Alexander the Great(Hamilton)

Wall Street Journal ^ | July 4, 2005 | RICHARD BROOKHISER

[kellynla]

When I was a boy my family had a Time-Life book on the mind which featured a chart of the presumed IQs of famous dead men. Goethe, as I recall, led the pack, at 210. But the Founding Fathers did very well: Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and George Washington all scored over 150. As the Fourth of July approaches, we'd do well to remember that the Founders were a smart lot, with few gentleman's C's among them. Yet they didn't know everything. They were strongest in law, political philosophy and history--all essential subjects for revolutionaries and statesmen. But another subject, equally vital to the success and happiness of countries, lay beyond the ken of most of them: economics.

In part, this lack was a function of their backgrounds. Most of the Founders were lawyers or planters. A few were merchants. Not one was a manufacturer; there was almost no manufacturing in the infant United States. In part, their ignorance had to do with the newness of the discipline. Modern economics was just beginning, in France and Scotland. Adam Smith's "The Wealth of Nations" came out in 1776. The Founders knew of Smith and his peers--David Hume, James Steuart, Jacques Necker--but not intimately. Smith was probably better known as a psychologist; John Adams plagiarized his "Theory of Moral Sentiments."

[SunkenCiv]

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[Pharmboy]

Thanks, SC. I don’t know how I missed this one 5 years ago, but I did. I think I’ll blame you for not pinging me back then...( ;-D

[SunkenCiv]

Historians find Hamilton something of a cipher. He didn't have the opportunity, as Adams and Jefferson did in their long retirements, to "spin, if not outright alter, the public record," noted Stephen Knott, author of "Alexander Hamilton and the Persistence of Myth."

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Alexander Hamilton and the Persistence of Myth by Stephen F. Knott hardcover

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[SunkenCiv]

Alexander Hamilton, Modern America’s Founding Father
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2197005/posts

Alexander Hamilton’s Last Stand (also posted by neverdem)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1169205/posts

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1071513/posts
Historians find Hamilton something of a cipher. He didn’t have the opportunity, as Adams and Jefferson did in their long retirements, to “spin, if not outright alter, the public record,” noted Stephen Knott, author of “Alexander Hamilton and the Persistence of Myth.”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1177315/posts
Theory of a founding father’s (Alexander Hamilton)African ancestry

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1150522/posts
Forgetting the Founding Fathers [Michael Barone]

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1125730/posts
Alexander Hamilton: City Boy

http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/1350223/posts?page=136#136
http://freerepublic.com/focus/news/1350223/posts?page=158#158