October is “Celebrate Pro Bono Month.” So let us take a brief look at Alexander Hamilton, who was the first American lawyer we know of who performed pro bono work on a wide and systematic scale. This free legal work was not limited to what we refer to today as “impact cases” or “cause lawyering” or “high profile litigation.” His pro bono cases included help for the poor with their individual, everyday problems.[1] Considering that Hamilton was not wealthy like many of the other Founding Fathers, his volunteer legal activities were a real sacrifice. His many friends and creditors, who were usually one and the same, continually urged him to devote more time to fee generating cases, yet his pro bono caseload only increased. Alexander Hamilton was a passionate man, and pro bono was one of his passions.

One reason for Alexander Hamilton’s dedication to pro bono was his background. He was born on Jan. 11, 1757, on the island of Nevis in the West Indies to unwed parents. His father abandoned Hamilton and his mother when he was young and left them in abject poverty and debilitating illness. Fever killed his mother and almost killed him. He was ashamed that he had no shoes to wear to her funeral. The legal system then dealt him another blow. The destitute, ill and unrepresented 11-year-old was denied what little inheritance he would have received from his mother because, under the law, he was deemed illegitimate. The meager personal property was awarded by the probate court to his mother’s long-estranged husband, from whom she had fled many years before to escape severe physical abuse. Her husband had refused to let her have a divorce and even had her imprisoned for adultery because of her relationship with Alexander’s father. Soon after Alexander was orphaned, a cousin who offered some help committed suicide.[2]

Alexander had almost no schooling because he was denied admission to Church of England schools because of his illegitimacy, but the headmistress of a Jewish school gave him some tutoring. At the age of 12 he was supporting himself as a clerk in a St. Croix counting house and was soon running the business for his employer. He achieved attention when his stirring essay describing a hurricane that hit the island was published in a local newspaper. His organizational, accounting and writing skills were so impressive that a collection was taken up to send him to college in America.[3] In 1772 he enrolled in King’s College (now Columbia), but soon found himself fighting in the early battles of the American Revolution.[4]

Attracting the attention of George Washington, he became the general’s aide-de-camp.[5] In Washington, Hamilton found the father figure he never had before, and the childless Washington came to love him like a son. With Washington’s permission, Hamilton ended his military service by leading the last charge at night at Yorktown, the last battle of the Revolution.[6] Because he was not born or raised in any colony, following the war, he had no strong state attachment and thought nationally, envisioning America becoming a great and unified political and economic empire modeled after Great Britain.[7]

Following the Revolution, the hard-working Hamilton completed a three-year course in law in six months and was admitted to the New York bar.[8] In conjunction with James Madison, he successfully won the calling of the Constitutional Convention in 1787 in the hopes of replacing the ineffectual Articles of Confederation with a plan for a strong national government. After serving at the Philadelphia gathering, Hamilton, along with Madison and John Jay, drafted The Federalist Papers, which explained the value of the proposed Constitution to the nation and was indispensable in winning ratification.[9]

His most famous contribution was Federalist No. 78 that argued the value of an independent and impartial judiciary, protected from political influence and pressure, and foreshadowed the doctrine of judicial review, which was subsequently adopted by the Supreme Court in Marbury v. Madison (1803).[10] Today, The Federalist Papers is seen as one of the most important writings on political theory ever written and is regularly cited by the United States Supreme Court.

At the age of 32, Hamilton was selected by President Washington to be the first Secretary of the Treasury. In that capacity, he did more than anyone else to organize the federal bureaucracy, establish the credit of the United States as the envy of the world and lay the foundation for America becoming an economic colossus. The key features of his financial program were the creation of the Bank of the United States, enactment of a tariff system and assumption of the Revolutionary War debts of the states by the national government, thus tying the moneyed class to the success of the new government. He also wrote President Washington’s famous Farewell Address and organized and commanded the Federalist Party in opposition to Thomas Jefferson’s Republicans.[11] Enemies and allies alike agreed that his work capacity was phenomenal.[12]

Upon retirement to private life in New York City, Hamilton swiftly became known as one of the best lawyers in the country and was eagerly sought after by clients as he handled some of the most important civil and criminal cases of the age and demonstrated courage in the face of “controversy and public hostility”[13] by representing detested Tories in efforts to regain their property illegally confiscated during the Revolution.[14] He also found time to help organize an anti-slavery society and helped found a school, later named after him, to educate Native American students.[15] Vividly remembering the horrors of slavery in the West Indies, he hated the institution and volunteered to represent escaped slaves who fled to New York from the South. He brilliantly litigated to prevent their return to servitude.[16]

Hamilton also represented many indigent people living in the ever-growing slums of the city in both civil and criminal cases.[17] His leading contemporary biographer noted, “He had an incorrigible weakness for aiding women in need.”[18] In his criminal work, he always refused to represent paying clients he believed guilty, but the poor had a special place in his heart and he would champion pro bono criminal defendants even if certain of their culpability.[19]

Although his considerable pro bono work won little attention, his paid legal work did attract much notice. For example, he handled litigation that laid the foundation for defamation law nationally[20] and he was considered New York’s leading expert on corporate, commercial and constitutional law and chancery practice.[21] When he argued a case before the United States Supreme Court, it was said of his three-hour presentation that those who heard it “were swept away by ‘his eloquence, candor and law knowledge.’”[22]

Hamilton was also well known for practicing the highest ethical standards and for rejecting what he considered to be extravagant fees. He strove not only to avoid impropriety but any appearance of impropriety.[23] And he was very proud and protective of the bar. For example, he once turned down a well-paying client who had disparaged the legal profession stating that this man’s comments about the bar “cannot be pleasing to any man in the profession and must oblige anyone that has proper delicacy to decline the business of a person who professedly entertains such an idea of the conduct of this profession.”[24]

Unfortunately, Hamilton’s life and legal career were cut short when he was killed by Vice President Aaron Burr, his chief New York political rival, in a duel at Weehawken, New Jersey. Not wanting to harm Burr, Hamilton fired first in the air, but the unscrupulous Burr responded by taking dead aim, shooting him through the liver.[25] After 36 hours of suffering, Hamilton forgave Burr and died of his wound on July 12, 1804, at the age of 49, leaving a widow and seven children.[26] He was interred at Trinity Church at Wall Street as thousands of the most powerful and most poor clogged the streets in mourning.[27] His burial site is fitting, for it is at the epicenter of the financial titan his polices helped to create.

Unlike other Founders, Alexander Hamilton has no great monument in Washington, D.C. But many counties are named in his honor, including Hamilton County, Tenn.,[28] and his image appears on the $10 bill. Accordingly, it is appropriate that all lawyers should “think pro bono” when they see his face on their currency and perhaps send the Hamilton bills they spot to their local legal aid office in remembrance of the orphan of the West Indies. Moreover, they should recall his heartfelt admonishment: “The first duty of society is justice.”[29]

Notes

1. See Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton 189 (2004).
2. See id. at 7–28.
3. See id.at 37–38.
4. Richard Brookhisher, Alexander Hamilton, American 27(1999).
5. Charles Cerami, Young Patriots 27 (2005).
6. Forrest McDonald, Alexander Hamilton: A Biography 25 (1982).
7. See Saul K. Padover, The Genius of America 78 (1960).
8. See Richard Brookhisher, Alexander Hamilton, American 65(1999).
9. See Saul K. Padover, The Genius of America 78-90 (1960).
10. Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (Cranch 1) 137 (1803).
11. See Saul K. Padover, The Genius of America 90–93 (1960).
12. Forrest McDonald, Alexander Hamilton: A Biography 63 (1982).
13. Id. at 64.
14. Charles Cerami, Young Patriots 65 (2005).
15. Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton 337 (2004).
16. Id. at 580.
17. Id. at 189 (2004).
18. Id.
19. Id.
20. Id. at 669 (2004).
21. Forrest McDonald, Alexander Hamilton: A Biography 60, 65 (1982).
22. Id. At 314.
23. Id. at 309-10.
24. Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton 189 (2004).
25. William Sterne Randall, Alexander Hamilton: A Life 424 (2003); Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton 204 (2004).
26. Forrest McDonald, Alexander Hamilton: A Biography 361 (1982).
27. See Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton 710-713 (2004).
28. Tre Hargett, Tennessee Blue Book 598 (2012).
29. Alexander Hamilton, The Quotable Lawyer 172 (Tony Lyons ed. 2010).

RUSSELL FOWLER is associate director of Legal Aid of East Tennessee (LAET) and since 1999 has been adjunct professor of political science at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. He served as the law clerk to Chancellor C. Neal Small in Memphis and earned his law degree at the University of Memphis in 1987. Fowler has more than 50 publications on law and legal history, including several in this Journal.