My friend Alex, who’s business blog is listed on the left, suggests that the current debate in the USA is not left-right but fits the more traditional American dichotomy — Hamilton-Jefferson.(Jefferson is on the left)

Hamilton favored a strong central government with policies directed toward supporting commerce and a commercial America. He created a national bank, believed deeply in the rule of law and strongly opposed embargoes of foreign goods. Hamilton, was a New Yorker, was a bastard son and married into a wealthy family. Hamilton was a key thinker in designing our Constitution, our divided government, and giving the judiciary strong powers. Hamilton disliked France.

Jefferson was an agrarian philosophe. He believed that a democracy based on landowning farmers was the closest political idea to perfection. Farmers were Jefferson’s idea of moral, upright clear-headed philosopher-kings. Jefferson, like most agrarian American’s, hated corrupt sin-filled cities like New York, and demanded that the US capitol be in the rural South. He got his wish with the District of Columbia.
Jefferson wanted the States to dominate all government matters except foreign affairs. He loved France.

In future blogs I will come back to the Hamilton-Jefferson dichotomy.

For now it is sufficient to note that AG Ashcroft in his policy of standardizing the conditions for capital punishment and plea bargains is Hamiltonian.

AG Ashcroft is also aware that US Supreme Court decisions are increasingly overturning cases where different standards of justice are used in different states for Federal matters.