Gen. Henry
Lee, of Virginia, complained to Madison of the complexity of Hamilton's
plan. "It departs," replied Madison, "from that simplicity which ought
to be preserved in finance more than anything else." Inability to
comprehend naturally breeds suspicion.
Hamilton's followers were, for the most part, from the Northern and
Middle States, city dwellers, money-lenders rather than borrowers,
business men, and manufacturers, who saw no wrong in having the
Government promote the general welfare by legislation. The sudden
revival of business which followed the adoption of Hamilton's plan to
redeem all the debts seemed to them both natural and legitimate. The
other group looked upon the entire matter as a corrupt transaction,
contrived by Hamilton, and a prostitution of government from its
legitimate purposes. Madison wrote that just before the report came
out the value of the various forms of debt rose from a few shillings
to eight or ten shillings in the pound, and that emissaries were still
exploring the interior and distant parts of the Union in order to take
advantage of the ignorance of the holders.
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