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1431470

Alexander Hamilton

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Hamilton free frank clipped from a letter

Alexander Hamilton, 1755-1804.  Signer of the United States Constitution; 1st United States Secretary of the Treasury, 1789–1795.  Franking signature, Free / A Hamilton, clipped from a letter.  Tipped to an article about Hamilton.

Hamilton, from New York, was one of the most influential of the Founding Fathers.  For four years during the Revolutionary War, he played an important role as General George Washingtonʼs chief aide.  After the war, Hamilton served in the Congress of the Confederation but became dissatisfied with the Articles of Confederation, under which the newly independent country floundered for lack of a strong central government with both executive and judicial powers.  Under his leadership, delegates from five states who assembled at the 1786 Annapolis Convention persuaded Congress to call the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, which drafted the United States Constitution.  Hamilton and Virginiaʼs James Madison led the movement to create a new government rather than fix the existing one. 

Hamilton actively participated in the Philadelphia debates, signed the new Constitution, and then helped to secure its ratification by writing 51 of the 85 installments of The Federalist Papers.  (The others were written by Madison and John Jay.)  Hamiltonʼs writings were instrumental in obtaining ratification of the Constitution by New York, which was crucial to national ratification.  Today The Federalist Papers remain the most important and influential source for determining the intent of the framers and thus for historical interpretation of the Constitution.

President Washington appointed Hamilton as the new nation's first Secretary of the Treasury.  At Hamilton's urging, Congress passed the Coinage Act of 1792 and created the United States Mint, which produced both gold and silver coinage by 1795. 

Hamilton directly contributed to the rise of the two-party political system in the United States.  Congressional opposition to his financial programs, led by Madison and ultimately also Thomas Jefferson, led to the formation of the Democratic-Republican Party, then known as the Republicans.  Hamilton and his allies called themselves Federalists. 

Hamilton resigned as Secretary of the Treasury in 1795.  He resumed his former law practice but exercised considerable influence in the presidential elections of 1796 and 1800.  His political machinations brokered a deal that resolved a stalemate between Jefferson and his running mate, Aaron Burr, and gave the election to Jefferson, whom Hamilton viewed as the lesser of two evils.  

Hamilton supported Burr's opponent in the 1804 New York gubernatorial election.  Afterward, when reports of Hamiltonʼs negative comments about Burr surfaced, but Hamilton refused to apologize, Burr defended his honor by challenging Hamilton to a duel.  On July 11, 1804, on a ledge above the west bank of the Hudson River, Burr shot Hamilton in the abdomen, while Hamilton's shot broke a tree branch above Burr's head.  In a letter the night before, Hamilton suggested that he would intentionally miss with his first shot.  But Burrʼs shot was fatal, and Hamilton died the next day.

Some historians view Hamilton as the forerunner of the modern liberal capitalist economy, while others view him as a dangerous centrist who sought to consolidate governmental power, to the point of sometimes advocating a monarchy.  In retrospect, however, it is indisputable that the policies that Hamilton established in the early days of the federal government remain influential today. 

This signature is tipped to a page of an article about Hamiltonʼs role in the adoption of the Consitution.  There is a toned, vertical fold through the "A" in Hamilton's signature.  The piece is in fine condition.

Unframed. 

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