James A Hamilton, District Attorney of Southern New York

James’s time as District Attorney of Southern New York was actually split between those duties and continuing to advise Jackson, through correspondence and frequent visits to Washington. He worked on two cases that he felt were significant enough to include in his Reminiscences.

In one, James was forced to select one person from a group of known pirates to testify against the others. One life would be saved through his evidence proving the others’ guilt. He selected a young man of 16 in the hopes that he would turn his life around if given the chance, but James felt the weight of the burden of this responsibility, writing, “To have the life or death of a human being in one’s hands, was a most painful condition.”

In the second, he worked on behalf of the royal family of Orange in a case where stolen jewels were found being smuggled into New York. The Collector of the Port of New York, Samuel Swartwout, attempted to claim half the value of the jewels, as was standard for smuggled goods, but James saw them returned to their rightful owner after many months of debate, legal maneuvering, and involvement by several of Jackson’s cabinet members.

James joined with Van Buren in encouraging Jackson to remove Samuel Swartwout from the position as Collector of the Port of New York for his obvious fraudulent activity. Unfortunately, Jackson refused, and Swartwout eventually embezzled over $1million in one of the largest instances of early American fraud.

James ended up resigning his district attorney position when advising Jackson on the national bank absorbed too much of his time. Some historians have assumed that James supported Jackson in his dissolving of the Second National Bank, but a review of their correspondence proves that James encouraged reforms but not disestablishment. He warned of the financial panic that would and did occur. He recorded in his Reminiscences, “These efforts to enlighten the President, made at his request, were wholly unavailing, He had determined, before he came to Washington, to destroy the Bank of the United States . . . The result was a most disastrous inflation of the currency, reckless speculation, and the extended ruin of 1837.”

Learn more about James Alexander Hamilton in my new biography published by Pen & Sword History!