by
Oil on canvas. New-York Historical Society, New York, NY.
This is Hamilton as Major General — second in command to Washington — during the Quasi-War
with France from 1798 to 1800.
Alexander Hamilton, c. 1798—1801
I set out on this ground, which I suppose to be self-evident, that the earth belongs in usufruct to the living; that the dead have neither powers nor rights over it.
This, with its echo of the Declaration (self-evident
) was Jefferson at his most terse. Except for the phrase in usufruct
— a legalism meaning the right to use property for a certain time — Jefferson’s words could be chiseled in stone, or shouted on the hustings.
James Madison (2011)