Favorite Founding Father

[oneblood]

No love for John Adams. Little has changed. My favorite has to go to Samuel Chase for starting the grand old American tradition of partisan ruling from the Supreme Court.

 

[Connemara]

Originally Posted by oneblood

No love for John Adams. Little has changed. My favorite has to go to Samuel Chase for starting the grand old American tradition of partisan ruling from the Supreme Court.
Do you mean Salmon Chase? Never heard of Samuel.

 

[DocHolliday]

Originally Posted by oneblood

No love for John Adams. Little has changed. My favorite has to go to Samuel Chase for starting the grand old American tradition of partisan ruling from the Supreme Court.

I really like John Adams, and my fondness for him contributes to my attitudes toward Jefferson.

Of all the founders, Adams seems the most real and accessible.

 

[itsstillmatt]

Originally Posted by Huntsman

Flawed, perhaps, but at least it was a better and more hopeful view -- an aspiration, if you will. I wish people would look forward, look towards idealism, a little more (says the lifelong, pessimistic pragmatist Huntsman).

~ H

Originally Posted by Connemara

Do you dislike the Jeffersonian/Paineian optimism?

I think they were great, enlightened men. I just don't think I would want to start a country based on too many men like them.

 

[Razele]

Who put gold / silver as legal tender ONLY in the constitution?

I love that guy.

It's in our constitution (Australia's) as well "Gold + Silver as legal tender only" but we don't take our constitution seriously at all.

 

[oneblood]

Originally Posted by Connemara

Do you mean Salmon Chase? Never heard of Samuel.

No, Samuel Chase signed the Declaration of Independence and was on the Supreme Court. He ruled purely in favor of federalist ideology, so much so that an attempted impeachment took place.

 

[wmb]

2 favorites of many:

Hamilton -- war hero aide de camp to George Washington, asked GW to lead the charge of the last redoubt at Yorktown. Then had a major hand in setting up the financial and political systems in this country. All done as an illegitmate child born in the Carribean. Also an early abolitionist. Unbelievable life...

Washington -- as stated by others, had a chance to become the most powerful man in the world (though already one of the richest in the country) and walked away... never been done before. What more is there to say than that?

 

[StephenHero]

Anybody that dies from a duel deserves to be up on the list, but Washington and Jefferson would be 1,2.

 

[Concordia]

Jefferson's a really cold fish-- hard to understand or like. He also did some genuinely dumb-ass things in his public life.

Franklin's urbanity is the most portable of any of the founders'. One of the more peculiar applications I had to write for business school asked what three people I'd want to have dinner with, and he was on my list.

Washington is-- well, Washington. Definitely a man of the 18th century, but anyone else would have cracked under the strain. The war was bad enough, but as one of my professors said of his presidency "every time he scratched his ass he set a precedent." That's not an easy thing to get right.

 

[fredbr]

john adams. thanks to hbo.

 

[RyJ Maduro]

Hamilton and Washington.

 

[Connemara]

All of this Hamilton talk reminds me that I must read that Chernow bio.

 

[JustinW]

Captain James Cook.