The Courtroom Where It Happened: Hamilton As A Lawyer

More than two centuries after his death, the legal work of the “10-dollar founding father” remains influential.

Law360, New York (September 28, 2016, 3:30 PM EDT) -- "A legislative folly has afforded so plentiful a harvest to us lawyers that we have scarcely a moment to spare from the substantial business of reaping." The busy lawyer speaking here was Alexander Hamilton. He was describing his good fortune in a letter to Gouverneur Morris in 1784.[1] The war was over and Hamilton was laboring in cases involving New York laws enacted to penalize those who had remained loyal to Great Britain.[2] Little has changed in 230 years. Legislatures are still in the folly business and lawyers of reaping the harvest. Alexander Hamilton was also a founding father of government law work....

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