Two of our Founding Fathers, A…

Two of our Founding Fathers, Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson had two completely different viewpoints on how the United States should run. Their ideas on subjects such as, foreign policies, economics, structure of government, and who should govern, opposed from each other strongly. Their main disagreements were mainly about the way the government should run, and their opposing ideas were based on their differing preferences for who were the best people to run the government.

Jefferson and Hamilton each wanted a different group of people to run the government. For example, Jefferson believed that the people of the country should have most of the power, where the states would be the ones to control the country; however, Hamilton disagreed because he didn’t believe that common people knew what was best for the country. He believed, that commoners were foolish, and he wanted the educated and rich men to rule the country.

For the most part, Hamilton supported the wealthy in certain situations such as running the government. Jefferson however, supported the middle class men, and had faith in commoners, especially farmers when it came to governing the United States. Additionally, Jefferson and Hamilton disagreed on the voting qualifications for the country. Jefferson wanted voting qualifications to be lower, meaning that more people, such as any men who could read should be allowed to vote; whereas Hamilton wanted the opposite.

He wanted to raise voting qualifications in order to grant voting rights only to wealthy and intelligent white men who owned property. Both founding fathers had extremely different viewpoints on who should rule America, mainly because of how they both supported different groups of people to govern.In addition to having opposing views on who should rule the country, Hamilton and Jefferson disagreed on how the government should be structured. Thomas Jefferson’s ideas regarding structure were based on some of the ideas presented in The Articles of Confederation. While Hamilton believed that a strong central government would be best for America’s governing system, Jefferson preferred having stronger state governments, and a weaker central government. Jefferson didn’t want the new government system to be similar to the British monarchy like Hamilton did, as America had just gained its independence from Great Britain, and so he wanted the government to be more democratic, in which the states would have more power than the central government. Jefferson wanted most of the power to be in the people’s hands, instead of having a federal government, which was how Hamilton wanted the government to be structured.

Unlike Jefferson, Hamilton believed that the number of federal employees should be increased, in order to have a strong centralized government. Along with disputes about how America should be governed, both Jefferson and Hamilton had opposing views on the Constitution. Hamilton, being a Federalist, thought that the Constitution should be interpreted loosely and didn’t think that people’s individual rights should be protected at all times. Jefferson however, favored a more strict interpretation of the Constitution. He believed that people’s liberties should not be restricted. He wanted people’s freedoms such as the freedom of speech and the press to be protected at all times without any restrictions. The overall ideas of Alexander Hamilton, and anti-federalist Thomas Jefferson, regarding the way that the United States should be governed, differed greatly.

They didn’t agree on who should govern, or how the government should run, and they supported different groups of people. Their opposing viewpoints about the American government system made it a difficult task to decide how America’s government would be run.