First Report On The Public Credit - Adminsitration and Performance

Adminsitration and Performance

Hamilton was instrumental in setting up a national administration that would carry out these programs. Setting the highest possible standard, he has been called “one of the greatest administrators of all time.” He modernized performance in public office, and personally oversaw the details of an increasingly complex system, “without sacrificing dispatch, clarity or discipline.”

Hamilton's initial program was an immediate success. It established excellent credit for the Federal government, proved the government could handle its affairs, and inaugurated an era of wide prosperity. When Jefferson transacted the Louisiana Purchase, credit and funding were available because of Hamilton's debt assumption plan.

The Treasury Department quickly grew in stature and personnel, encompassing the United States Customs Service, the United States Revenue Cutter Service, and the network of Treasury agents Hamilton had foreseen. Hamilton immediately followed up his success with the Second Report on Public Credit, containing his plan for the Bank of the United States – a national, privately-operated bank owned in part by the government, which became the forerunner of the Federal Reserve System. In 1791 Hamilton released a third report, the Report on Manufactures, which encouraged the growth and protection of manufacturing.

Hamilton’s First Report on the Public Credit and his subsequent reports on a national bank and manufacturing stand as “the most important and influential state papers of their time and remain among the most brilliant government reports in American history”.