The mother, who opened a small store to make
ends meet, and a Presbyterian clergyman provided Hamilton with
a basic education, and he learned to speak fluent French. About
the time of his mother's death in 1768, he became an apprentice
clerk at Christiansted in a mercantile establishment, whose proprietor
became one of his benefactors. Recognizing his ambition and superior
intelligence, they raised a fund for his education.
In 1772, bearing letters of introduction, Hamilton traveled to
New York City. Patrons he met there arranged for him to attend
Barber's Academy at Elizabethtown (present Elizabeth), NJ. During
this time, he met and stayed for a while at the home of William
Livingston, who would one day be a fellow signer of the Constitution.
Late the next year, 1773, Hamilton entered King's College (later
Columbia College and University) in New York City, but the Revolution
interrupted his studies.
Although not yet 20 years of age, in 1774-75
Hamilton wrote several widely read pro-Whig pamphlets. Right after
the war broke out, he accepted an artillery captaincy and fought
in the principal campaigns of 1776-77. In the latter year, winning
the rank of lieutenant colonel, he joined the staff of General
Washington as secretary and aide-de-camp and soon became his close
confidant as well.
In 1780 Hamilton wed New Yorker Elizabeth Schuyler,
whose family was rich and politically powerful; they were to have
eight children. In 1781, after some disagreements with Washington,
he took a command position under Lafayette in the Yorktown, VA,
campaign (1781). He resigned his commission that November.
Hamilton then read law at Albany and quickly
entered practice, but public service soon attracted him. He was
elected to the Continental Congress in 1782-83. In the latter
year, he established a law office in New York City. Because of
his interest in strengthening the central government, he represented
his state at the Annapolis
Convention in 1786, where he urged the calling of
the Constitutional Convention.
In 1787 Hamilton served in the legislature, which
appointed him as a delegate to the convention. He played a surprisingly
small part in the debates, apparently because he was frequently
absent on legal business, his extreme nationalism put him at odds
with most of the delegates, and he was frustrated by the conservative
views of his two fellow delegates from New York. He did, however,
sit on the Committee of Style, and he was the only one of the
three delegates from his state who signed the finished document.
Hamilton's part in New York's ratification the next year was substantial,
though he felt the Constitution was deficient in many respects.
Against determined opposition, he waged a strenuous and successful
campaign, including collaboration with John Jay and James Madison
in writing The Federalist (see Federalist
Papers). In 1787 Hamilton was again elected to the
Continental Congress.
When the new government got under way in 1789,
Hamilton won the position of Secretary of the Treasury (see excerpt
from A Biography of Alexander Hamilton by Lisa Marie
DeCarolis). He began at once to place the nation's disorganized
finances on a sound footing. In a series of reports (1790-91),
he presented a program not only to stabilize national finances
but also to shape the future of the country as a powerful, industrial
nation. He proposed establishment of a national bank, funding
of the national debt, assumption of state war debts, and the encouragement
of manufacturing.
Hamilton's policies soon brought him into conflict
with Jefferson and Madison. Their disputes with him over his pro-business
economic program, sympathies for Great Britain, disdain for the
common man, and opposition to the principles and excesses of the
French revolution contributed to the formation of the first U.S.
party system. It pitted Hamilton and the Federalists against Jefferson
and Madison and the Democratic-Republicans.
During most of the Washington administration,
Hamilton's views usually prevailed with the President, especially
after 1793 when Jefferson left the government. In 1795 family
and financial needs forced Hamilton to resign from the Treasury
Department and resume his law practice in New York City. Except
for a stint as inspector-general of the Army (1798-1800) during
the undeclared war with France, he never again held public office.
While gaining stature in the law, Hamilton continued
to exert a powerful impact on New York and national politics.
Always an opponent of fellow-Federalist John Adams, he sought
to prevent his election to the presidency in 1796. When that failed,
he continued to use his influence secretly within Adams' cabinet.
The bitterness between the two men became public knowledge in
1800 when Hamilton denounced Adams in a letter that was published
through the efforts of the Democratic-Republicans.
In 1802 Hamilton and his family moved into The
Grange, a country home he had built in a rural part of Manhattan
not far north of New York City. But the expenses involved and
investments in northern land speculations seriously strained his
finances.
Meanwhile, when Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied
in Presidential electoral votes in 1800, Hamilton threw valuable
support to Jefferson. In 1804, when Burr sought the governorship
of New York, Hamilton again managed to defeat him. That same year,
Burr, taking offense at remarks he believed to have originated
with Hamilton, challenged him to a duel, which took place at present
Weehawken, NJ, on July 11. Mortally wounded, Hamilton died the
next day. He was in his late forties at death. He was buried in
Trinity Churchyard in New York City.
See also:
Excerpt
from A Biography of Alexander Hamilton by Lisa Marie DeCarolis
This biography was downloaded from the National
Archives.
