2025/06/01 by Kyle Jeffrey Martin · 1 voice
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #American Constitutional Law and Politics #Legal and Constitutional Studies #Political Theory and Influence
paper · doi:10.1086/736327
openalex publication_date 2025/06/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/04/21
In this article, I analyze Alexander Hamilton’s understanding of conscience as a source of moral and political obligation. In Federalist no. 85, Hamilton argues that each citizen must judge the new constitution in accordance with their understanding and conscience. Drawing from writings across his corpus, I attempt to reconstruct Hamilton’s conceptualization of conscience. Conscience, together with reason, is opposed to the passions. For Hamilton, these three forces coexist in tension with one another, as the individual strives to pursue the common good of society. I argue that for Hamilton the concept of conscience is a source of moral knowledge that serves to confirm and motivate our sense of moral and political obligation. This analysis helps lend credibility to the morally “optimistic” reading of Hamilton and ought to cause us to reconsider the oft-cited principle of self-interest set against self-interest as the foundation of our constitutional order.