American Machiavelli

John Lamberton Harper is Professor of American Foreign Policy and European Studies at the Bologna Center of the Johns Hopkins University Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies. He is the author of America and the Reconstruction of Italy, 1945–1948, winner of the 1987 Marraro Prize from the Society for Italian Historical Studies, and American Visions of Europe: Franklin D. Roosevelt, George F. Kennan, and Dean G. Acheson, winner of the 1995 Robert Ferrell Prize from the Society of Historians of American Foreign Relations. His articles and reviews have appeared in The American Historical Review, The Journal of American History, The Times Literary Supplement, Foreign Affairs, The National Interest, Survival, World Policy Journal, SAIS Review, and other publications.

'… a decent history about the role Alexander Hamilton plated in the shaping of foreign policy of the Early American Republic … the book does help further the scholarship of the history of American foreign policy …' Political Studies Review

• Part I. The Coming of Necessity: 1. From providence to fortune, 1757(?)–1781; 2. Prepared to be not good, 1781–1788; Part II. Battle Lines are Drawn: 3. At Washington's side again, 1789; 4. Hamilton versus the Virginians, 1789–1791; 5. The Nootka Sound Crisis, part one: the Morris mission; 6. The Nootka Sound Crisis, part two: Hamilton and Jefferson; 7. Liaisons Dangereuses, 1791–1792; Part III. Seizing the Helm: 8. The birth of American neutrality, February-May, 1793; 9. 'A most distressing dilemma', May-December, 1793; 10. Hamilton and the war crisis of 1794; 11. The Jay treaty; Part IV. Informal Adviser to the Prince: 12. Return to not-so-private life, 1794–1795; 13. 'Camillus' into the breach, 1795; 14. A high-stakes game: Washington's farewell address, 1796; 15. Transition to the new regime, 1796–97; Part V. A Prince in His Own Right?: 16. Hamilton and Adams: the background; 17. Hamilton's 'Grand Plan'; 18. Hamilton's army, part one, 1797–1798; 19. Hamilton's army, part two, 1798–1799; 20. Killing two birds with one stone, 1799; Part VI. The Lesser of Evils: 21. 1800 and after; 22. From fortune into providence.