Free Founding Brothers by Joseph J. Ellis

the quirk in the electoral
college—subsequently corrected by the Twelfth Amendment—which gave
Burr and Jefferson the same number of votes without specifying which candidate
headed the ticket. Hamilton lobbied his Federalist colleagues in the House to
support Jefferson over Burr for the presidency, a decision that probably had a
decisive effect on the eventual outcome. Finally, in 1804, in the campaign for
governor of New York, which actually produced the remarks Burr cited in his
challenge, Hamilton opposed Burr’s candidacy for an office he was
probably not going to win anyway. 34
    This brief
review of the Burr-Hamilton rivalry provides a helpful sense of context, but to
fully appreciate Burr’s eventual charges, and Hamilton’s private
acknowledgment that they were justified, one needs to know, specifically, what
Hamilton said about Burr. Throughout this same period, Hamilton made a host of
political enemies about whom he had extremely critical things to say (and vice
versa). Indeed, Jefferson, rather than Burr, was Hamilton’s chief
political enemy, followed closely behind by Adams. This made logical as well as
political sense, since Jefferson was the titular leader of the Republican
opposition and Adams was the leader of the moderate wing of the Federalists, a
group that found Hamilton’s policies sometimes excessive and his
flamboyant style always offensive. But within this Hamiltonian rogues’
gallery, Burr was always the chief rogue, and what Hamilton said about him was
truly distinctive.
    Whereas Hamilton’s central charge against
Jefferson was that he was a utopian visionary with a misguided set of political
principles, his core criticism of Burr was that he was wholly devoid of any
principles at all. Burr was “unprincipaled, both as a public and private
man,” Hamilton claimed, “a man whose only political principle is,
to mount at all events to the highest political honours of the Nation, and as
much further as circumstances will carry him.” Sporadic attacks on
Burr’s character along the same lines—“unprincipaled in
private life, desperate in his fortune,” “despotic in his ordinary
demeanor,” “beyond redemption”—are littered throughout
Hamilton’s correspondence in the 1790s, and they probably reflect a mere
fraction of his unrecorded comments to Federalist colleagues. 35
    The full
and better-recorded salvo came late in 1800 and early in 1801, during the
debate in the House of Representatives over the presidential deadlock between
Burr and Jefferson. Since everyone knew that Jefferson was Hamilton’s
implacable political enemy, the kind of elusive target who seemed to be put on
earth by God to subvert Hamilton’s visionary plans for a powerful federal
government, Hamilton’s strong endorsement of Jefferson as “by far
not so dangerous a man,” who possessed “solid pretensions to
character,” only served to underline his contempt for Burr. “As to
Burr there is nothing in his favour,” Hamilton observed, then went on:
“His private character is not defended by his most partial friends. He is
bankrupt beyond redemption except by the plunder of his country. His public
principles have no other spring or aim than his own aggrandizement.… If
he can he will certainly disturb our institutions to secure himself
permanent power
and with it
wealth.
He is truly the Catiline
of America.” 36
    This
mention of Catiline is worth a momentary pause, in part because the reference
is so unfamiliar to modern ears as to seem meaningless, and also because it was
so familiar to the leaders of the revolutionary generation as to require no
further explanation. By accusing Burr of being Catiline, Hamilton was making
the ultimate accusation, for Catiline was the treacherous and degenerate
character whose scheming nearly destroyed the Roman Republic and whose
licentious ways inspired, by their very profligacy, Cicero’s eloquent
oration on virtue, which was subsequently memorized by generations