Interviewees:
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Julie Golia
- Linda May Uris Director, Humanities and Social Sciences Research Library, New York Public Library
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Meredith Mann
- Interim Charles J. Liebman Curator of Manuscripts, New York Public Library
Alexander Hamilton is New York's most iconic founding figure—an immigrant who arrived with nothing, witnessed the Sons of Liberty's destruction of Loyalist printer Rivington's press as an eighteen-year-old King's College student, and, despite his Patriot sympathies, drew from that experience a lifelong conviction about the dangers of unchecked popular passion and the need for constitutional guardrails. His prolific writing tested the intellectual foundations of first a new nation and then a stronger federal government. George Clinton offers a contrasting model: New York-born and deeply rooted, he simultaneously fought in the Continental Army and served as governor, guiding the state through years of contested warfare, and later became vice president of the United States. Where Hamilton quickly moved beyond New York to shape national politics, Clinton embodied the state's own identity and interests.
