Page 33 of My Dear Hamilton

Chapter Thirty-One

Autumn 1799

Harlem, New York

T HERE WAS SOMETHING mesmerizing about the dueling pistols, with their gleaming dark walnut stocks, and the glint of the brass barrels, and the hair trigger that an expert duelist could use to gain an advantage over his opponent. Perhaps the allure was in the fact that something so beautiful could be so deadly...

“See how the hair trigger is disguised?” my brother-in-law asked as he showed them to my admiring sons, who all strained to get a closer look. “Try for yourself.”

Grinning, seventeen-year-old Philip took the weapon into his hands, clearly fascinated despite having handled his father’s own weapons many times before. “Did you have the hair trigger set in your duel, Uncle Church?”

Church settled back onto a divan beside my sister in the cottage we’d all rented together in the wilds of Harlem so that Peggy, Angelica, and I could share the season. Now our children and husbands crowded the place, making the perfect audience for Church to brag about his exploits. “I wanted Aaron Burr to know that I could kill him without any advantage if I so chose,” he said, coolly straightening his white lace cravat. “And perhaps I should have.”

Alexander cut in with a reproachful glance at his brother-in-law. My husband was, after all, no longer the same man who became embroiled in two affairs of honor in a single day. As a general, he’d been working to eradicate the antiquated practice from the ranks of the army. “I’ve been persuaded that dueling is a horrid custom, one the legislature must see fit to curb.”

I wish, now, he’d said so much more. For the memory of our son Philip holding that pistol even all these decades later retains the power to make me want to retch.

Alexander held out his hand for the pistol and returned the pair to their portmanteau, though that didn’t affect a change of subject because the men in my family were in a belligerent humor about Burr.

When it looked certain that we’d go to war with France, Burr had volunteered to help defend the harbor, despite his earlier support of the French Revolution. Burr had also abandoned his fellow Republicans to support the antislavery measure in New York’s legislature. He’d even proposed a new project to bring clean water to the city so as to prevent yellow fever. Alexander had been thrilled to see Burr’s political changes, and he’d championed them.

But it’d been a scheme. My harried husband, busy arranging for military supplies and organizing the army, had missed a few legal clauses belatedly added to the paperwork for the water utility—clauses that enabled Burr to transform the supposedly charitable corporation he started with my husband’s help into a bank.

A Republican bank.

Burr had used him.

It’d been a masterful and malevolent joke, sly and well executed at the very time my husband was occupied in everything from designing military uniforms from sash to buttonhole, to recommending a military academy at West Point. Otherwise, Hamilton would never have been distracted enough to let Burr slip something past him.

Seldom did anyone outsmart Alexander Hamilton.

But Burr had done just that, in a most public and humiliating way.

Alexander had privately fumed, but Church accused Burr of corruption, which brought about a duel between the men, where my brother-in-law proved himself such an expert marksman that he shot a button off Burr’s coat—a feat that much impressed my sons, but not my sister.

Hearing Church boast now about how he could have killed a man, Angelica set her cup down so hard that I feared it would crack, and strong black tea sloshed over both sides. For she, like the rest of us, had learned of her husband’s duel only after the fact. And the fright of having so nearly been made a widow, in complete ignorance, still set her nerves on edge.

“What if you had killed him, Jack?” Angelica asked.

No one in our family seemed poised to answer that question—least of all my unrepentant brother-in-law. And over our teacups, Peggy and I exchanged a look, both of us knowing from childhood experience not to tangle with Angelica when she was in this mood. But as my newborn daughter mewled like a kitten in her cradle, I was emboldened to remind everyone of our blessings. “Let’s just give thanks to God that no one was hurt. Not to mention that we’re all together to enjoy a respite in this beautiful countryside.”

“A respite that would’ve been even more enjoyable if you’d named your new daughter Margaret,” Peggy piped up, both changing the subject and professing jealousy that we’d named our first daughter after Angelica but none after her.

“I’m afraid I favor the name Elizabeth, ” Alexander replied with a wink. “But perhaps the next one...”

“The next one! And to think I once feared Betsy would be a spinster. You’re like rabbits, you two,” Peggy accused, quite heedless of the agonized cringes this elicited from my sons and the chorus of snickers from their cousins. Especially Angelica’s twenty-one-year-old Flip and Peggy’s eleven-year-old Steven—where they stood, still admiring Church’s pistols in the open portmanteau.

Reaching to pat my husband’s knee, I said, “Since the gentlemen of the family have been so fixated on guns, perhaps you might take the boys into the woods and bring us some ducks for supper.”

Alexander looked as if he wished to protest but called for his new hunting dog, an overeager spaniel that answered to the name Old Peggy. That’s when my Philip joked to his aunt, “You have a Hamiltonian namesake after all.”

Peggy gave an indignant sputter that sounded quite like the curly-haired mongrel—eliciting howls of laughter from all of us. “My nephew is a rogue,” Peggy said, affectionately ruffling Philip’s dark hair. “Be gone with you to fetch our supper.”

Then Alexander marched off into the forests of Harlem with a fowling piece in hand, my brothers-in-law and our boys all trooping behind.

“Do you see how Church swaggers about like a daring boy of eighteen?” Angelica hissed when they’d gone.

To soothe her, I said, “You were once charmed by Church’s daring.”

“That was before I loved him,” Angelica replied, taking me quite by surprise. “When we eloped, that was just the seedling of love. It’s taken years of careful tending, pruning, and cultivation to come to full flower. Though, if Church had gotten himself killed in a childish duel, I should doubt the whole enterprise of love altogether!”

Peggy dramatically rolled her eyes. “Oh, how would it have looked if he’d refused Burr’s challenge? It’s the way men defend their personal honor.”

Angelica seethed. “It’s never personal with Burr. Tell her, Eliza.”

“It’s true,” I said, in the familiar role of mediator between them. As improbable as it sounded, Burr was, and had always been, wryly amused with life, taking it all for a game.

“Burr only cares about his political reputation,” Angelica said. “Now, thanks to my husband, that sly self-seeker can boast that he didn’t flinch when a bullet came close enough to wing a button off his coat. He’ll tell that story every chance he gets while campaigning for Jefferson in the upcoming presidential election. And mark me a fool if Burr doesn’t win the vice presidency for himself.”

“Heaven forfend,” I said, glad Alexander wasn’t present to hear this prediction, for it would have sent him spiraling into a rage.

What I wanted was to celebrate with my sisters that we were all together. The three of us. Our children playing together outside. Our husbands good friends. Just as I’d once dreamed we’d be.

So I did my best to soften Angelica’s temper until the three of us were laughing together as we did when we were girls. “I’ll call her Lysbet for short,” I said to Peggy of the new daughter in my arms. “And I am sorry, Peggy. I wanted to call her Margaret but my husband is still persuasive when he desires something.”

She snorted. “Oh, and I’ll bet he knows just how to persuade you, too. No doubt it involves his—”

“Say no more!” I said, laughing despite myself. “There’s an innocent babe here.”

Chuckling, Peggy smoothed her hand over Lysbet’s downy hair. “Call her what you like. It’s just good to see you happy again.”

I was happy, I realized.

The advantage of the Reynolds scandal was that I no longer had anything to hide. I found satisfaction in my work—and in Alexander’s. For on the Fourth of July, we’d toasted the state legislature’s passage of a law establishing the gradual abolition of slavery. And shortly thereafter, Alexander had taken me to scout a property he meant to buy for our home—a high, wooded place not far from the river.

The country still feared an American war with France—with that tyrant, Napoleon Bonaparte. But with Washington and Hamilton at the head of our armies, we could be in no safer hands.

***

Doctor, I die hard. But I am not afraid to go.

— G EORGE W ASHINGTON

December 1799

New York City

George Washington’s passing shook the very foundations of the country. Few men on earth had done more to earn eternal rest than the former president, but we were left like children frightened to face a world without him. Even Alexander, though he was loath to admit it.

Nevertheless, like a grieving son, my husband went to Philadelphia to march in a somber funereal procession in honor of his fallen chief, wearing a black sash of mourning, leading a white riderless horse from Congress Hall, accompanied by a solitary drumbeat.

But where were the rest of the country’s supposedly great men?

One would have searched the assembled crowd in vain for Jefferson, Madison, or Monroe. Though I could well imagine the three Republicans clustered around a dinner table, wickedly toasting Washington’s demise and the opportunity it now gave their party to rise to power.

For my part, I was forced to steal away to the privacy of my room so that the children would not see my tears fall as I remembered the first time that godlike man spoke my name in welcoming me to his military encampment.

My heart bled for Martha.

She must feel so alone now, I thought. Inconsolable. She’d had children from her first marriage, but none with Washington. And she’d had only two years with her husband after a lifetime of public service. Only two years to sit together upon their piazza overlooking the Potomac and dine together in the privacy of their rooms. And yet, even then, I knew Mount Vernon resembled a well-resorted tavern, with people stopping by for a glimpse of the former president and in expectation of southern hospitality. A meal, a room for the night, a stable with feed for their horses—all at Washington’s expense, of course.

We consumed him, I thought, clutching the pendant I wore containing his hair.

We might not have chopped off Washington’s head and lapped up his blood from the paving stones as the French mobs did with their king. But we’d taken the best years of his life—his sweat, his toil, his wisdom, his vigor and energies. And what did we give him in return? For eight years we called him president. Now we called him the Father of the Country.

Who then, was the heir?

All eyes, it seemed, turned to an increasingly erratic President John Adams. But finding him wanting, some looked to Alexander Hamilton. And for the first time, I found myself almost grateful for the exposure of my husband’s infidelity. Because it meant that he hadn’t the stature to run for the presidency. Not now, at least.

We were stuck with President Adams. The alternative was unthinkable.

The alternative was Jefferson.

“Did you remember to deliver the parcel to Widow Rhinelander?” I asked Philip when he absconded with a piece of bread, trying to slip out the back door.

“I could scarcely forget, with all your reminders.” My tall son leaned against the butcher block table in the basement kitchen of our rented town house, affecting a manly devil-may-care pose. He was still dutiful about helping to deliver baskets to the needy, but having graduated from Columbia College, he would not be at my beck and call for long. He was grown now—and keen to prove it. “Fortunately, Mrs. Rhinelander has a very pretty girl living next door to her...”

“Naughty young man,” I scolded, for he was entirely too much like his father had once been—irresistibly brilliant, shamelessly flirtatious, and outrageously handsome. I’d already had to warn him against making eyes at our pot-scrubbing girl. Now I snatched the butter before he absconded with it, too. “Don’t make me fear to send you on errands for the charity lest you flirt with the ladies.”

“I wouldn’t flirt with Widow Rhinelander.” Philip’s mouth twisted into a feigned expression of horror and he shuddered. “She reminds me of the Baron von Steuben, may he rest in peace. Besides, she says all her German gentlemen friends are voting Republican...”

Of course they were.

Which was why, for the coming elections, I found myself undertaking the most energetic role in the political wrangling that I could without forfeiting my dignity as a lady. While going door to door and church to church raising charitable donations, I’d made careful note of those with Federalist sympathies who might be approached for support. Every day that my husband—who should’ve been about the business of the military—rode hither and yon, haranguing passing crowds on street corners, attending committee meetings in various wards, and even enlisting our sons to stand watch at polling stations where we suspected election trickery, I pinned my black Federalist cockade to my hat and went out to praise the virtues of courage and perseverance in the Federalist cause.

It was an unseemly business to electioneer in support of President Adams, but we’d been forced to it by Aaron Burr, who opened his house to offer refreshments and a mattress upon the floor to any grubby miscreant willing to campaign for a populist sweep of Jeffersonians into the government.

And now Philip complained, “It seems Colonel Burr sent someone to the neighborhood who spoke German. And he’s drawing up lists of voters in all the immigrant precincts.”

“For all the good it will do him,” I said, smugly. “To vote, immigrants must have resided here fourteen years, and own substantial property.”

But, having embarked upon the study of the law in his father’s footsteps, Philip explained, “Burr’s found a legal loophole. He’s going to have them pool the value of their property so they can qualify to vote.”

Damn Aaron Burr! Was there no end to his schemes?

Of course, it was just what Alexander would’ve done if he’d thought of it. My husband had, after all, filled the Federalist slate with booksellers, a grocer, a mason—precisely the sort of working people who ought to appeal to populists. And, as if in diabolical mockery, Burr filled the Republican slate with rich and venerable old Clintonites and Livingstons for the cachet of their family names.

Despite what he’d said to me on the street that day, however, I didn’t think Burr’s tireless campaigning came from any principled stance; he simply wanted to be vice president. And perhaps that wouldn’t be so terrible an ambition if he didn’t want to serve under Jefferson, who would assuredly plunge us back into a world of chaos, starvation, and riots.

“We’d better warn your father,” I said, grabbing up the lunch basket I’d filled with fruit and pastries. I wouldn’t open my home with mattresses on the floor for every mercenary willing to campaign under my husband’s generalship, but I was determined to feed and encourage the troops.

As I searched for Alexander and passed out my baked goods to my husband’s loyalists on the streets, I heard the most outrageous talk amongst the milling crowds. Hollow, ignorant Republican slogans. Curses and taunts at our party’s volunteers. Libelous rumors about President Adams. I felt a growing dread that if we lost this election, my future and that of my children would be thrown into a world characterized by such vitriol—all at the hands of Jefferson—an atheist in religion and a fanatic in politics.

I would see half the earth desolated, Jefferson once said to me.

That must not be allowed to happen.

I finally found my husband outside a notorious boardinghouse on Greenwich Street warning a discontented crowd of ruffians against a Jefferson presidency.

“Alexander,” I called, attempting to push through them with my basket.

But he didn’t hear me, and they refused to hear him. Instead, the men shouted him down. “Thief! Rascal! Villain!”

They cursed my husband, their general, a man still in uniform with a sword on his hip. Stunned, I took a step back and quite nearly bumped into the Quaker proprietress of the boardinghouse waving her arms at my husband, and shrieking, “If thee dies a natural death, Hamilton, I shall think there is no justice in heaven! I’ll never support anything you’re about. I tell all my boarders to vote with Burr!”

It wasn’t the first time that proprietress had accosted him. She’d done it months before in a courtroom where Alexander had defended the man accused of murdering her cousin. The trial had created a sensation, especially when Alexander exposed the proprietress as running a bit of a bawdy house. So it didn’t surprise me to hear the woman shriek and rave.

Outraged, my husband tugged his military coat straight. “Hear now—”

The growing crowd drowned him out with a raucous cheer of support for the proprietress, one that made me anxious. “Alexander,” I said, finally forcing my way through to him.

“Oh, dear Eliza, it’s too rowdy out here today for you.” He took my basket and sheltered me away from the unruly mob with an arm around my shoulders. But frustration rolled off him. “Why does that lady not recall that Aaron Burr was the other defense attorney in that case? Why doesn’t she blame him, too?”

“Because Burr is slippery,” I replied when we finally found a bit of privacy in the doorway to a millinery shop. “The sort of fellow off the surface of whom can slide almost any resentment.” Whereas, when it came to Alexander, everything stuck.

Perhaps that was because Burr’s ancestry stretched back to Jonathan Edwards, one of the great New England theologians, whereas Hamilton was said to be a Creole bastard. Or perhaps it was because Burr never proclaimed any position on anything until he knew which way the wind was blowing, whereas Hamilton could never keep an opinion to himself.

Late that night, sinking in exhausted despondency beside his father in the parlor, Philip groaned. “Our state election is over. They’ve swept the slate. It’s all Republicans.”

New York would give twelve electoral college votes to Jefferson. Enough, quite possibly, to tip the balance of the presidency. And it was all accomplished by the wily Aaron Burr who had, in the late hours of the election, gotten every man who couldn’t vote to bring out wagonloads of those who could, even carrying the infirm and sitting them down on chairs in the middle of the cobblestone street to wait their turn.

We’d lost New York!

My general had been out-generaled. I suppose it had always seemed impossible to me that Alexander could fail at anything he set his mind to, and so I sank down, too, numbly.

But at the stroke of midnight, Alexander was already at his desk, drawing up new battle plans. Feverishly, he scratched out a letter to the governor, audaciously suggesting that presidential electors should be chosen by popular vote rather than by the incoming legislature.

“Such a measure would be seen as overturning the election,” I warned, hoping to dissuade him from sending it. “And would surely cause a civil war.”

“A civil war would be preferable to Jefferson,” Philip said, perhaps remembering the sermon we’d heard at church telling us that if Jefferson became president, we’d have to hide our Bibles.

“In times like these, it will not do to be overscrupulous,” Alexander said, still writing. “It’s easy to sacrifice the substantial interests of society by a strict adherence to ordinary rules. This is a matter of public safety .”

Remembering Jefferson’s admiration for, and encouragement of, the Francophile mobs in Philadelphia, I agreed with him. That our fright drove us to consider radical and unsavory ideas in the few terrifying days after the election—what some were already calling the revolution of 1800 —I don’t deny. But our fever-induced proposals were never adopted, whereas the worst, panic-struck ideas of President Adams were immediately put into action.

Realizing he was likely to lose the election, the first thing Adams did was fire his entire cabinet—including the secretary of war.

“But the president blames you, more than anyone, for his probable defeat, Ham,” McHenry said, having come straight from Philadelphia to report the news. He glanced at me, apologetically, as he pushed away his dinner plate, having apparently lost his appetite. “Adams thinks you brought about the loss of the election in New York intentionally.”

The indignity of it, after all we’d done! My own appetite wavered.

Mac added, “Adams shouted that you’ve been trying to control the government while posing as a private man. That you’re a man devoid of every moral principle—a bastard and a foreigner besides.”

I flinched, because it was an insult designed to strike at my husband’s weakest points, and an unworthy and unbecoming thing for the president of the United States to stoop to say besides. But, worse, few men were more American than Alexander Hamilton, and yet the president proclaimed him a foreigner. The same president who had the power to deport foreigners he deemed dangerous to the peace...

Alexander flung his napkin onto the table in disgust. “Not only the worst constructions are put upon my conduct as a public man, but it seems my birth must still be the subject of the most humiliating criticism!”

I put a hand on my husband’s knee in comfort. His birth wasn’t his fault, and yet, no conduct of his could ever seem to change it. And even McHenry seemed sensible of the wound he’d opened. “My dear Hamilton, with respect to the legitimacy of your birth, not one of your friends would respect you less even if everything your enemies say on this head were true.”

“Well, that is kind, Mac,” Hamilton allowed. “But my friends are precious few.”

That was only partially true, I thought. Because even then, my husband still wore the aura of a victor. His star had dimmed but still blazed. And I confused followers for friends.

I know better now.

But at the time, I merely smiled at McHenry in gratitude.

Mac gave a long sigh. “While I’m at it, you might as well know this, too. During his tirade against me, the president declared Mr. Jefferson an infinitely better man than you; one who, if president, would act wisely. He said he’d rather be vice president under Jefferson than indebted to you, a man who ruled George Washington, and would rule still if he could.”

I understood what this meant, and chills raised gooseflesh on my arms. “John Adams is changing sides. He’s going to abandon the Federalists.”

McHenry nodded. “You’re not the only one to think the president has cut a deal with Jefferson to save his own neck.”

At that, Alexander abruptly rose from the table to pace behind the chairs and looked as if he wished to throw one of them out of our bow window into the street below. “The man is more mad than I ever thought him, which he just might force me to say.”

I was inclined to agree. Adams was going to abandon us to the bloodthirsty clutches of the Republican mob, who blamed my husband for every unpopular act of his own administration. And, for the first time since the days of the revolution—the revolution of ’76—I began to consider that we might need to flee.

McHenry did nothing to change my mind. “Certainly, the president spoke in ways to persuade me he’s actually insane.”

“Very well, then.” Alexander drained his wineglass, as if for courage. “Then Federalist electors must withdraw their support of Adams for president. If we must have an enemy at the head of the government, let it be one we can oppose and for whom we are not responsible, who will not involve our party in the disgrace of foolish and bad measures.”

I dismissed this as merely hot talk. No one could prefer that Jacobin, Thomas Jefferson, even to an insane John Adams. And I said as much to my husband later that night, in the darkness of our bed.

His exhausted sigh crossed the space between us. “Mayhaps it makes no matter who becomes president, because four years from now I don’t expect to have a head still upon my shoulders. Unless it is at the head of a victorious army.”

***

December 1800

New York City

President Adams declared peace with France and dissolved the army. Too late to stave off his ignominious defeat at the polls.

Nationwide, the presidential election was a tie.

Not between Jefferson and Adams, whose erratic actions sealed his own fate. But a tie between Jefferson and Burr .

The presidential candidate and the vice presidential candidate had, through a quirk of our system, received the same number of electoral votes. But the people plainly meant for Jefferson to be president and wished that Burr would simply accept the vice presidency as intended.

I hoped for something else altogether. Because popular reason doesn’t always know how to act right, nor does it always act right when it knows. Fortunately, the choice would be thrown to the House of Representatives, where my husband’s Federalists reigned.

Alexander would choose our new president. And in this, I sensed our salvation.

Nearly laughing at the absurdity of Burr as president, I nevertheless felt a glorious relief. Burr was a trickster and a maker of chaos to be sure, but he was also a man we knew well. Burr might be a libertine, but he wasn’t a chilly zealot like Jefferson, musing about the desolation of the earth in the pursuit of liberty.

In Burr, I felt certain we were to be delivered from our worst Jacobin nightmare of Jefferson unleashing the French Revolution on our shores.

So I was both stunned and dismayed to find myself in a heated argument about it when I passed by Alexander’s study and overheard him telling our eldest son, “Upon every virtuous and prudent calculation, Jefferson is to be preferred over Burr.”

Philip and I both gasped at the same time. “ Jefferson ?”

Alexander scarcely looked up from his writing table. Perhaps he dared not look at us for fear he’d lose his nerve or his lunch. Rubbing at his kidney, which had troubled him recently with spasms, he said, “There is no fair reason to suppose Jefferson capable of being corrupted, whereas Burr is bankrupt beyond redemption. His private character is not defended even by his most partial friends.”

That Burr was corruptible, I had no doubt. Everyone knew he was in debt. “That only means he can be bought,” I said. “And a man who can be bought can be bargained with.”

Now my husband did look at me, his eyes widening, as if I’d sprouted two heads. I suppose he’d looked to me for moral di rection only to find that I, too, had been compromised by this wicked world. “This is no time for saints, Alexander.”

He shook his head and gathered his papers. “Nevertheless, Burr cannot be bargained with. Because no agreement with him could ever be relied upon.”

Shamelessly, I blocked his exit. “Even so, you cannot prefer a radical theorist like Jefferson to Burr, a—a mere opportunist .”

“Is it a recommendation to have no theory?” Alexander asked. “Can a man be an able statesman who has none? I believe not. Burr is far more cunning than wise, far more dexterous than able. In my opinion, he is inferior in real ability to Jefferson.”

“As if ability matters,” I argued, in frank disbelief. “As if these were ordinary times and not ones in which you tell me you stand to lose your head!”

It was exactly the wrong thing to say, and I realized it even before my husband stiffened. I shouldn’t have appealed to his sense of self-preservation over the good of the nation. I was speaking, after all, to a man who’d been willing to fight and die for it. And I’d just questioned his willingness to do just that in the presence of our proud, patriotic son.

Fortunately, and to my surprise, Philip was on my side. “Father, the country won’t survive Mr. Jefferson.”

Alexander held up his hands to fend us both off. “I’m not an apologist for Jefferson. His politics are tinctured with fanaticism and he’s a contemptible hypocrite. But he’s vain . He isn’t zealot enough to do anything that will destroy his popularity or our union. By contrast, Burr will disturb our institutions to secure permanent power and wealth. He’s an American Cataline.”

Cataline . Another accursed old Roman who’d plotted to overthrow the republic. I remembered perfectly well a time when Burr jested that the Constitution was nothing but a miserable paper machine, but I said, “You’re allowing your resentments to get the better of your reason.”

After all, though Jefferson always seemed to loom large, he’d been gone from our daily lives a long time, whereas Alexander had more recently tangled with Burr, been embarrassed by Burr, and been bested by Burr. My husband was too proud now to let Burr win. But I was not that proud. “Give Burr what he wants and you might win him to the Federalist point of view.”

“A groundless hope,” said my husband. “No, Burr is one of the worst men in the community. Sanguine enough to hope everything, daring enough to try everything, and wicked enough to scruple nothing. From the elevation of this man, may heaven preserve us!”

Philip and I remained in mutinous disagreement. In fact, the argument in our household went on almost as long as it did in Congress, through thirty-five rounds of ballots. And while Congress debated, so did we. Upon waking and sleeping. At breakfast and dinner. Before church and after church. And never in my life did I see anyone hector Alexander more relentlessly, or effectively, than my son did that winter.

While I sliced bread for the younger boys one morning after prayers, Philip argued, “By denying Jefferson the presidency and throwing support to Burr, we could split the Republican vote in the next election. The Federalists must support Burr.”

Alexander might have made it out the door if he could have resisted an argument. But of course, he couldn’t. Another father—perhaps any other father—might’ve resented Philip’s arguments as the insolent yappings of a young pup. But Alexander was proud of our son’s political passion and afforded him the same respect he’d give any other man in a political argument.

That is to say, he went on at length, ruthlessly smashing every argument Philip made, as if they were no more than a swarm of buzzing gnats.

“There is no circumstance,” Alexander concluded, “not in the entire course of our political affairs, that has given me so much pain as the mere idea that Mr. Burr might be elevated to the presidency by the means of the Federalists. Jefferson is by far not so dangerous a man and he has, at least, pretensions to character. Let the people have their choice.”

With this, Alexander looked to me, as if to applaud the superior merit of his argument, but I thought Philip had the right of it. That’s why I said, “We know Burr. He isn’t the sort of cold-blooded man who would murder his political enemies.”

Oh, how it chills me now to remember the way Alexander replied, “He is precisely that cold-blooded.”