This past thursday liberty hall, check on that online for that needs to give special thanks of number of organizations that made this program possible today. Especially Trinity Church, who hosts this partners with great spirit and great support con c and the members of the haha society and the board of directors all worked hard to bring this together. We had 32 events and 20 locations over 10 days. And it took everyones support and encouragement. The haha society joins two honor hamiltons life and his legacy. In that light to the Awareness Society will be presenting the first hamilton legacy award to ri richard for his two decades of his work to educate the public. The revival of history can be traced to mr. Brookheisers work, ill give you four examples. After reading about and writing a studying a book, he saw that, wow, theres someone, a right hand aid and man in his life, Alexander Hamilton became intrigued and wrote a tremendous book in 1999. The book is only 220 pages long, that deserves an award. If you can tell Alexander Hamiltons life and all the dimensions of it and 220 pages, its magnificent. The other thing that we really impersonate and really gets the true hamilton and going to the primary sources, its been really helpful to the cause of looking for people and about the accurate characterization where many of us didnt hear about him because of the mischaracterization, so we thank him for that book and really was quite accomplishment. Number two, he was historian cure rater the man who made modern how many were able to see that. How many were able to see that, good. He worked with the institute with jim and nicole, and then there were these alexander exhibit panels that were produced, and it was so excited, we went down where Alexander Hamilton was born and there were those panels. We were at the patterson museum, yesterday, sorry, sunday and there were those panels, so articulately tell the story of all the dimensions of his life, number three. Mr. Called rediscovering Alexander Hamilton and that came out in 2011. Now, all of these resources created a foundation from years ago that resulted in great scholarship and content of much renown. They have become the core resource material this year, you may have heard the support of the institute, along with the Rockefeller Foundation and the hamilton musical, all came together to serve 20,000 students to see that over 18 months. And that rich content was because of the work of him over many years, and quite a hamilton legacy. Because it was original continued efforts to share alexanders story, richard is very deserving as the first recipient of the hamilton legacy award, which reads richard is here by presented with legacy award, for decades of Outstanding Service and dedication, to educating the public about the contributions of Alexander Hamilton to the United States of america. The alexander Awareness Society, 2016. Lets thank Richard Brookheiser. You have to have them, but theyre not enough. They have to be made real in the world, you have to work for them. And the same is true of memory. We have to remember what weve done right. We have to remember what weve done wrong, but memory is not automatic. It has to be informed and it has to be cherished and encouraged, and the alexander Awareness Society does splended work in that regard and its a great honor to be recognized by them. Thank you. In the hamilton musical, it ends with a profound perspective and a set of questions. Who lives, who dies, who tells your story. I like to answer those three parts, who lives, we all live in hamiltons america. As it was Alexander Hamilton that created the vision and shaped the foundations upon which the United States of america achieve greatness. Who dies, on this day july 12th, 2012 years ago, Alexander Hamilton died defending his honor, such that as he would say, to be in the future useful. In 18 minutes will be mark the 2 00 passing of alexander passing after 30 years from his injury. He often chose the nations well being over his physical, financial, and familys well being. Who tells your story, were most privileged to have Richard Brookheiser tell the story. Alexander hamilton, ladies and gentlemen, Richard Brookheiser. So how did hamilton make america prospero prosperous. We have to look at three things, we have to look at the arc of his life, where he came from and where he went. And then we have to review what he did at the height of his life. And then we have to consider what inspired him, what most moved him. Hamilton, as you know, was an immigrant and there were several other immigrants among the Founding Fathers, ratio gates, Robert Morris, james wilson. But these other men all came from the british aisles. Hamilton was the unique immigrant from the west indys, raised on the island of saint croix, which was on the ver gir islands. And it was like the middle east today. It was the place where the thing that everyone wanted came from. Today thats oil and the 18th century. The wealth that was generated by west indian sugar was fantastic. When hamilton was six years old, 1763, the french and indian war ended, also called seven years from war. And at the end of this world war between britain and france, britain had conquered so many of the colonies that they had to give some back. They couldnt possibly hold all that they had won. So there was a serious debate British Government should we keep canada or the island of gaud they decided to give back and they were fiercely criticized by the British Business community, how could they have done this, canada is only snow that was a sign of how valuable these islands were. Hamilton saw the commerce that was generated from the ground up, this first job in christian stead in saint kroi was for merchant house, it was headquartered in new york city. It had branches in the west indys and another branch in bristol england. The cougar who ran the branch ended up becoming a member of parliament he also saw, enormous despairties in the holding of this wealth, most of this money went to plan terns. James mansfield novel, or thomas bertrum is a plantation owner and he appears in the novel halfway through, he comes back to england from antigua. Many of them never left from france and home countries. They were run by overseers. And merchants, a few professions. This was the class in which hamiltons parents belong, james hamilton, rachel, he was merchants agent, she owned a small store and christian stay. But the vast bulk of the population of slaves, the population with hamilton lived there was 10,000 10,000 slaves, 500 white people. Population of st. Croix was 22,000 slaves, 2,000 white people. The average life span of a field hand who was brought to the west indies from south africa was seven years before he was worked to death or died of diseases. The plantars were not so concerned with that, there was always another slave ship coming in. Beak man and kruger sometimes dealt in slaves. The slaves fresh from africa were held before they were sorted out, put on smaller ships and sent west of the british west indies. This was the social system hamilton grew up in. Heavily skewed, no opportunity to rise. He managed to get out because of his own brilliance and luck. He was a smart boy and a smart young man his blowers recognized that. So did the local minister. He had connections with the north american mainland. When hamilton was a teenager. He was isnt to north america to be educated the plan was to get him trained as a doctor and he would come back to the islands to practice. The first plan was to send him to the college of new jersey which is now prince upon. He went to Kings College which is now colombia. Just up broadway from this building p. M. This is the second important location in hamiltons life, the fact that he came here to new york rather than to philadelphia or boston, which were the other significant cities in british north america. Philadelphia the largest, new york had passed boston to become second. They were all commercial cities. But boston and philadelphia had been founded as holy cities. They were religious experiments. Boston was the city on the hill. Philadelphia was the city of brotherly love. And some of that atmosphere still clung to them, new york was always and only about getting and spending. The dutch founded it as New Amsterdam as a trading post to take first from the iroquios indians. The english acquired the city, but it kept its character. Im sure you all know the founding myth of new york that is that it was bought in the indians for 24 of beads, trinkets and tools in 1624 the way the myth is usually told the poor indians were treated. I have heard some tellings of the myth in which the indians who sold manhattan didnt actually live here, theyre just passing through. There may be double dealing on both sides. Myths always tell a truth. And the trujth of that myth is that the soul of new york is commerce. Thats why people live here, to make it, to get ahead. Hamilton was coming from one commercial place to another innately commercial place. It was by no means a paradise. New york was a slave city in a slave colony. The population of the city was about 1 6 slave. And they worked as house servants, worked on the small farms in what is now brooklyn and queens. The city was doubly bound to slavery. What was grown and produced on those farms, the food, timber, fabric, it was shipped down to the west indies to be used by the slaves and the owners of the slaves there there was still slavery here in new york, there were a lot of other things going on. There was some commerce. There was some manufacturing. It wasnt supposed to happen under the british mercantile system. The people got around the rules and the laws as i hear they still do in new york there was informing here then. Hamilton came from a place that marked him and he moved to a place that continued to mark him. He never graduated from colombia, the revolution happened and he left his college to fight. He became a captain of an artillery company. He was noticed by George Washington put on his staff as a colonel where he served for four years and finally at the end of the fighting, he was given a field command at the botal of yorkto yorktown. He came back to new york, made his money as a lawyer. He also served in the new York Assembly and the Continental Congress he was sent as a delegate to philadelphia in 1787. He wasnt regular in his attendance. After the constitution was written, he took up the job of campaigning for it in the newspapers. He organized a series of essays we would now call them op ed pieces in the new york newspapers. New york was crucial because it had an anticonstitution governor but central location. If new york stayed out of the country, new england would be split off from the rest of the country new york was a must win state. Hamilton found two collaborators james madison, and john jay, an older man, former diplomat and spy master. The three of them wrote 85 essays for the new york newspapers. Jay got sick early on, so he only wrote 5, madison wrote 29 hamilton wrote 51. These essays came out at a rate of four a week. They were each 2,000 words long. Some weeks there were five, one week there were six. Columnists in the new york types today they write 750 words twice a week. Theyre also immortal. After the constitution was ratified George Washington had to pick a first treasury secreta secretary. He first asked Robert Morris who had run the finances of the country during the second half of the revolution. Morris was the richest man in america he didnt want to do Public Service again, he wanted to make money. He recommended Alexander Hamilton saying he was sharp. Washington knew that already. He becomes the first treasury secretary of the United States september 1789 when hes 32 years old. Now we come to what he did at the climax of his life. The problem he faced was debt. Wars cost money and the United States had no money. We had gone through the war 8 1 2 year war, the longest war we ever fought until vietnam. It was longer than the civil war and our portion of world war ii put together. We couldnt pay for it. The government and congress could not tax the states, they could ask the states for money. And if the states wouldnt pay or couldnt pay. They didnt have to pay. Robert morris said at one point asking the states for money, was like preaching to the dead. They minted paper money. And as unbacked paper money always does, it inflated away until it was worthless. They called in all the old dollars, they issued new money, that began to inflate in turn. They kighted their bills, they did funny stuff with their cred ders. They got loans from dutch bankers who were willing to run a risk. They got loans from france. And they scraped through at the very end of the war, the soldiers marching to yorktown would not have got there, because they had not been paid. But a french ship filled with silver was part of the french armada that came to participate in the yorktown campaign. And so that campaign was funded. And america won its final victory. After the war 1783, the hearter was truly bare. Our debt was trading in europe and amsterdam and antwerp at a quarter to a third of its value. It was essentially junk. What did hamilton do . He had going for him the fact that the new constitution did allow the federal government to raise taxes. That was a plus. How would the money be spent . He made two early decisions of great consequence. One was called assumption, the other was called nondiscrimination. Assumption had to do with the fact that there was not one american debt, but 14 there were the debts owed by the United States and there were the debts owed by each of the 13 states the 13 states had raised their own troops. Made their own expenses in the war. And some of them were badly in arrears. Massachusetts in particular, and also south carolina. And there was ill feeling among the states, some of the states had paid off their debts, and they thought, why should we take on obligations by the deadbeat states. Not all the states who paid their debts had done it honestly. Rhode island paid its debts by printing paper money. So there was a lot of suffering and sharp dealing on all sides. Hamiltons argument was that the war had been a common struggle. All the states were fighting together for the liberty of all for the whole country. He assumed the debts of the 13 states along with the federal debt. They would all be treated as one debt. They would be paid off at the same time. This was the decision for assumption. Nondiscrimination had to do with the creditors, the holders of the debt most of them were soldiers who had not been paid during the war. This was simply chronic, soldiers were not paid. They were given ious, at the end of the war they were sent home with their ious, promises of future payment. But over the years, some of these ious had been sold. If a soldier needed money immediately, he might sell his iou at a discount to a merchant. Or maybe he would sell it to a speculator, to someone with resources who thought, maybe one day these things will be paid off. Let me buy them up from soldiers. The ious had been traded. Everyone agreed soldiers should be paid off at their full value, these men had suffered for the country, they had fought, they bled. Many americans thought, why should we pay off speculators, they havent fought, they havent bled, they were simply looking for a profit. Hamilton knew the way the world of money works. He knew that if debtors pick and choose among their creditors, they can do it once. They wont be able to get a loan again, or if they can it will be at punishing rates of interest. So he said there should be nondiscrimination that all the creditors will be paid off at a common rate he was able to get congress to agree to this too. He had to do some bargaining to make this happen. The most consequential deal was to move the capitol from new york first to philadelphia for ten years and then to a site in the potomac which was as yet undeveloped, is now washington, d. C. We incurred a future of murderous washington summers but we got americas debts paid off in a timely fashion and that was due to hamiltons foresight and clever deal making. He also had an insight about how to handle the debt. His intention was not to pay it off and make it go away. He wanted to manage the dead. He wanted a debt where regular payments would be made on the interest. And his insight was, if you did that with debt it turns from being a liability into being a resource. People see youre not struggling under a burden. Youre maintaining it. So theyre willing to extend you credit. Debt becomes credit. Debt can become money. If you have a credit card, you know how this works. If you have 20 credit cards, you know how this doesnt work. Debt has to be managed carefully. That was hamiltons intention. His way of managing the debt was a new thing in world finance. Only two countries had gone this route. Holland was first, england followed with the bank of england. Early in the 18th century, france tried to join the new financial world. The man in charge of their debt was not cautious. He was a man named john law. A scottsman, brilliant but literally a gambler. He gambled himself. The smashup was so terrible, the french had been suspicious of banks to this day. This is why most french banks are not called banks. Thats how dean the suspicion in france of banks and banking goes. Alexander hamilton was going to take this small country on the edge of nowhere and make it the third country in the world, in the new world of modern finance. There are going to be many bumps on the road after his death. People did not maintain his policies. We would have panics and depressions. He got us off to a solid start. When he came in as treasury secretary as i said, our debt was trading at a quarter to a third of i