was (to vary the metaphor) loading
the ship of state with a necessary ballast, whereas in truth he was
disturbing its balance and preventing it from sailing free. He succeeded
in imbuing both men of property and the mass of the "plain people" with
the idea that the well-to-do were the peculiar beneficiaries of the
American Federal organization, the result being that the rising
democracy came more than ever to distrust the national government.
Instead of seeking to base the perpetuation of the Union upon the
interested motives of a minority of well-to-do citizens, he would have
been far wiser to have frankly intrusted its welfare to the good-will of
the whole people. But unfortunately he was prevented from so doing by
the limitation both of his sympathies and ideas. He was possessed by the
English conception of a national state, based on the domination of
special privileged orders and interests; and he failed to understand
that the permanent support of the American national organization could
not be found in anything less than the whole American democracy. The
American Union was a novel and a promising political creation, not
because it was a democracy, for there had been plenty of previous
democracies, and not because it was a nation, for there had been plenty
of previous nations, but precisely and entirely because it was a
democratic nation,--a nation committed by its institutions and
aspirations to realize the democratic idea.

Much, consequently, as we may value Hamilton's work and for the most
part his ideas, it must be admitted that the popular disfavor with
which he came to be regarded had its measure of justice. This disfavor
was indeed partly the result of his resolute adherence to a wise but an
unpopular foreign policy; and the way in which this policy was carried
through by Washington, Hamilton, and their followers, in spite of the
general dislike which it inspired, deserves the warmest praise. But
Hamilton's unpopularity was fundamentally due to deeper causes. He and
his fellow-Federalists did not understand their fellow-countrymen and
sympathize with their purposes, and naturally they were repaid with
misunderstanding and suspicion. He ceased, after Washington's
retirement, to be a national leader, and became the leader of a faction;
and before his death his party ceased to be the national party, and came
to represent only a section and a class. In this way it irretrievably
lost public support, and not even