Hamilton’s Ambivalent Role in the New-York Manumission Society

Hamilton was never an antislavery zealot. Following the lead of his friend Robert Troup, Hamilton joined the New-York Manumission Society when it began in 1785. He did not free any of his or his wife’s slaves, however, and purchased slaves for his friends. Despite being a legal counselor for the NYMS for several years, he did not initiate any antislavery proposals. He remained apathetic toward slavery. His Report on Manufactures as Secretary of the Treasury in 1791 advocated putting women and very young children to work in factories, in some ways a form of enslavement.