Alexander Hamilton was an American statesman and one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He was an influential interpreter and promoter of the U.S. Constitution, as well as the founder of the nation's financial system, the Federalist Party, the United States Coast Guard, and The New York Post newspaper. Hamilton was the first United States Secretary of the Treasury, serving during the administration of President George Washington.
What is the most famous quote by Alexander Hamilton ?
I think the first duty of society is justice.
— Alexander Hamilton
What can you learn from Alexander Hamilton (Life Lessons)
- Alexander Hamilton taught the importance of hard work and dedication; he rose from poverty to become a Founding Father of the United States and an influential political figure.
- He also demonstrated the power of education; he was self-taught and educated himself on the law, economics, and politics.
- Finally, Hamilton showed the importance of standing up for what you believe in; he was a passionate advocate for a strong central government and was unafraid to voice his opinions.
The most controversy Alexander Hamilton quotes to discover and learn by heart
Following is a list of the best Alexander Hamilton quotes, including various Alexander Hamilton inspirational quotes, and other famous sayings by Alexander Hamilton.
Men often oppose a thing merely because they have had no agency in planning it, or because it may have been planned by those whom they dislike.
There is a certain enthusiasm in liberty, that makes human nature rise above itself, in acts of bravery and heroism.
If you don't stand for something, you will fall for anything.
He who stands for nothing will fall for anything.
The people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government and to reform, alter, or totally change the same when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it.
It's not tyranny we desire; it's a just, limited, federal government.
There are seasons in every country when noise and impudence pass current for worth; and in popular commotions especially, the clamors of interested and factious men are often mistaken for patriotism.
People sometimes attribute my success to my genius;
all the genius I know anything about is hard work.
Foreign influence is truly the Grecian horse to a republic.
We cannot be too careful to exclude its influence.
Influential quotes by Alexander Hamilton
To my utter astonishment I saw an airship descending over my cow lot.
It was occupied by six of the strangest beings I ever saw. They were jabbering together, but we could not understand a word they said.
When a government betrays the people by amassing too much power and becoming tyrannical, the people have no choice but to exercise their original right of self-defense — to fight the government.
A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.
Ambition without principle never was long under the guidance of good sense.
The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.
Our countrymen have all the folly of the ass and all the passiveness of the sheep.
I have carefully examined the evidences of the Christian religion, and if I was sitting as a juror upon its authenticity I would unhesitatingly give my verdict in its favor. I can prove its truth as clearly as any proposition ever submitted to the mind of man.
[H]owever weak our country may be, I hope we shall never sacrifice our liberties.
Quotations by Alexander Hamilton that are revolutionary and visionary
It is the Press which has corrupted our political morals - and it is to the Press we must look for the means of our political regeneration.
I would die to preserve the law upon a solid foundation;
but take away liberty, and the foundation is destroyed.
The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased.
Remember civil and religious liberty always go together: if the foundation of the one be sapped, the other will fall of course.
It has been observed that a pure democracy if it were practicable would be the most perfect government. Experience has proved that no position is more false than this. The ancient democracies in which the people themselves deliberated never possessed one good feature of government. Their very character was tyranny; their figure deformity.
The honor of a nation is its life. Deliberately to abandon it is to commit an act of political suicide.
The people are turbulent and changing; they seldom judge right or make good decision.
If it were to be asked, What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? The answer would be, An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws - the first growing out of the last . . . . A sacred respect for the constitutional law is the vital principle, the sustaining energy of a free government.
We are now forming a republican government.
Real liberty is never found in despotism or the extremes of democracy, but in moderate governments.
The natural cure for an ill-administration, in a popular or representative constitution, is a change of men.
When the sword is once drawn, the passions of men observe no bounds of moderation.
Hard words are very rarely useful. Real firmness is good for every thing. Strut is good for nothing.
. . . [The Judicial Branch] may truly be said to have neither FORCE nor WILL, but merely judgment; and must ultimately depend upon the aid of the executive arm even for the efficacy of its judgments.
Nothing could be more ill-judged than that intolerant spirit which has, at all times, characterized political parties.
Constitutions should consist only of general provisions;
the reason is that they must necessarily be permanent, and that they cannot calculate for the possible change of things.
The love for our native land strengthens our individual and national character.
A fondness for power is implanted in most men, and it is natural to abuse it when acquired.
A national debt if it is not excessive will be to us a national blessing;
it will be powerfull cement of our union. It will also create a necessity for keeping up taxation to a degree which without being oppressive, will be a spur to industry.
If the federal government should overpass the just bounds of its authority and make a tyrannical use of its powers, the people, whose creature it is, must appeal to the standard they have formed, and take such measures to redress the injury done to the Constitution as the exigency may suggest and prudence justify.
Of those men who have overturned the liberties of republics, the greatest number have begun their career by paying an obsequious court to the people, commencing demagogues and ending tyrants.
We must make the best of those ills which cannot be avoided.
[If you understood the natural rights of mankind,] [y]ou would be convinced that natural liberty is a gift of the beneficent Creator to the whole human race, and that civil liberty is founded in that, and cannot be wrested from any people without the most manifest violation of justice.
Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of man will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint.
Civil liberty is only natural liberty, modified and secured by the sanctions of civil society. It is not a thing, in its own nature, precarious and dependent on human will and caprice; but it is conformable to the constitution of man, as well as necessary to the well-being of society.
As to Taxes, they are evidently inseparable from Government. It is impossible without them to pay the debts of the nation, to protect it from foreign danger, or to secure individuals from lawless violence and rapine.
In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.
What is the most sacred duty and the greatest source of our security in a Republic? An inviolable respect for the Constitution and Laws.
And it is long since I have learned to hold popular opinion of no value.
Whoever attentively considers the different departments of power must perceive, that, in a government in which they are separated from each other, the judiciary, from the nature of its functions, will always be the least dangerous to the political rights of the Constitution; because it will be least in a capacity to annoy or injure them.
Experience teaches, that men are often so much governed by what they are accustomed to see and practice, that the simplest and most obvious improvements . . . are adopted with hesitation, reluctance, and slow gradations.
Americans rouse - be unanimous, be virtuous, be firm, exert your courage, trust in Heaven, and nobly defy the enemies both of God and man!
Now, mark my words. So long as we are a young and virtuous people, this instument will bind us together in mutual interests, mutual welfare, and mutual happiness. But when we become old and corrupt, it will bind no longer.
Happy will it be for ourselves, and most honorable for human nature, if we have wisdom and virtue enough to set so glorious an example to mankind!