The Founding Fathers Unite (2:51 min) Curator: Mark Dimunation
Week of: May 17, 2010 Thomas Jefferson received this first
edition of The Federalist in book form while he was in Paris
serving as minister to France. As the title page attests, this
copy was originally a gift from Elizabeth Hamilton, wife of
Alexander Hamilton, to her sister, Angelica Church, who was a
close friend of Jefferson in Paris. Now considered to be the
most significant American contribution to political thought,
these essays supporting the ratification of the new Constitution
first appeared in New York newspapers under the pseudonym
"Publius." Although it was widely known that the eighty-five
essays were the efforts of Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and
John Jay, the initial curious speculation about authorship of
specific essays gradually developed into heated controversy.
Jefferson, who rarely wrote in his books, could not resist the
political parlor-room game of speculating which author wrote
which essay. On the fly-leaf of his co