Jefferson and Hamilton: The Rivalry that Forged a Nation

"Ferling has written many books about the American Revolution; he has an encyclopedic knowledge of this period. His Jefferson and Hamilton is a portrait in partisanship, a blow-by-blow account of the ideological contest between men with divergent visions. Jefferson feared centralization and a strong national government. Jefferson is, comparatively speaking, a states’-rights advocate. Hamilton believes in the strong central government. Jefferson is a Francophile and Hamilton is an Anglophile. Get the weekly Five Books newsletter Both Jefferson and Hamilton were underhanded in advancing their agendas. Hamilton revealed privileged information to a British representative, subverting Jefferson’s efforts, as secretary of state, to keep a distance from Britain. Jefferson wrote a long letter to Washington, in September 1792, trying to convince him that Hamilton was a monarchist intent on destroying the Republic. Jefferson and Hamilton went head-to-head in Washington’s cabinet. When Washington sided with Hamilton, Jefferson retired to his plantation. Hamilton ultimately got the better of Jefferson—until 1800. A decade after he left the presidency, in a letter, he referred to his election as ‘The Revolution of 1800’. What Jefferson meant was that his election removed the dominant Federalist Party (the Hamiltonians) from power. Jefferson’s party, which eventually morphed into the Democratic Party, was able to win both houses of Congress and the Presidency. So, Jefferson came into office with his political opposition on the decline. He was able to move away from Hamilton’s economic infrastructure. The elitism of the Federalists was supplanted by what we just described as ‘Jeffersonian democracy’, which elevated educated men of sometimes humble roots and placed greater faith in the idea that ordinary citizens could understand what was in their collective best interest."