President Hamilton an academic question

Suppose Alexander Hamilton had survived his duel with Aaron Burr and gone on to become President either beating Jefferson in 1804 or more likely Madison in 1808? What would his presidency have been like?

There would almost certainly have neen no War of 1812 as his election may well have been due to the hostility of the Embargo Act. The United States may have even joind in the war against Napoleon and there may have been an earlier Monroe doctrine, the "Hamilton doctrine" akin to the Monroe doctrine supported by Britain but probably not until nearly the end of his term of office as Spain and Britain became allies in 1808 when France invaded Spain.

Hamilton was a supporter of strong Federal government and may have attempted to abolish slavery although there would be strong hostility in the Southern States. He also supported protectionism and may well have created the condition for an earlier insdustrialisation. An earlier civil war is a possiblity.

However a Hamiltonian presidency would have resulted in the term Hamiltonian to describe strong interventionist Federal Government which although unpopular in some areas would be viewed as distinct from socialism. Some of Americas better presidents were arguably Hamiltonians; Abaraham Lincoln, Teddy Rossevelt, Franklin D Roosevelt, Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson (over his Great Society propsals and civil right legislation not Vietnam) and to some extent John F Kennedy. Barack Obama looks like being in the Hamiltonian mode.

History tends to go in cycles and periodically Hamiltonianism is required to save the American was i.e Teddy Rossevelt with the trusts ansd FDR's New Deal. The danger is not socialism as the intervention supports the system but that federal bodies have a habit of mission creep and empire building and becoming swelf perpetuating . Ronald Reagan was a supporter of the New Deal in his youth but dergulated in office possibly because he had seen intervention carry on beyond its need. America is probably set for another period of Hamiltonianism. J Edgar Hoover was one of the few examples of concentration of Federal power becoming dangerous but an FBI is still needed as crime doesn't recognise state boundaries

Ironically the only use of the term Hamiltonian is in James Blishes Cities of Flight series where there is an exodus of Hamiltonian refugees from a beauracratic state. In practice Madison's support for the Wasr of 1812 resulted in his having to strengthen Federal government's power! Aaron Burr is one of the few examples of a lone nut assassin who was also part of the establishment albeit a rogue member. Most assassinations involve a wider circle although not necessarily the inside jobs beloved of conspiracy theorists.
 
I am afraid that the duel is too late a POD to make AH President. By the time of the duel, AH was tarred with the Maria Reynolds scandal and had aliented the Adams wing of the Federalist Party by his pamphlet attacking John Adams in the election of 1800. In addition, the Federalist Party as a whole had aliented major segments of the nation because of the Alien and Sedition Acts, its obstructionist attitude in the House election of the President in 1801 and its general air of elitism.
However, if by the application of handvaium we can have AH avoid his entaglement with Maria and his ill fated intervention in the election of 1800, there is a possibility that AH and the Federalist Party could rebound by 1808. Possible, but still unlikely because of the underlying unpopularity of the Federalist Party.
I agree that by 19th Century standards, AH would have been an activist President. The Bank of the United States would not have been allowed to expire, as Madison allowed it to do. Its activities might even have been expanded in a Hamilton Presidency. The Army and the Navy would have been expanded and professionalized. There still might have been a war in the 1810-1815 period, but it might have been against France, rather than England. Rather than seeking (and failing) to obtain Canada, the U.S. might have invaded France's Caribbean colonies. I also think that it is possible that a Hamiltonian U.S. allied with the U.K. might have obtained some small pieces of what is now Canada such as New Brunswick or Southern Ontario (to connect New York with Michigan) in return for assistance against Napoleon and before a true spirit of "Canadian" nationhood took hold.
As to slavery, I think that AH would have encouraged manumission by word and by deed but I do not think he would have tried to abolish slavery in the South. However, having a President who actively disapproved of slavery and sought to limit it might have created a much different outlook on the institution than a succession of slave holding Southern Presidents, and Northern Presidents who were afraid of the "slave power".
I agree with Ron Chernow who in his excellent biograppht of AH makes the point that AH was simply too honest and direct to be a successful politician. Unlike Jefferson, there was no guile or indirection in AH. He could not keep a secret, hide his feelings or delay an opinion for tactical advantage. Without the protection of Washington, he was an unguided missile who was destined to self destruct politically sooner or later. But I also agree with Chernow and others who say that because of his ideas about the future of the U.S. as an industrial and financial power and the steps he took to implement these idea, we live in a Hamiltonian America.
 
You should read by Glory of the Eagle timeline. It doesn't have Hamilton becoming President but I plan to have him eventually become a sort of behind-the-scenes guy running the nation as Secretary of State or something behind a Federalist President.
 
There is the slight problem that Hamilton couldn't be president since he was born in the West Indies.

I think the law said that anyone born before the formation of the United States could run for President as long as he was a citizen at the time he ran for President after all Washington, Adams, Jefferson etc were technically born in the British Empire.
 
There is the slight problem that Hamilton couldn't be president since he was born in the West Indies.

Yeahbut, he was grandfathered in because he (like everyone else of serving age at that time) all had been born before the Constitution was enacted. He was eligable for nomination and election.
The first president elected who was born in the United States was (IIRC) Martin van Buren.
 
For some strange reason I could've sworn that you had to be born in N. America while it was still colonial. No idea where i got that from either. sorry.
 
I am afraid that the duel is too late a POD to make AH President. By the time of the duel, AH was tarred with the Maria Reynolds scandal and had aliented the Adams wing of the Federalist Party by his pamphlet attacking John Adams in the election of 1800. In addition, the Federalist Party as a whole had aliented major segments of the nation because of the Alien and Sedition Acts, its obstructionist attitude in the House election of the President in 1801 and its general air of elitism.

I agree with Ron Chernow who in his excellent biograppht of AH makes the point that AH was simply too honest and direct to be a successful politician. Unlike Jefferson, there was no guile or indirection in AH. He could not keep a secret, hide his feelings or delay an opinion for tactical advantage.

Hamilton's fortunes could have improved slowly several other politicians have recovered from scandals i.e Grover Cleveland. By 1808 the unpopularity of the embargos would have made the Jeffersonians unpopular. Ironically when Madison strengthened the state in the War of 1812 the victims were the New Englanders who would have been Hamilton supporters.

As to the comparison between Hamilton and Jefferson over honesty it sounds a bit like the differences between Michael Collins and De Valera in Ireland except it is probably offensive to Jefferson to like n him to De Valera who seems to have been absent every time things got serious. I listed Hamiltonian Presidents but who could we call Jeffersonians? Eisenhower, Reagan? Wilson however a comparison with an internal non interventionist like George W sounds offensive to Jefferson
 
Mr. Railman,

No, I have not been reading 18th Century political propaganda, I have been reading 20th and 21st Cenurry historians of the Early Republic. We may disagree as to whether Jefferson or Hamilton was the clearest thinker as to America's future or which one was the most effective politician, but I believe that it is undeniable that Jefferson hated face to face controversy and preferred to fight his political battles by using surrogates such as Madison and Monroe or by denying responsibility for things he did and said. Two examples:
1. Jefferson lied directly to Washington when Washington complained that one of Jefferson's clerks at the State Department was writing scandoulous newspaper aricles about Washington while on the government's payroll and at Jefferson's direction. The paper trail is now clear that Freneau was Jefferson's hired man and was writng at Jefferson's direction. Washington suspected as much and never trusted Jefferson fully after this incident.
2. Jefferson's authoriship of the Kentucky Resolves challenging the Alien and Sedition Acts, written while Jefferson was the serving Vice President of the U.S. Jefferson's original draft went up to the border of nullification and succession and Jefferson did not, to my knowledge, admit authorship.
No one can take away Jefferson's contributions to the birth and development of the U.S. If he had just authored the Declaration of Independence and the Virginia Statue of Religious Freedom and founded the University of Virginia (the three achievements he chose to put on his gravestone) he would be a great man. But like all men, even great men, he had his failings, and guile and occassional dishonesty were some of his. Some of Hamilton's failings were that he appears to have never had an unspoken or unwritten thought and a directness of purpose and language that continually got him in trouble.
Finally, in answer to some questions posed earlier, Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution states: "No person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution shall be eligible to the Office of President;" Hamilton was therefore clearly eligible to be President since he had been a citizen of New York and the U.S since before the Revolution.

Your humble servant
AH
 
You mean he ghost-wrote several pamphlets and articles detailing his politics, an extremely common practice at the time? Hamilton himself did it with the Federalist papers.

I think what you're failing to notice here is that Jefferson was a politician. In the end, all politicians lie. My problem isn't really with your characterization of Jefferson, my problem is with your characterization of Hamilton. It really DOES sound like 200 year old political propaganda: The one guy is some too-honest-for-his-own-good saint, the other a slimy liar of a bastard with no thought but for his own gain. Are you gonna call Jefferson a heathen, next?
 
Mr. Railman,

Jefferson a heathen? Certainly not! He was a Deist who thought he could improve the New Testament by rewritting it without all the "God" parts.
My point was not that Jefferson was a slimy politician and Hamilton was a saint. My point was that Jefferson was a very successful politician becuase of his guile and strategic lying while Hamilton was, after the death of his sponsor and protector Washington, a very unsuccesful politician because he could not keep his mouth shut and his pen still.
I claim no originality for these points. I admit that I have been heavily influenced by Ron Chernow's excellent biography of Hamilton and Joseph Ellis' interesting analysis of Jefferson in "American Sphinx."
I believe that Chernow rescues Hamilton from the "monarchical plotter and hater of the people" dustbin which Jefferson had attempted to place him for all eternity while Ellis shows the complexity of Jefferson's thought and his ability to lie to others and to himself while believing himself to be the most straight forward of men.
So, no devils and no saints here. Just brilliant, complex men who hated each other but who together laid the foundation for much of what we call modern America.
As to an earlier question as to "Hamiltonian Presidents", I would argue that Presidents such as Jackson and Polk (who both used the word "Federalist" as a curse), Lincoln, both Roosevelts, Wilson, Truman, Kennedy, Reagan, Bush and Obama were "Hamiltonian" in the sense that they believed in an activist President at the head of an "energetic" executive. By this standard, even Jefferson with his purchase of Louisiana and his Embargo was a "Hamiltonian" altough he would have denied it and would not have appreciated the irony.
 
I get it now: Jefferson knew what to say and when to say it but Hamilton just couldn't keep his mouth shut, right?

And I mentioned the heathen thing because that's what Abigail Adams and others called him during his political career.
 
Mr. Railman,

I would think that our views are beginning to converge, except for the suspicion that you are having a bit of fun with me. Ah well, summer vacation calls so our little discussion must be put on hold. I leave with you the thought (I believe it may have been George Will's) that we live in Hamilton's America but pretend we live in Jefferson's.

Your obedient (if somewhat humorless) servant
AH
 
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