Sex and the Founding Fathers

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In today’s New York Post, just in time for the long 4th of July weekend, Cindy Adams compared the Founding Fathers to the “cheating, lying, mistress-loving Mark Sanford.” Adams claims “Despite my research, their [the Founders] sex lives remain unclear. Some may have been a tad randy, but it is still not totally certain whether it was mandatory that they be unfaithful to their wives as it apparently is for our politicians today.”

Well here’s a “randy” story about my favorite Founding Father and New York Post founder, Alexander Hamilton whom John Adams described as “a man who’s excessive production of secretions no number of whores could draw off.”

One day while serving as George Washington’s Secretary of the Treasury, the married 34-year-old Hamilton was visited by a 23-year-old Maria Reynolds.  Claiming her husband abandoned her, Maria asked Hamilton for some money which he delivered at her living quarters later that night.  Over the next three years, Hamilton and Maria regularly exchanged sex for cash which Maria’s husband pocketed in exchange for allowing Hamilton to schtup his wife.  Word of the arrangement reached Hamilton’s political enemies who published the story in hopes of sabotaging his revolutionary plans to create a national banking system and a powerful central government.

So did Hamilton respond by calling a press conference to apologize to his wife, his family and all people of faith in America?  Hell no! He published a candid tell-all laying out all the salacious details and showing that the arrangement was just a private matter involving consenting adults. The public accepted Hamilton’s upfront explanation and everyone moved on.

For once Id like to see a politician caught in a sex scandal to be honest about it and not try to spin the sex as a crisis of faith (Mark Sanford) or the manifestation of a psychological hang-up  (Elliot Spitzer and John Edwards). Does anyone ever feel sorry for these guys?  Has spinning an affair as a story of redemption ever rescued a career?  Maybe the next politician caught with his pants down should just be honest like Hamilton. Admit that the sex was real fun and hope the public thinks you’re too valuable to lose.