Timothy Birdnow

On Facebook I said there has been a war between statists and limited government people since the inception of the country. Tom Waeghe asked about that and I replied:

Alexander Hamilton is a prime example. He was bubbling over with ideas about how centralized government could do so many wonderful things for us.The Federalist Party was largely a collection of oligarchs who wanted big government. The tensions between those who sought limited government (as in Jefferson, Madison, and the anti-Federalists) bitterly resisted the big government types from the beginning. If you read the discussions from back then you will see real anger on both sides of the issue. The big government guys won out slowly over time (although they were given a big setback by Andrew Jackson later.)

Dita Sullivan, an argumentative sort, disputed that: Alexander Hamilton was the greatest of all The Founders. He is the reason for the prosperity of America.

I retorted:

I begto differ Dita Sullivan. He began the whole rising statism in America. Or did you agree with the idea of a central bank to control wealth?

America did fine without the Bank of the United States after Jackson abolished it. Hamilton promoted government subsidies of big businesses, high taxes, heavy regulations, everything that bedevils us now. He believed in a strong central government. Our prosperity was in spite of Hamilton, not because of him.

Dita responded:

I couldn’t disagree more.
I worship him. He created stability for the republic.

I replied:

Well, Mussolini and Hitler created stability too. I prefer liberty to a government-imposed stability.

The 80th Congress - controlled by Republicans, listed Alexander Hamilton as one of one of the prime inspirations for the Fascists in their report House Document No. 401. FASCISM IN ACTION. A DOCUMENTED STUDY AND ANALYSIS. OF FASCISM IN EUROPE. They were right; Hamilton was a proto-Fascist.https://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/NHC/NewPDFs/USA/USA%20Fascism%20in%20Europe,%201947.pdf Woodrow Wilson was heavilyinfluenced by Hamilton and HE was the protofascist; Mussolini admitted Wilson was his role model.

Dallas Stephens jumps in:

And there it is. The beginning of the beginning of America's problem, going back 235 years. Federalists v. Anti-Federalists. Progressives v. Constitutionalists. North v. South. R's v. D's. Right v. Left. Right v. Wrong. Civil Wars that never end. Tain't but one way to end the madness. Agree to disagree, divorce, sell the house, pay the lawyers, split what's left and move far, far away from one another. As if that ever happens. Tain't like North and South Korea can ever turn their back on each other. The problem goes beyond all borders and planets. "The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire."
—Robert A. Heinlein

I continue:

From 1841 to 1856, the United States experienced a 16-year economic expansion that was characterized by high economic growth rates despite the fact the Second Bank of the United States was dissolved completely in 1841 (after years of being ineffectual as a private corporation) thanks in no small part to the lack of a central planning committee as we have now with the Federal Reserve. If prosperity came from a central bank it the statistics certainly do not prove it.

I would add there have been 14 recessions since the Great Depression, and two before that since the creation of the Federal Reserve. Both the Great Depression - which featured "a depression within a depression" and the Depression of 1921 were worse than any ever experienced by these United States. And almost all of these recessions since the turn of the 20th century were caused by the fiscal mismanagement and currency manipulation by the Federal Reserve, the reincarnation of Hamilton's Bank of the United States.

(The Great Depression was caused primarily by the Fed slowly pumping up the money supply through the '20s and then contracting it suddenly, leading to the stock market crash. Couple that with tax increases and the economy was doomed.)

I would add that Nicholas Biddle, head of the Second Bank of the United States, crashed the U.S. economy just to screw Andrew Jackson, who was promising to close the bank. Those are the fruits of the prosperity offered by the brainchild of Alexander Hamilton.

Even if Hamilton meant entirely well (and there is no reason to think he did not) he was still a big believer in statism and in a two-tiered system with elites running things for the benighted public. Togo back to my original point, America did indeed have a war between statists and freedom-loving peoples going back to the beginning. Hamilton was one of the big proponents of this statism.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 12:26 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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