f I omitted respectful mention of distinguished names yet
fresh in your recollections. How can I stand here, to speak of the
Constitution of the United States, of the wisdom of its provisions, of
the difficulties attending its adoption, of the evils from which it
rescued the country, and of the prosperity and power to which it has
raised it, and yet pay no tribute to those who were highly instrumental
in accomplishing the work? While we are here to rejoice that it yet
stands firm and strong, while we congratulate one another that we live
under its benign influence, and cherish hopes of its long duration, we
cannot forget who they were that, in the day of our national infancy, in
the times of despondency and despair, mainly assisted to work out our
deliverance. I should feel that I was unfaithful to the strong
recollections which the occasion presses upon us, that I was not true to
gratitude, not true to patriotism, not true to the living or the dead,
not true to your feelings or my own, if I should forbear to make mention
of ALEXANDER HAMILTON.

Coming from the military service of the country yet a youth, but with
knowledge and maturity, even in civil affairs far beyond his years, he
made this city the place of his adoption; and he gave the whole powers
of his mind to the contemplation of the weak and distracted condition of
the country. Daily increasing in acquaintance and confidence with the
people of New York, he saw, what they also saw, the absolute necessity
of some closer bond of union for the States. This was the great object
of desire. He never appears to have lost sight of it, but was found in
the lead whenever any thing was to be attempted for its accomplishment.
One experiment after another, as is well known, was tried, and all
failed. The States were urgently called on to confer such further powers
on the old Congress as would enable it to redeem the public faith, or to
adopt, themselves, some general and common principle of commercial
regulation. But the States had not agreed, and were not likely to agree.
In this posture of affairs, so full of public difficulty and public
distress, commissioners from five or six of the States met, on the
request of Virginia, at Annapolis, in September, 1786. The precise
object of their appointment was to take into consideration the trade of
the United States; to examine the relative situations and trade of the
several States; and to consider how far a uniform system of comm