The sinews of liberty and virtue: Aristotle and Hamilton on political economy and statesmanship (Alexander Hamilton)

In the debate about the nature of the American regime, many scholars have asserted that America's devotion to commerce represents a key feature distinguishing it from ancient political thought and practice. It is also claimed that by creating a commercial republic, the founders lowered the moral horizon of American politics to little more than securing peace and prosperity. As a result, America is a “low but solid” regime.; My dissertation challenges this view of the American regime in two ways. First, I closely examine Aristotle's views of economics and commerce as presented in his Politics. In particular, the prevailing view of Aristotle as hostile to commerce neglects important concessions he makes to acquisition in the conduct of most actual regimes for the sake of supplying citizens with the “equipment of virtue.” Indeed, Aristotle praises commercial Carthage more highly than non-commercial Sparta. Taking his argument as whole, I contend that Aristotle may be said to give commerce “two cheers” of praise.; Second, I explore the political economy of Alexander Hamilton. By all accounts, Hamilton was a proponent of an advanced industrial republic modeled on Great Britain. Hamilton's various reports on supporting public credit, establishing a national bank, and promoting manufactures all point to the development of the kind of industrial capitalist economy which the United States has become. Many commentators take Hamilton's economic system as proof of his decisive break with classical republican thought and practice, and firm embrace of modernity. My argument, however, is that the spirit of classical prudence was just as influential in Hamilton's economic statesmanship as was modern philosophy. And far from trying to narrow America's moral horizon to securing peace and prosperity, Hamilton employed commerce to pursue the wider goals of cementing union, instilling virtue, promoting equal opportunity, striving for national greatness, and ending slavery.; In short, the American founding was neither as modern nor as low as we have been led to believe.