Primary Source Documents

Hamilton and Jefferson on the Emergence of Parties

In 1792, Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson both reflected on the emergence of political parties during Washington's first term. Writing to a close friend, Hamilton defended his policies and expressed his resentment of Jefferson's and Madison's opposition. Jefferson's defense of his position, criticizing Hamilton's program, was prompted by a letter from Washington deploring the conflict between his two advisers and urging greater moderation on both sides. The excerpt from Hamilton is first.

It was not till the last session [of Congress] that I became unequivocally convinced of the following truth -- "That Mr. Madison, cooperating with Mr. Jefferson, is at the head of a faction decidedly hostile to me and my administration, and actuated by views, in my judgment subversive of the principles of good government and dangerous to the union, peace, and happiness of the Country."...

Mr. Jefferson...manifests his dislike of the funding system generally, calling in question the expediency of funding a debt at all.…In the question concerning the Bank [of the United States] he not only delivered an opinion in writing against its constitutionality and expediency, but he did it in a style and manner which I felt as partaking of asperity and ill humor towards me.…

In respect to foreign politics, the views of these gentlemen [Jefferson and Madison] are in my judgment equally unsound and dangerous. They have a womanish attachment to France and a womanish resentment against Great Britain. They would draw us into the closest embrace of the former and involve us in all the consequences of her politics, and they would risk the peace of the country in their endeavors to keep us at the greatest possible distance from the latter.…The Neutral and Pacific Policy appear to me to mark the true path to the United States.…

I am told serious apprehensions are disseminated in your state as to the existence of a Monarchical party meditating the destruction of State and Republican Government.…I assure you,…there is not in my judgment a shadow of foundation of it.…As to my own political Creed,…I am affectionately attached to the Republican theory. I desire above all things to see the equality of political rights exclusive of all hereditary distinction firmly established by a practical demonstration of its being consistent with the order and happiness of society.…I acknowledge the most serious apprehensions that the Government of the United States will not be able to maintain itself against their [the states'] influence.…Hence, a disposition on my part towards a liberal construction of the powers of the National Government.…As to any combination to prostrate the State Governments I disavow and deny it.…

On the whole, the only enemy which Republicanism has to fear in this Country is the spirit of faction and anarchy. If this will not permit the ends of Government to be attained under it -- if it engenders disorders in the community, all regular and orderly minds will wish for a change, and the demagogues who have produced the disorder will make it for their own aggrandizement. This is the old Story.

--From Alexander Hamilton to Edward Carrington, May 26, 1792

That I have utterly, in my private conversations, disapproved of the system of the Secretary of the treasury, I acknowledge and avow; and this was not merely a speculative difference. His system flowed from principles adverse to liberty, and was calculated to undermine and demolish the republic, by creating an influence of his department over the members of the legislature. I saw this influence actually produced, and its first fruits to be the establishment of the great outlines of his project by the votes of the very persons who, having swallowed his bait…had nothing in view but to enrich themselves.…

If what was actually doing begat uneasiness in those who wished for virtuous government, what was further proposed was not less threatening to the friends of the Constitution. For, in a Report on the subject of manufactures…it was expressly assumed that the general government has a right to exercise all powers which may be for the general welfare.…The object of these plans taken together is to draw all the powers of government into the hands of the general legislature, to establish means for corrupting a sufficient corps in that legislature to…preponderate…and to have that corps under the command of the Secretary of the Treasury for the purpose of subverting step by step the principles of the constitution, which he has so often declared to be a thing of nothing which must be changed.

No man is more ardently intent to see the public debt soon and sacredly paid off than I am. This exactly marks the difference between Colonel Hamilton's views and mine, that I would wish the debt paid tomorrow; he wishes it never to be paid, but always to be a thing where with to corrupt and manage the legislature.…

Such views might have justified some thing more than mere expressions of dissent, beyond which, nevertheless, I never went. Has abstinence from the department committed to me been equally observed by him?…In the case of the two nations with which we have the most intimate connections, France and England, my system was to give some satisfactory distinctions to the former, of little cost to us, in return for the solid advantages yielded us by them; and to have met the English with some restrictions which might induce them to abate their severities against our commerce.…Yet the Secretary of the treasury, by his cabals with members of the legislature, and by high-toned declamation on other occasions, has forced down his own system, which was exactly the reverse.…

…My objection to the constitution was that it wanted a bill of rights…Colonel Hamilton's was that it wanted a king and house of lords. The sense of America has approved my objection and added the bill of rights, not the king and lords.…He wishes the general government should have power to make laws binding the states in all cases whatsoever. Our country has thought otherwise: has he acquiesced?…

--From Thomas Jefferson to George Washington, September 9, 1791

1		What reasons does Hamilton give for his differences with Jefferson? Does Jefferson list the same reasons in explaining their conflict?
2		What values and principles do Hamilton and Jefferson share in common? On what principles do they differ?
3		How does each man appeal to history and past developments in defending his position?