ABSTRACT
“The voice of the people has been said to be the voice of God,” Alexander Hamilton told the Constitutional Convention on June 18, 1787. The irony of Alexander Hamilton is that a person with such attitudes contributed so substantially to the launching of the American republic. Hamilton also has the questionable distinction of being the only signer of the Constitution to die in a duel. Hamilton attended the Annapolis Convention of 1786, and wrote its final report, which called for the Constitutional Convention. In 1800, when Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr received the same number of electoral votes, Hamilton helped throw the presidency to Jefferson. By 1840, when publication of James Madison’s notes from the convention proved that Hamilton had been lying, all parties to the dispute were safely in their graves. After ratification, Hamilton became Washington’s secretary of treasury. His fiscal program fulfilled the constitutional promise of paying off the war bonds.
