Friday, October 8, 2010

Empire of Liberty - elite tensions

Boyes writes:

I have never been an admirer of Hamilton, but this quotation makes him seem foolish. Why would this "natural aristocracy" not be self interested? Why would they not want power or more power?


Implicit in Boyes' speculation is an inquiry into the tension between the Hamiltonian and Jeffersonian perspectives and this inquiry is, in my view, essential to a more rounded understanding of the emergent civil society that evolved during the period that Wood describes. It is this commercial society that McCluskey argues over on CATO that actually stimulated the catallaxy which we rely upon today. And we know that Jefferson was intensely distrustful of this commercial society while Hamilton wished to stimulate it.


In thinking back to the period prior to the Enlightenment the issue of power and governance was one that evolved to my reading as one based in Western Europe on classical origins. That is, in thinking back to Aristotle, "the good" was to be achieved by "the few". As this evolved over time, there was a sense that the vast majority, the mob in the view of the elites, were incapable of self rule - these masses could not know "the good" and therefore "the few" were responsible for the interests of all. Woods points to the French Revolution as compelling evidence for this belief system. It might be argued that the Glorious Revolution was also, for all the benefits to later generations, evidence for a bit of concern over the masses as a governing group.

An odd philosophy that seems so alien to a Revolutionary movement, but this philosophy was widely shared - Washington, Madison, Wilson, even Jefferson held to varying degrees this attitude.

I found the following useful to think of the contradictions that Hamilton represents. David Hackett Fischer writes in Liberty and Freedom:

This [Hamiltonian] vision of liberty and freedom cannot be understood in the categories of the twentiy-first century. It accepted inequalities of wealth . . . supported the rights of free labor and was deeply hostile to slavery. It fiercely defended private property, commerce and industry but favored active public regulation of the economy in a syustem of mixed enterprise public and private together. Here was a vision of a republic as a commonweath of free men who combined individual rights with a strong sense of community. (200)


It should be remembered that Hamilton was an outspoken opponent of slavery, a stalwart defender of property rights and as we know an advocate of the commercial society. Jefferson on the other hand, in spite of reservations, supported slavery in his shameful capitulation in the writing of the declaration of independence and his deafening public silence on the issue. His support of private property is thus undermined as the most fundamental property right is to ones' own life. Jefferson also privileged a Rousseurian view that advantaged argiculture over industry (so in his own way he wanted the government to pick winners) and his disasterous welding of power as president (the Embargo Act of 1807 comes immediately to mind) along with the purchase of Louisiana (an action that is at odds with his previous stated philosophy) reflects a character that seems in the tradition of a pragmatist.

That said, anticipating the end of the Woods story and book and the legacy today, I can report that I agree with Matt Ridley's concluding comments in The Rational Optimist.

I forecast that the twenty-first centruy will show a continuing expansion of catallaxy-Hayek's word for spontaneous order created by exchange and specialization. Intelligence will become more and more collective; innovation and order will become more and more bottom-up; . . . The bottom-up world is to be the great theme of this century. (355)

I am drawn to this optimism and the argument that Ridley presents is persuasive. Echoing the work of Baumol it suggests that institutions will evolve in a manner to incentivize wealth creating entrepreneaurship (wikipedia, google, facebook) at the expense of unproductive (state rent seeking) entrepreneaurship.

This optimism challenges the contemporary reader to reflect on the question raised by Boyes which is inherent in our study of Woods and the late 18th century debate that was shaped by these two founding fathers.

This inquiry into the causes and conditions of Jeffersonian and Hamiltonian philosophy and action is important for no other reason than it illustrates the synthesis of ideas that informed the adaptation and emergence of the United States and it anticipates Walt Whitman . . .

Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself, I am large, I contain multatudes.

Clearly our evolved national character, to the extent that such a culture exists contains strains of both of these opposing perspectives.

Our author in this podcast on Aaron Burr, the quintessential, self interested politician and in Woods' must listen podcast, talks about the 1800 election. Burr and Hamilton were fellow New Yorkers and had a very amiable personal relationship. By this time, Hamilton had a strong animosity toward Jefferson and detested his political ideology (as well as his very sophisticated political practice). Nonetheless, in the time after the 1800 electorial college tie vote, Hamilton worked tirelessly, Woods says almost hysterically for Jefferson and against Burr. Burr, for Hamilton, epitomized self interested behavior writ large, at the expense of "the good" and while Jefferson had an ideology that was at total odds with the Hamiltonian program, Jefferson was a gentleman, fellow member of the aristocracy and, while mistaken in Hamilton's view, was working from an ideology that was directed toward society and was not self interest, particularly in comparison to Burr, who anticipates most presidents and certainly our 20th and 21st century chief executives a la FDR, Clinton, Bush Jr. In fact, in the podcast, Wood says that Burr was a traitor to his class.

Gordon Wood

“The Real Treason of Aaron Burr”

http://www.gilderlehrman.org/historians/podcasts/mp3/download.php/Wood3.mp3

The University Club, New York, February 4, 1998
Running Time: 46:23

In 1807, Aaron Burr was tried and acquitted on charges of treason for his "adventures" in the American West, but he had fallen out of favor in American life long before, after he had run for president against Thomas Jefferson, served a single term as vice president, and shot and killed Alexander Hamilton in an 1804 duel. A free spender, a womanizer, and the only Founding Father who was actually descended from the English aristocracy, Burr was famously secretive and conspiratorial. In this lecture, historian Gordon Wood argues that Burr's true treason was not his actions in the West but his naked ambition, his lack of principles and character that made him a threat to the young republic.

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