But getting back to TJ and Alex for a moment, the former clearly disliked the northern finance-types, hated NYC when he had to live there (and, for those interested, if you go to Google Maps, plug in "59 Maiden Lane, NYC" and then click and drag on the little yellow guy in the satellite view, then put him in front of that address, it will give you a street view. As you look at the big "59" on the building, pan left and you will see a guy sitting on a bench and a plaque on the building wall in front of him: that plaque commemorates Jefferson's apartment).
At any rate, TJ did not like these city-types and really hated the speculators (interesting how BHO attacks the 'oil speculators' today, don't you think?). How much of the First and/or Second Bank were bad examples of crony capitalism I cannot say (although I'm sure there was some of that), but I also believe that just like Madison (an anti-Federalist cum Democrat-Republican), Hamilton's primary motive was to stabilize the currency and form a foundation for a solid economic footing for the early Republic.
But let's look at who Hamilton was, and from the beginning:
May of 1867 finds that a convention was organized in Philadelphia to take up the issue of a united colonies constitution.
The delegates fell into three factions. There were Democratics, demonstrating constant dread of Federal encroachments, and advocating keeping the power of the Federal government at a minimum level.
The Democratic Republican faction wanted to invest the Federal Government with just enough power to make it effective.
Finally came the Monarchists, later the Federalists, who repudiated a Republican form of government.
Hamilton was strongly in favor of a government patterned after the European monarchies. He was totally against democracy, especially a republican form of government. He was the arch-Federalist who “hated Republican Government, and never failed on every occasion to advocate the excellence of and avow his attachment to a Monarchic form of Government, was so enamored with the British system of government that he called for the annihilation of the several State governments.”
How did this manifest itself in his actions?
Alexander Hamilton dreamed of an alliance between a strong central government and the wealthiest businessmen. In 1791 when he first proposed the national bank, as the proposal was written, it was openly a Federal monopoly over the money supply, with government subsidies to businesses that were aligned with his party. His rationalizations for this relationship were based on more than loose interpretations of the Constitution that he used to justify his proposals.
Hamilton's proposals were resented and received immediate resistance. The Virginia House of Delegates declared that “in an agricultural country like this, to erect a large monied interest in opposition to the landed interests, is a measure which must, in the course of human events, produce one other of two evils: the prostration of agriculture at the feet of Commerce, or a change in the present form of Federal Government fatal to the existence of American liberty.”
He also advocated the appointment of Senators and a President for life as well as the creation of a subservient House of Commons in order ‘check the imprudence of democracy,’
In addition to this, he suggested that the ‘rich and well born’ should have ‘a distinct, permanent share in the government’ because ‘the mass of the people... seldom judge or determine right.’
During a speech delivered in New York, he exclaimed, “The People! Gentlemen, I tell you the people are a great Beast!”
Alexander Hamilton foisted the argument that the government should undertake activities designed to make the nation more prosperous.
Others, such as Thomas Jefferson, saw that his ideas would consolidate power in the hands of the few, and argued for a more limited government that would not use its power to meddle in the lives of the citizens, thus respecting the concept of liberty.