reek, and mathematics to enter Harvard, Yale, or the college of New Jersey at Princeton.Getting that extra education proved no problem for him. He had arrived in New York with letters of introduction to prominent citizens from Cruger. These people in turn introduced Hamilton to their friends and associates. One of these new acquaintances enrolled Hamilton in Dr. Barber’s Academy in Elizabethtown, New Jersey.Hamilton worked hard at his studies. He often stayed up past midnight doing his homework by candlelight. In 1773, after less then a year of study, he was ready for college. So Hamilton packed up his books and clothes and ferried back across the Hudson to King’s college. Hamilton intended to become a doctor and worked even harder then he had at Dr. Barber’s school. He found other interests at King’s as well. The college library was the largest Hamilton has ever seen, and soon he was reading his way through it. Stories about great emperors and their wars thrilled him, but he was most fascinated by books about politics and economics. Besides the classic works on those subjects, Hamilton also loved to read copies of debates in both the British parliament and the colonial assemblies. He even founded a debating society to discuss the issue he had read about.By the start of his second year at King’s college, politics and debate had become a far more important part of Hamilton’s life then a medicine or mathematics. The North American colonies were becoming very angry about the way the British Parliament kept making up new taxes for them to pay. By law, Englishmen could only be taxed by a legislature of their elected representatives, yet the Parliament taxing the colonies had no American members. Up and down the east coast, patriots claimed it was time for the colonies to rule themselves. Hamilton, a British citizen by birth, had been brought up to be loyal to the King and the Parliament. But the influence ...
