The death of Hamilton was in a peculiar sense a part of his public career. He had never hesitated to denounce in strong terms the public career and some of the private acts of Aaron Burr. The latter, after losing the presidency, sought the governorship of New York, and entered into correspondence with the Federalist leaders in New England with a view to the formation of a Northern confederacy. Hamilton succeeded in dividing the Federalist vote in New York so as to give the election to Lewis, Burr's democratic rival. Burr then determined to force a personal quarrel upon Hamilton in order to obtain revenge upon the man who had so often thwarted him. Hamilton had no desire to fight, but he did not feel able to repudiate the code of the duelist as it was then accepted among gentlemen.

It was on June 17, 1804, that Colonel Burr, through his intimate friend Judge Van Ness, demanded an apology for a criticism by Hamilton which had reached Burr's ears. Several letters were exchanged before it became plain that Burr was bound to force a quarrel or to humiliate Hamilton to a point which he knew would not be endured. When Burr's true purpose became plain to Hamilton, he requested a short time to close up several important cases for his clients, which were then pending in the circuit court. The circuit having terminated, Colonel Burr was informed (Friday, July 6, 1804) that Hamilton would be ready to meet him at any time after the following Sunday. Both men realized that the meeting might be fatal, and prepared for it in a characteristic way. Burr, who because of his fascinating manners was a great favorite with women, destroyed the compromising letters which he had received and devoted his spare hours to pistol practice. Hamilton had fewer such letters to destroy, and was determined not to kill Burr if it could be avoided. He drew up his will, and prepared a statement of his reasons for fighting. This statement set forth that he was opposed to the practice of dueling and had done all that was practicable, even beyond the demands of a punctilious delicacy, to secure an accommodation. He then said:—

"I have resolved, if our interview is conducted in the usual manner, and it pleases God to give me the opportunity, to reserve and throw away my first fire; and I have thought even of reserving my second, and thus giving a double opportunity to Colonel Burr to pause and repent."

The arrangements for the duel were made on Monday, and on the following Wednesday (July 11) the meeting took place at seven o'clock in the morning at Weehawken, three miles above Hoboken, on the west shore of the Hudson. Burr and Hamilton exchanged salutations, the seconds measured the distance, which was ten paces, and the parties took their respective stations. At the first word, Burr fired. Hamilton's weapon was discharged in the air, and he almost instantly fell, mortally wounded. The ball struck the second or third false rib, fractured it about the middle, passed through the liver and diaphragm, and lodged in the first or second lumbar vertebra. Hamilton was at first thought to be dead, but he revived when put on board the boat which was in waiting, and was able to utter a few words as he was borne towards his home. He died on the day after the meeting at two o'clock in the afternoon. Even in his death he rendered a parting service to his countrymen, by the revulsion of feeling which was everywhere aroused against the practice of dueling. The news of his premature taking off caused a wave of grief and indignation to spread over the country, differing from the chastened sorrow felt over the death of Washington, because Washington had met his end full of years and honors, and in the natural order of nature.

The concluding statement made by Hamilton in the paper which he left regarding his meeting with Burr gives some clue to his reasons for fighting. This paragraph ran as follows:—

"To those who, with me, abhorring the practice of dueling, may think that I ought on no account to have added to the number of bad examples, I answer that my relative situation, as well in public as private, enforcing all the considerations which constitute what men of the world denominate honor, imposed on me (as I thought) a peculiar necessity not to decline the call. The ability to be in future useful, whether in resisting mischief or effecting good, in those crises of our public affairs which seem likely to happen would probably be inseparable from a conformity with public prejudice in this particular."

This statement has been construed to mean that Hamilton looked forward to the time when the Constitution would be assailed by extremists and he would be called by events to put himself at the head of a movement for a stronger government, and perhaps even to lead an army. Several passages in his writings, especially after the downfall of the Federalists, gave color to the view that he feared an outbreak of Jacobin violence in America, and the failure of the Constitution in such an event to resist the strain which would be put upon it. In a letter to Gouverneur Morris (February 27, 1802), he drops into the following gloomy forebodings:—

"Mine is an odd destiny. Perhaps no man in the United States has sacrificed or done more for the present Constitution than myself; and, contrary to all my anticipations of its fate, as you know, from the very beginning, I am still laboring to prop the frail and worthless fabric. Yet I have the murmurs of its friends no less than the curses of its foes for my reward. What can I do better than withdraw from the scene? Every day proves to me more and more that this American world was not made for me."

This mood of despondency was not the usual mood of Hamilton. Much as he abhorred the sympathy with France shown by the Democrats and the tendency towards French ideas, his habitual temper was for combination and action rather than surrender. During the three years which followed the inauguration of Jefferson, he continued, though busy with his law practice, to keep up in private life an active correspondence with Federalist leaders throughout the country, and to advise earnest efforts to defeat Democratic policies. Only the day before the duel, in a letter to Sedgwick of Massachusetts, he indirectly condemned a project which was on foot for a combination of the Northern States into a separate confederacy. He said that "dismemberment of our empire will be a clear sacrifice of great positive advantages without any counterbalancing good, administering no relief to our real disease, which is Democracy."

Hamilton had fears for the future of the Union under the Constitution which were much exaggerated by his leanings towards a strong, self-centred government like that of Great Britain. It is not unreasonable to believe that he felt that he might again be called upon to play a great part in politics as the leader of his party, and that under the prejudices then prevailing he would weaken his personal influence if he refused a challenge. The public man of that day who could be charged with cowardice or lack of regard for his personal honor would suffer much with the masses, if not with the party leaders, who understood his character and abilities. Hamilton hardly needed to prove his personal courage to any reasonable man after his services in the Revolution, including his reckless charge upon the redoubt at Yorktown, but political foes might forget these evidences of his character if he should tamely submit to insult from a political opponent. It is doubtful whether his purpose in meeting Burr went beyond this submission to the general prejudice in favor of dueling and the belief on his part that his position as a gentleman and a political leader required him to accept the challenge.

The high abilities and great services of Hamilton to the new Union have been sufficiently set forth in these pages to make unnecessary any elaborate estimate of his character and attainments. His essential merit was that of a constructive and organizing mind, which saw the opportunity for action and was equal to the opportunity. Hamilton was governed to a large extent by his intellect, but having reasoned out a proposition to be sound and wise, he rode resolutely to its accomplishment, taking little account of the obstacles in the way. He was not a closet philosopher, pursuing abstract propositions to their sources, and searching, through the discordant threads of human destiny, the ultimate principles of all things; but his mind was keen and alert in seizing upon reasoning which seemed obviously sound, laboring in behalf of his convictions, and presenting them with force and simplicity to others. He found the career for which he was preËminently fitted in the organization of the financial system and the consolidation of the Union, under the first administration of Washington. He was less fitted for the career of a politician in times less strenuous, or when tact and finesse were more useful in securing results than clear reasoning and strong argument.

Hamilton was cut off when he had only recently resumed his professional career, but was making a distinguished record at the bar. Always a great lawyer, he would soon have accumulated a fortune if he had lived amid the tempting opportunities of to-day. As it was, his legal fees were modest and his sudden death left large debts. He bequeathed the request to his sons that they should assume these debts if his estate was insufficient, but the gratitude of some of the wealthy Federalists relieved them of this filial obligation. Hamilton had six sons, but most of them were already approaching a self-supporting age when he died. His oldest son had fallen a victim to the barbarous practice of dueling in a petty quarrel at a theatre three years before the father's death. The fourth son, Mr. John C. Hamilton, gave much time to the study of his father's career, and prepared the Life of Hamilton which has been the source of the later work of historians. Hamilton's widow, the daughter of General Schuyler, survived until 1854, when she died at the age of ninety-seven years and three months.

As a man in private life, Hamilton was loved and respected by those who came closest to him, but it was as much by the qualities of his mind as by the special fascinations of his manner. He commanded the respect and support of most of the leaders of his party, because they were great enough to grasp and appreciate his reasoning, but he was never the idol of the people to the same extent as many other leaders. He would probably have made a great career in whatever direction he might have turned his high abilities, but he was fortunate in finding an opportunity for their exercise in a crisis which enabled him to render greater services to the country than have been rendered by almost any man in her history, with the exception of Washington and Lincoln.

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