Complete Works. Hamilton Alexander
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Название: Complete Works

Автор: Hamilton Alexander

Издательство: Bookwire

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isbn: 4064066394080

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СКАЧАТЬ the New York convention, and the general line of thought and argument is the same in both cases. It was, too, a topic to which Hamilton had given particular attention, and this may have been the reason that he fell into an error as to number 64, which is concerned with the treaty-making power of the Senate. As to every doubtful number outside of the ten from 49–58, Madison was in error, and this seems to me to be fatally against him as to 62 and 63.

      In regard to the disputed ten, I have been able to come to no confident conclusion. Before I knew of the Washington list, and before I had discovered a curious addition to No. 56 in the edition of 1802, I felt that the probabilities were in favor of Madison, and I was inclined to assign those numbers to him, although not so confidently as in giving 62 and 63 to Hamilton.

      The Washington list, both from its date and the character of its author, seems to me to tell very strongly against Madison. The other point to which I have just alluded in regard to number 56, has never been noticed before, so far as I am aware. When the edition of 1802 was in preparation, Hamilton was asked to revise it, but declared, in the strongest terms, that the Federalist must be printed as it was written, and he also insisted that full credit should be given to Mr. Jay and Mr. Madison in the preface for the excellence of their work. The edition was revised, unquestionably, I think, as Mr. Dawson has shown, by William Coleman, the editor of the New York Evening Post. Many changes were made, but, with one exception, they were utterly unimportant, effected no improvement, and were nearly all purely verbal. In number 56, however, in treating of the regulation of the militia, a sentence is inserted, as may be seen by referring to that number in this edition, which relates to the need of local knowledge in dealing with such troops. This sentence is a bit of military criticism, and could hardly have been written by any but a military man, for it would not have occurred to a civilian. It is very unlikely indeed that it would have occurred to Coleman, and he certainly would not have inserted it without Hamilton’s approbation. On the other hand, there is little doubt that the proof-sheets of this edition were seen by Hamilton, and the sentence in question is very characteristic of Hamilton and of his mode of thought. He was rigidly scrupulous as to changes in the Federalist and was extremely particular as to the work of his fellow-writers. Hopkins, the publisher of the edition of 1802, wrote to Mr. J. C. Hamilton that the most scrupulous delicacy was observed in regard to the essays of Madison and Jay, and that a portion of the work was reprinted because a single favorite word of Madison had been changed in one passage. It is therefore in the highest degree improbable that Hamilton would have added such an important sentence himself, or permitted any one else to add it, to an essay which he did not know to be his own. The insertion of this sentence, therefore, points very strongly to the conclusion that Hamilton, in 1802, considered number 56 his own, not in a moment of agitation and hurry, but when coolly examining proof-sheets. If this was his opinion at that time and under such circumstances as to number 56, it is difficult to believe either that he was mistaken as to that number or as to the other twelve in dispute. At the same time, the Washington list and the sentence in number 56 are not, of course, conclusive, and while these two bits of evidence have almost removed my inclination to believe in Madison’s authorship of the disputed numbers, I am not even yet completely satisfied that they are not his work.

      The outcome of it all is that the evidence in regard to the twelve disputed numbers is so conflicting that, although the balance is strongly in Hamilton’s favor the best which can be done is to present the plain facts and all the arguments as simply and clearly as possible, and then leave every one to draw his conclusions to suit himself. No one is entitled to assign the disputed numbers to either Hamilton or Madison with absolute confidence. They were surely written by one or the other, and with that unsatisfactory certainty we must fain be content.

      II.

      Bibliography of the “Federalist”

       Table of Contents

      Protracted and minute search, supplemented by widespread advertisements, and by the obliging aid of many kind correspondents, has enabled me to add only two editions to the list of editions of the Federalist already given by Mr. Dawson. In a few instances where Mr. Dawson was able to speak of an edition only from hearsay, I have succeeded in finding a copy and in obtaining a full description of it. This, however, is all, and the bibliography of the Federalist which follows is in the main that of Mr. Dawson’s edition of 1863, to which the reader may be referred for much minute bibliographical information which it did not seem necessary to reproduce here.

      I. The first edition was that of 1788, published by J. and A. McLean, of New York. The first volume appeared March 22, 1788, and the second followed on May 28th. When the second volume appeared the essays were still running in the newspapers, and numbers 78 to 85 inclusive were therefore first given to the world in this edition. The title-page is as follows:

      “The Federalist: / A Collection / of / Essays, / written in favour of the / new Constitution, / as agreed upon by the federal convention / September 17, 1787. / In two volumes / Vol. I or Vol. II / New York: / Printed and sold by J. and A. McLean, / No. 41, Hanover-Square. / M.DCC.LXXXVIII.”

      This first edition is now very rare, and copies, especially if they are in good condition, command a high price.

      II. The second edition was a French translation, published in 1792, with the following titles:

      “Le Fédéraliste, / ou / Collection de quelques Écrits en faveur de / la Constitution proposée aux États-Unis / de l’Amérique, par la Convention convoquée / en 1787; Publiés dans les États-Unis de l’Amérique par / MM. Hamilton, Madisson e Gay, / Citoyens de l’Etat de New York. / Tome Premier. (or Tome Second.) / A Paris / Chez Buisson, Libraire, rue Hautefuille, / No. 20. / 1792.” The translator was M. Trudaine de la Sabliére, who added a few explanatory notes, an introduction of about eighteen pages, and a translation of the Constitution. This edition was reissued by the same publisher in the same year. The second issue was identical with the first, except that the introduction was omitted, probably for political reasons. Neither Brunet (Manuel du Libraire) nor Graesse (Trésor des Livres rares) mentions the Federalist. Barbier (Dictionnaire des Anonymes) mentions this edition of 1792, but not the second French edition of 1795. Both issues of this first French edition are of the utmost rarity. I have heard of but one example of the first issue, the imperfect copy in the library of Harvard College, referred to by Mr. Dawson. The second issue is almost equally rare. There is one copy in the New York State Library (mentioned by Mr. Dawson), another in the library of Yale College, and a third was sold at auction not long since, in Boston, for twenty-five dollars a volume. I am indebted to Mr. Addison Van Name of Yale College for proof of the identity of these two issues of 1792, which Mr. Dawson correctly conjectured to be the case. I am also indebted to Mr. Henry A. Homes, State Librarian of New York, in addition to many other kind suggestions, for much exact information as to the French editions.

      III. A second French edition was published in 1795. It was identical with the second issue of 1792, omitting, like that, the introduction. There were three slight changes in the title-page: “Seconde Edition” is inserted before “Tome Premier,” Jay’s name is spelled correctly, and at the bottom, instead of the usual date, appears “An 3e de la République.” This edition also is of the utmost rarity.

      IV. All that Mr. Dawson could say of the fourth edition of the Federalist was that “it is said that in the year 1799 a new edition of the Federalist was published in New York.” Mr. Dawson, after the most exhaustive search, failed to find a copy, and only heard of one, or what appeared to be one, in the collection of Mr. Force, while his own volume was passing through the press, and he was therefore compelled to leave the existence of such an edition largely a matter of conjecture. This gap can now be filled. There is a copy of this edition, probably unique, for the Force copy seems to have disappeared, in the possession of the Long Island Historical СКАЧАТЬ