensive to the great majority of those who heard him. Representative government under a republican head had not then been tried upon a large scale in any part of the world. Such small republics as existed in ancient times and in Italy had been confined within narrow areas, and had in many cases presented examples of factional strife which were far from encouraging to the friends of liberty. The Americans, in revolting against Great Britain, revolted only against what they considered the false interpretation given by King George to the guarantees of the English constitution, wrested by their ancestors from King John and his successors and consecrated by the Revolution of 1688. It was far from the thoughts of the most extreme, with perhaps an occasional personal exception, to cut loose from the traditions of English liberty, tear down the ancient structure, and build from the ground up, as was done a few years later in France by the maddened victims of the oppression of the nobles.

The sentiment most strongly opposed to the views of Hamilton was not democratic sentiment, in the strictest sense of the word, but devotion to local self-government. Hamilton was democratic enough to insist, in the discussion of the manner of choosing members of the House of Representatives, "It is essential to the democratic rights of the community that the first branch be directly elected by the people." What he desired was strength at the centre of authority, from whatever source that authority was derived. Coming from a little West Indian island where the traditions of parliamentary government had little footing, he attached no such importance as most of his associates to the reserved rights of the states. He was the man for the hour as the champion of a strong government, but it would not have been fortunate in some respects if his views had been adopted in their extreme form. There never was the slightest chance, as he doubtless knew, that they would be adopted by the descendants of English freemen who had founded self-governing states in accord with their own principles on the western shores of the Atlantic.

Having delivered a single strong speech, which pointed the way towards a strong union, Hamilton remained comparatively in the background during the remainder of the convention. It was inevitable, however, that he should make himself heard upon the proposal that the new government should have power "to emit bills on the credit of the United States." The power to issue unfunded paper had received his censure four years before, as one of the defects of the existing Articles of Confederation. He now opposed in the most emphatic manner the grant of authority to the new government to issue paper money in the form of its own notes, and to force them into circulation as a substitute for gold and silver coin. When Gouverneur Morris moved to strike out the power to issue bills on the credit of the United States and was supported by Madison, it was supposed that, if the motion prevailed, the power to issue government paper money and make it a legal tender for debts was guarded against for all time. The power was stricken out of the Constitution by a vote of nine states against two. Madison decided the vote of Virginia, and declared that "the pretext for a paper currency, and particularly for making the bills a tender, either for public or private debts, was cut off." It is not surprising that Mr. Bancroft, the jealous friend of the Constitution, in spite of the opening of the door at a later period by the Supreme Court of the United States, declared:

"This is the interpretation of the clause, made at the time of its adoption alike by its authors and by its opponents, accepted by all the statesmen of that age, not open to dispute because too clear for argument, and never disputed so long as any one man who took part in framing the Constitution remained alive."