The #HamAlong Never Liked the Quiet Before

At least, dear friends, the worst has happened. The #HamAlong has reached the second-saddest bit of the musical:¹ Philip Hamilton dies in a duel which he fought to defend his father and in which his father urged him to delope.

Anyway, not quite yet. We’ll get to that. The first thing that happens is that Hamilton supports the Alien and Sedition Acts, which Chernow tries to pretend is semi-okay even though it is blatantly not. And like — honestly? This section makes me feel rather patriotic. Like, the ways that America turned out well were very far from inevitable, if the country had gone a different direction early on. We could have ended up with shitty libel laws like Britain, or become prone to deporting foreign journalists for criticizing us.

Hamilton does some lawyering in this section, including the defense trial of one Levi Weeks (you may remember him from “Nonstop”), which causes Chernow to say this about the murder victim, and God knows I quote:

…and that Sands, no innocent damsel, had a little weakness for laudanum.

Hamilton gets sick of lawyering eventually and inserts himself back into public life by publishing his response (to John Adams basically just being President). While it is lengthier than a simple “Sit down John, you fat motherf***er!” — because Hamilton — it cannot be denied that that is the gist of it. Even Ron Chernow, seriously, even Ron Chernow, has kind of turned against Hamilton in this section.

Hahahah, nah, I’m just messing with you. Like, Ron Chernow turning against Hamilton looks like this:

For a man of Hamilton’s incomparable intellect, the pamphlet [against John Adams] was a crazily botched job, an extended tantrum in print.

It’s interesting, though, because of course Hamilton has not changed who he essentially is since he first washed up on the shores of New York, desperate for power and respect. It’s just that before, he was getting the power and respect. So this whole thing does come off like a tantrum: Up to his resignation from Washington’s cabinet, Hamilton’s brilliance and energy were enough to carry the day. Now that they aren’t, it’s clear he doesn’t know what to do with himself.

If someone had gotten Hamilton a hobby, I bet this whole thing would never have happened. The hobby would have had to give him lots of political power though. Maybe the hobby could have been a governorship. I bet if Hamilton had had a hobby of being the governor of New York, this whole pamphlet thing would never have happened.

Philip also dies. It is way less Hamilton’s fault than the musical makes it seem. It’s still really sad, though, and I choose to gloss over it.

I will leave you on an up note: When Jefferson becomes President, he asks the new Secretary of the Treasury to go through all Hamilton’s Treasury files and find out all the bad things Hamilton did and what all he stole from the government and all the reasons why his stupid banking system was a fraud and an overreach. So the Secretary, Gallatin, went all up in Hamilton’s files and practices, and this was his verdict:

I have found the most perfect system ever formed. Any change that should be made in it would injure it. Hamilton made no blunders, committed no frauds. He did nothing wrong.

SO THERE, JEFFERSON.

Only one more week, y’all! We are so close to having read the whole of this monster book! Thanks, as always, to the fabulous Alice for hosting!