John Jay and Alexander Hamilton on Black Enslavement

"The idea that America's heralded founders were antislavery slaveholders boggles the mind.... Arthur Scherr shows how self-interest won out over moral principle in this intensive, argumentative study of John Jay and Alexander Hamilton."

—Andrew Burstein, Manship Emeritus Professor of History, Louisiana State University, USA

"Scherr's impressive new book makes it clear that Hamilton and Jay were prisoners of a tyrannical system they neither created nor... summon[ed] the power to destroy."  

—Robert M. S. McDonald, Professor of History, United States Military Academy, USA

"Scherr, known for his trenchant evaluation of prior scholarship, his exhaustive research, and his vigorously independent conclusions grounded in evidence, has done it again in this book. He effectively disproves the romanticized portrayals of Hamilton, and less significantly Jay, as persistent, dedicated, consequential opponents of slavery."

—John B. Boles, William P. Hobby Emeritus Professor of History at Rice University, USA

In this groundbreaking study, Arthur Scherr examines the positions on slavery held by two of the most famous New Yorkers of the early American Republic: John Jay and Alexander Hamilton. Using Hamilton's 1779 proposal to free Southern slaves on the condition that they fight in the Continental Army as a starting point, Scherr assesses the pair’s positions on enslavement. Utilizing often-untouched resources, Scherr offers a re-evaluation of Hamilton and Jay’s modern status as antislavery icons.

Arthur Scherr taught at the City University of New York, USA. He is the author of several critically acclaimed books, including Thomas Jefferson’s Haitian Policy: Myths and Realities (2011), John Adams, Slavery, and Race: Ideas, Politics, and Diplomacy in an Age of Crisis (2018), and Rightful Liberty: Slavery, Morality, and Thomas Jefferson’s World (2021).