Alexander Hamilton
QUOTES! • "There is a certain enthusiasm in liberty, that makes human nature rise above itself, in acts of bravery and heroism" • "Unless your government is respectable, foreigners will invade your rights; and to maintain tranquillity, it must be respectable - even to observe neutrality, you must have a strong government."
CONCLUSION: • Yes, I may have begun as a "bastard, orphan" but I did not "throw away my shot" and I am very influential because it is very likely that the Constitution would not have been ratified without my aid, that the country would have fallen into deeper Revolutionary War debt, and that the government would be severally lacking in power. Also, Lin-Manuel Miranda thought I was important enough to write an entire musical about so beat that.
REVOLUTIONARY WAR! • Another major contribution of mine was to the Revolutionary War effort when I became a part of the New York Provincial Artillery Company and fought in various battles. I was promoted to lieutenant colonel and I caught the attention of General George Washington, who made me his assistant and trusted adviser. For the next five years, I wrote Washington's critical letters, and composed numerous reports on the strategic reform and restructuring of the Continental Army. I later convinced Washington to let me go back to the battle one last time and I helped to bring about the British surrender in the Battle of Yorktown as an army commander.
LAWYER YEARS • I left my position under Washington to become a lawyer, establishing a practice in New York. • In 1784, I took on the Rutgers v. Waddington case, which involved the rights of Loyalists. It was important to the American justice system, as it led to the creation of the judicial review system. In defending the Loyalists, Hamilton instituted new principles of due process.-Argument for why he helped loyalists. In defending the Loyalists, I instituted new principles of due process. I also helped to get the Trespass Act repealed.
CONSITUTIONAL CONVENTION • In 1787, while serving as a New York delegate, I met in Philadelphia with other delegates to discuss how to fix the weak Articles of Confederation. I heavily influenced the ratification of the Constitution, which laid out the structure for the American government as we still know it today, by writing the Federalist Papers with James Madison and John Jay. In these essays, I explained and defended the newly drafted Constitution prior to its approval and they convinced New York to ratify it along with 8 other states.
SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY: • When George Washington was elected president of the United States in 1789, he appointed me as the first secretary of the treasury. The nation was facing great debts due to the Revolution which I proposed a solution to that included fiscal policies which would initiate the payment of federal war bonds, had the federal government assume states' debts, would institute a federal system for tax collection and would help the United States establish credit with other nations. I also proposed and established the First National Bank of the United States in order to help with these debts and to establish a standard currency of the nation. I reached a compromise with fellow delegates who feared a return to tyranny because of Federalist ideologies, to place the nation's capital in Washington D.C. in return for Madison's agreement that he would no longer block Congress from approving policies that promoted a more powerful central government over individual states' rights.
INTRODUCTION! • Hi, my name is Alexander Hamilton. I had the greatest positive influence on the U.S. because I was a delegate to the constitutional convention, the main author of the Federalist papers, the first Secretary of the Treasury for the United States under president George Washington, and through my participation in the American Revolution, I helped to turn America into the independent and strong nation that it is today.
START DEBATE! CONSTITUTION-SUPER IMPORTANT! • My most impactful action was when I realized that the Articles of Confederation separated rather than unified the colonies, so I convinced George Washington that establishing a strong central government was the key to America's unified independence. This led to the creation of the Federalist Party which I led whose ideologies of a strong central government are still preserved today.
RESPONSE TO AFFAIR WITH MARIA REYNOLD'S AND MARRIAGE • On December 14, 1780,I married Elizabeth Schuyler, the daughter of Revolutionary War general Philip Schuyler. We enjoyed a strong relationship throughout their marriage and had eight children together. I will admit that I had an affair with Maria Reynolds, however I deeply regretted my actions, writing "I can never cease to condemn myself for the pang which it may inflict in a bosom eminently entitled to all my gratitude, fidelity, and love." I deeply loved my wife despite my mistakes as can be seen in my letter to her on July 4, 1804 in which I wrote "Fly to the bosom of your God and be comforted. With my last idea; I shall cherish the sweet hope of meeting you in a better world. Adieu best of wives and best of Women. Embrace all my darling Children for me." Eliza, who lived for 50 years after the death of Alexander, would dedicate her life to preserving his legacy.
• BAD- HE BELIEVED COMMON PEOPLE WERE TOO GOVERNED BY PASSIONS AND SHOULDN'T EVEN BE ALLOWED TO VOTE-The reason that Hamilton believed this was because he wanted to support a stable government that was united not separated by emotional opinions.
EDUCATION! • I attended King's College which is now Columbia University, but left before graduating because I felt such passionate support for the independence movement against the economic oppression by the British.
• Early Life! I started my first job at 11 after my father left our family so that I could provide for my mother, brother, and I. My boss, a businessman named Nicolas Cruger, valued my hard work and dedication so deeply that he and other businessmen pooled their resources together with help of a newspaper editor to send me to America for an education.
• MARTIN WASN'T EVEN HIS REAL NAME- King's birth name was Michael, not Martin. The civil rights leader was born Michael King Jr. on January 15, 1929. In 1934, however, his father, a pastor at Atlanta's Ebenezer Baptist Church, traveled to Germany and became inspired by the Protestant Reformation leader Martin Luther. As a result, King Sr. changed his own name as well as that of his 5-year-old son. Was never legally changed.
• King was jailed 29 times. According to the King Center, the civil rights leader went to jail nearly 30 times. He was arrested for acts of civil disobedience and on trumped-up charges, such as when he was jailed in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1956 for driving 30 miles per hour in a 25-mile-per-hour zone.
