Hamilton PODs

Quick question. The founding father who raped people he owned as property is....

Hamilton doesn't fit into the label autocratic elitist despot. He certainly didn't trust the masses, believing absurd things like the French Revolution would end in tears and with a militarist seizing power, which hahaha was absurd, and favoring radical notions like ensuring the US's creditworthiness, but let's not pretend that Jefferson was a simple yeoman farmer.

And then you see, this immediately becomes the Hamilton v Jefferson thing because the entire history has been hijacked for modern political purposes. Idiot libertarians re-imagining Jefferson as a proto-libertarian does not excuse idiot progressives doing the same thing with Hamilton.
 
And then you see, this immediately becomes the Hamilton v Jefferson thing because the entire history has been hijacked for modern political purposes. Idiot libertarians re-imagining Jefferson as a proto-libertarian does not excuse idiot progressives doing the same thing with Hamilton.

While I am certainly an idiot, I still think there's a lot to admire about the bastard Scotsman immigrant who rose through the ranks of the early United States.
 
While I am certainly an idiot, I still think there's a lot to admire about the bastard Scotsman immigrant who rose through the ranks of the early United States.

That I won't deny. He was an actual, no-exaggeration genius of the first rank.

Look for writings on his response to the financial panics of the early 1790's. The man understood macroeconomics and finance on a level we usually reserve for 20th century central bank presidents.
 
And then you see, this immediately becomes the Hamilton v Jefferson thing because the entire history has been hijacked for modern political purposes. Idiot libertarians re-imagining Jefferson as a proto-libertarian does not excuse idiot progressives doing the same thing with Hamilton.

Fair, though I think Hamilton would fall very nicely into the Wall Street Wing of the Democratic Party.
 
Fair, though I think Hamilton would fall very nicely into the Wall Street Wing of the Democratic Party.

His politics would not be recognizable in modern contexts. My passion in this topic isn't because I particularly hate Hamilton or anything (at least any significantly moreso than any of his contemporaries), it's because I cannot emphasize strongly enough to modern readers that he is not an antecedent of the left-wing in American politics.
 
His politics would not be recognizable in modern contexts. My passion in this topic isn't because I particularly hate Hamilton or anything (at least any significantly moreso than any of his contemporaries), it's because I cannot emphasize strongly enough to modern readers that he is not an antecedent of the left-wing in American politics.
Well, no, political evolution is a complicated thing. Despite being rather on the left wing, given the context of the late 1700s I would have been a Federalist because stability is desirable in a young nation.
 
The only way that I understand the Board's Hamilton love is that he is a proto-nerd.

Is this something that requires explanation? If anything (based on this thread at least) it seems like a lot of people on the board have a bit of a hate-on for Hamilton, seemingly out of backlash against historically ignorant fans of the musical.

It's definitely reasonable to say that Hamilton was the most 'progressive' founding father who ever actually got much power, meaning excluding true radical like Thomas Paine. Sure he was far from perfect and certainly falls down on a number of issues by today's standards, but being a fairly enlightened capitalist counts for a lot when most of your peers are are wannabe feudal lords with slaves instead of serfs.
 
Go the other way

These threads always seem to take off on the "Let's make Hamilton more successful" track and get bogged down in his personality.

What about going the other way? What would the US look like if he wasn`t in a place to be recognized/show his talents as a genius financier?

You can do that in a few ways: Make him less successful (dies at Yorktown for example) or simply not have him get to the US when he did. Whatever...

His major period of influence is clearly from 1789 to about 1794/5 when he shaped the financial structure of the US. What if he wasn't there to be the visionary?

Where would the capital be? How would the various states deal with the remaining war debts, if not through assumption? How would the country deal with a low tariff regime that made Southerners happy but Northerners not?

Love him or hate him, I'm not sure there be a recognizable US without him.

Just my two cents,

David
 
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