Hamilton's Report on Manufactures and Political Philosophy*

Abstract

The argument of Hamilton's Report on Manufactures was that the general welfare required the encouragement of manufactures in the United States. But Hamilton's Report goes further than that. Its defense of manufacturing is a defense of the acquisitive principle. More than any other American political thinker, Hamilton felt compelled to emphasize the applicability of the spirit of acquisitiveness to the American experience. The acquisitive faculties that found protection under the combined influence of commerce and the Constitution would be further enhanced by manufacturing, the new economic force in American politics. Hamilton's Report, moreover, is based on the principles of modern political philosophy. It is of greatest importance to bear in mind that a revolution in political philosophy, a fundamental change in perspective, had occurred in the seventeenth century. The classic modern political philosophy of the seventeenth century, in its pristine form, was a philosophy of acquisitiveness, that peculiarly grasping passion devoted to the accumulation of ever more wealth. The peculiar acquisitive spirit characteristic of early modern political philosophy reveals itself most strikingly in the teachings of John Locke. Locke justifies the emancipation of acquisitiveness by showing that it is conducive to the common good or the prosperity of society. An acquisitive society, with all its inevitable inequalities, will create economic incentives and thereby enhance the wealth of the society.