Alexander Hamilton (January 11, 1755 or 1757 - July 12, 1804) was an Army officer, lawyer, Founding Father, American politician, leading statesman, financier and political theorist. One of America's first constitutional lawyers, he was a leader in calling the Philadelphia Convention in 1787; he was one of the two chief authors of the anonymous Federalist Papers, the most cited contemporary interpretation of intent for the United States Constitution.

During the Revolutionary War, Hamilton served as an artillery captain, was an aide-de-camp to General George Washington, and led three battalions at the Battle of Yorktown. Under President Washington, Hamilton became the first Secretary of the Treasury. As Secretary of the Treasury and confidant of Washington, Hamilton had wide-reaching influence over the direction of policy during the formative years of the government. Hamilton believed in the importance of a strong central government, and convinced Congress to use an elastic interpretation of the Constitution to pass far-reaching laws. They included: the funding of the national debt; federal assumption of the state debts; creation of a national bank; and a system of taxes through a tariff on imports and a tax on whiskey that would help pay for it. He admired the success of the British system -particularly its strong financial and trade networks- and opposed what he saw as the excesses of the French Revolution.

He was one of the creators of the Federalist party, the first American political party, which he built up using Treasury department patronage, networks of elite leaders, and aggressive newspaper editors he subsidized both through Treasury patronage and by loans from his own pocket. His great political adversary was Thomas Jefferson who, with James Madison, created the opposition party (of several names, now known as the Democratic-Republican Party). They opposed Hamilton's urban, financial, industrial goals for the United States, and his promotion of extensive trade and friendly relations with Brit

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