Alexander Hamilton Article Summary

Rarely does a single person stand out as much when solving a problem as Alexander Hamilton did after being appointed Secretary of Treasury on the late 1700s. Our country had a great deal of problems with national debt after the Revolutionary War, Hamilton created one of the best financial foundations ideas for our economy, that could bring us to a great economic power at the nation’s early stages of development. His economic ideas were centered around the philosophy of “Hamiltonianism”, which he stated, “Give all power to many and they will oppress the few. Give all power to the few and they will oppress the many. Both therefore ought to have power, that each may defend itself against the other.” He understood that when one group has too much power they can become dangerous, so he wanted to spread it out. His initial plans to get the country to such high standards were to redeem the old national debt, and then he would have a plan to nationalize the states’ debt with issued bonds. These bonds gave America a higher credit rating than any other country in Europe. His last idea was to have a central bank in America, which would act as a reservoir for government funds, and the bank could also transfer these funds across the world to other countries. Getting the bank in existence was a hard bill to pass, but when it finally did, it helped greatly in developing early American economy.

John Steele Gordon selected this story to describe this time period because it was one of the first things that America had done to make it such a leading world country that it

is today. This is the story of our country becoming one of the worlds leading powers, and Alexander Hamilton is the leading factor for this movement. At the time, America was in extreme debt after the American Revolution. Hamilton did everything he could to get the country back on its feet, with motions that included a bank system, refunding the national debt, and tariffs had to be collected, also the government had to