Alexander supplemented his education with a family library of 34 books. received individual tutoring and classes in a private school led by a Jewish headmistress. While their mother was living, Alexander and James Jr. Hamilton and Lavien moved together to Nevis, her birthplace, where she had inherited a seaside lot in town from her father. In 1750, Lavien left her husband and first son before travelling to Saint Kitts, where she met James Hamilton. Rachel Lavien was married on Saint Croix. Hamilton, a Scotsman who was the fourth son of Alexander Hamilton, the laird of Grange, Ayrshire. Hamilton and his older brother, James Jr., were born out of wedlock to Rachel Lavien (née Faucette), a married woman of half-British and half- French Huguenot descent, and James A. Hamilton was born and spent the early part of his childhood in Charlestown, the capital of the island of Nevis in the British Leeward Islands. His ideas are credited with laying the foundation for American government and finance. Scholars generally regard Hamilton as an astute and intellectually brilliant administrator, politician, and financier who was sometimes impetuous. in Greenwich Village for medical attention, but succumbed to his wounds the following day. Hamilton was immediately transported to the home of William Bayard Jr. In the July 11, 1804, duel in Weehawken, New Jersey, Burr shot Hamilton in the stomach. Taking offense, Burr challenged Hamilton to a duel. When Burr ran for governor of New York in 1804, Hamilton again campaigned against him, arguing that he was unworthy. Jefferson and Aaron Burr tied for the presidency in the electoral college and, despite philosophical differences, Hamilton endorsed Jefferson over Burr, whom he found unprincipled. Outraged by Adams' response to the crisis, Hamilton opposed his reelection campaign. In the Quasi-War, Hamilton called for mobilization against France, and President John Adams appointed him major general. He was a leader in the abolition of the international slave trade. Hamilton and other Federalists supported the Haitian Revolution, and Hamilton helped draft the constitution of Haiti.Īfter resigning as Secretary of the Treasury, Hamilton resumed his legal and business activities. Hamilton's views became the basis for the Federalist Party, which was opposed by the Democratic-Republican Party led by Thomas Jefferson. He also persuaded Congress to establish the Revenue Cutter Service. resumed friendly trade relations with the British Empire. He opposed American entanglement with the succession of unstable French Revolutionary governments and advocated in support of the Jay Treaty under which the U.S. He successfully argued that the implied powers of the Constitution provided the legal authority to fund the national debt, assume the states' debts, and create the First Bank of the United States, which was funded by a tariff on imports and a whiskey tax. He envisioned a central government led by an energetic president, a strong national defense, and an industrial economy. In 1786, Hamilton led the Annapolis Convention to replace the Articles of Confederation with the Constitution of the United States, which he helped ratify by writing 51 of the 85 installments of The Federalist Papers.Īs a trusted member of President Washington's first cabinet, Hamilton served as the first U.S. He resigned to practice law and founded the Bank of New York. After the Revolutionary War, Hamilton served as a delegate from New York to the Congress of the Confederation in Philadelphia. He then served as an artillery officer in the American Revolutionary War, where he saw military action against the British in the New York and New Jersey campaign, served for years as an aide to General George Washington, and helped secure American victory at the climactic Siege of Yorktown. He pursued his education in New York City where, despite his young age, he was a prolific and widely read pamphleteer advocating for the American revolutionary cause, though an anonymous one. Posthumous portrait by John Trumbull, 1806, derived from the life bust by Giuseppe Ceracchi, 1794ġst United States Secretary of the TreasuryĨth Senior Officer of the United States Armyĭelegate to the Congress of the Confederation from New YorkĬharlestown, Colony of Nevis, British Leeward IslandsĪlexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755, or 1757 – July 12, 1804) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first secretary of the treasury from 1789 to 1795 during George Washington's presidency.īorn out of wedlock in Charlestown, Nevis, Hamilton was orphaned as a child and taken in by a prosperous merchant.
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