The Compromise of 1790 was a compromise among Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison, where Hamilton won the decision for the national government to take over and pay the state debts, and Jefferson and Madison obtained the national capital, called the District of Columbia, for the South. This agreement resolved the deadlock in Congress. Southerners had been blocking the assumption of state debts by the Department of the Treasury, thereby destroying the Hamiltonian program for building a fiscally strong federal government. Northerners rejected the proposal, much desired by Southerners, to locate the permanent national capital on the Virginia–Maryland border.
The meeting, which was organized by Thomas Jefferson, was attended only by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and Jefferson, which led to speculation about what was talked about.[ citation needed ]
The compromise made possible the passage of the Residence Act and Funding Act of 1790 in July and August 1790. According to historian Jacob Cooke, it is "generally regarded as one of the most important bargains in American history, ranking just below the better known Missouri Compromise and the Compromise of 1850." [1]
Politicians at the federal and the state levels sought to break the legislative deadlock by unofficial negotiations. A number of clandestine meetings and political dinners were held in New York City, then serving as the nation's temporary capital, in the summer of 1790. [2]
The "dinner table bargain" [3] [4] was a pivotal episode in the final stages of these compromise efforts. Based on an account given by former Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, two years after the event, the "dinner" [5] was a private meeting between Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton and U.S. House of Representatives member James Madison. [3] Shortly after the Assumption Bill failed for a second time in June in the House, Hamilton, despairing that his financial plan would be scuttled, appealed to the newly appointed Jefferson to apply his influence on the matter. [5] [6] According to Jefferson's account, he arranged the dinner for the two officials at his residence in New York City on or about June 20, 1790. The meeting produced a political settlement on the "assumption" and "residency" crisis.
Jefferson described the encounter between the men at his lodgings in New York City:
"It ended in Mr. Madison's acquiescence in a proposition that the question [i.e., assumption of state debts] should be again brought before the house by way of amendment from the Senate, that he would not vote for it, nor entirely withdraw his opposition, yet he would not be strenuous, but leave it to its fate. It was observed, I forget by which of them, that as the pill would be a bitter one to the Southern states, something should be done to soothe them; and the removal of the seat of government to the [Potomac] was a just measure, and would probably be a popular one with them, and would be a proper one to follow the assumption." [7]
The key provision of Secretary Hamilton's First Report on the Public Credit won approval with the passage of the Assumption Act, establishing the foundation for public credit. [8] The Residence Act resulted in the permanent U.S. capital being located in the agrarian states of Maryland and Virginia, the demographic center of the country at the time, [9] rather than in a metropolitan and financial center such as New York City or Philadelphia. [8] [10] Jefferson and Madison secured a lucrative debt adjustment for their state of Virginia from Hamilton, as part of the bargain. [11] [12]
Historian Max M. Edling says that assumption worked by using the location of the capital as a bargaining ploy. Alexander Hamilton proposed that the federal Treasury take over and pay off the debt states had incurred to pay for the American Revolutionary War. The Treasury would issue bonds that rich people would buy, thereby giving the rich a tangible stake in the success of the national government. Hamilton proposed to pay off the new bonds with revenue from a new tariff on imports. Jefferson originally approved the scheme, but Madison had turned him around by arguing that federal control of debt would consolidate too much power in the national government.
Edling pointed out that after its passage in 1790, the assumption was accepted. James Madison tried to pay speculators below 100%, but they were paid the face value of the state debts they held regardless of how little they had paid for them. When Jefferson became president, he continued the system. The credit of the U.S. was solidly established at home and abroad, and Hamilton was successful in signing up many of the bondholders in his new Federalist Party. Good credit allowed Thomas Jefferson's Treasury Secretary, Albert Gallatin, to borrow in Europe to finance the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, and to borrow to finance the War of 1812. [13]
The compromise is dramatized in the musical Hamilton by Lin-Manuel Miranda in the song "The Room Where It Happens", which tells the story from the perspective of Aaron Burr. [14]
James Madison was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Father who served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison was popularly acclaimed the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting and promoting the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights.
Alexander Hamilton was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first secretary of the treasury from 1789 to 1795 during George Washington's presidency.
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The history of the United States from 1789 to 1815 was marked by the nascent years of the American Republic under the new U.S. Constitution.
The Residence Act of 1790, officially titled An Act for establishing the temporary and permanent seat of the Government of the United States, is a United States federal statute adopted during the second session of the 1st United States Congress and signed into law by President George Washington on July 16, 1790. The Act provides for a national capital and permanent seat of government to be established at a site along the Potomac River and empowered President Washington to appoint commissioners to oversee the project. It also set a deadline of December 1800 for the capital to be ready, and designated Philadelphia as the nation's temporary capital while the new seat of government was being built. At the time, the federal government operated out of New York City.
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In United States history, the Second Report on the Public Credit, also referred to as The Report on a National Bank, was the second of four influential reports on fiscal and economic policy delivered to Congress by the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton. Submitted on December 14, 1790, the report called for the establishment of a central bank with the primary purpose to expand the flow of legal tender, monetizing the national debt by issuing of federal bank notes.
The Federalist Era in American history ran from 1788 to 1800, a time when the Federalist Party and its predecessors were dominant in American politics. During this period, Federalists generally controlled Congress and enjoyed the support of President George Washington and President John Adams. The era saw the creation of a new, stronger federal government under the United States Constitution, a deepening of support for nationalism, and diminished fears of tyranny by a central government. The era began with the ratification of the United States Constitution and ended with the Democratic-Republican Party's victory in the 1800 elections.
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Debt Assumption, or simply assumption, was a US financial policy executed under the Funding Act of 1790. The Washington administration pursued the policy, under Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton's leadership, to assume the outstanding debt of states that had not yet repaid their American Revolutionary War bonds and a scrip. Some states, such as Virginia, had already repaid their debt. The policy of assumption, Hamilton argued, required expanded federal taxation, including a tariff and an excise tax on whiskey. Western farmers violently protested in the Whiskey Rebellion.
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Tariff of 1791 or Excise Whiskey Tax of 1791 was a United States statute establishing a taxation policy to further reduce Colonial America public debt as assumed by the residuals of American Revolution. The Act of Congress imposed duties or tariffs on domestic and imported distilled spirits generating government revenue while fortifying the Federalist Era.
Throughout his life, James Madison's views on slavery and his ownership of slaves were complex. James Madison, who was a Founding Father of the United States and its 4th president, grew up on a plantation that made use of slave labor. He viewed slavery as a necessary part of the Southern economy, though he was troubled by the instability of a society that depended on a large slave population. Madison did not free his slaves during his lifetime or in his will.
James Madison was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Father who served as the 4th president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. He is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for his pivotal role in drafting and promoting the Constitution of the United States and the Bill of Rights. Disillusioned by the weak national government established by the Articles of Confederation, he helped organize the Constitutional Convention, which produced a new constitution. Madison's Virginia Plan served as the basis for the Constitutional Convention's deliberations, and he was one of the most influential individuals at the convention. He became one of the leaders in the movement to ratify the Constitution, and he joined with Alexander Hamilton and John Jay in writing The Federalist Papers, a series of pro-ratification essays that was one of the most influential works of political science in American history.