"I'm not going to write about it. I'm not going to write about it. I'm not going to write about it." That's what I told myself all week. Everybody's going to be talking about "it," people much smarter and more prepared than me, why would they want to read yet another column about it?

But the elephant in the room is too big to miss.

Yesterday I received a book that I bought on Amazon, taking advantage of the free shipping promotion. I was lucky enough to get it "like new", at a very discounted price, special edition not bound, but sewn. "Alexander Hamilton" by Ron Chernov. For those of you who don't know him, Hamilton is one of the founding fathers of the United States, face of the ten dollar bill, ideologue of the American financial system, one of the main promoters of the Constitution (as well as a delegate to the constitutional convention) of the North Country, among others. With apologies to the most purist historians, Hamilton's life inspired Lin Manuel Miranda to write the musical "Hamilton", a Broadway super hit, winner of eleven Tony Awards and the most successful play ever released (if you haven't seen it, it's on Disney+). From this one, I would like to highlight two parts that I think fit very well with the historical moment we are living in.

The first, in the song "Non-Stop"[1], in a conversation between Aaron Burr and Hamilton, a few verses read as follows:

[BURR] The constitution's a mess

[HAMILTON] So it needs amendments

[BURR] It's full of contradictions

[HAMILTON] So is independence

We have to start somewhere

 

We have to start somewhere. And so we are starting. Over the weekend, through a democratic process, unprecedented in the world, we elected 155 Constituent Convention members (77 women and 78 men), who will be in charge of drafting the country's potential new constitution, which will have to be ratified in an exit plebiscite, with mandatory voting, once the new document is presented. We have already seen that these were not the results the market was expecting. But well, that's that. It is also not so clear to me that the vote the market expected was really something positive in the medium term, considering the context in which this very process originated, but let's leave that to people who know better. For now, we have to start somewhere.

While Hamilton, a Federalist, could not pass his financial plan through Congress, Thomas Jefferson, a fierce Democratic-Republican adversary, proposed a meeting to negotiate and bring positions closer together. In the musical, "The room where it happens"[2]:

 

BURR] Congress is fighting over where to put the capital- [BURR] Congress is fighting over where to put the capital-

Company screams in chaos

[BURR] It isn't pretty

Then Jefferson approaches with a dinner and invite

And Madison responds with Virginian insight:

[MADISON] Maybe we can solve one problem with another and win a victory for the Southerners, in other words-

[JEFFERSON] Oh-ho!

[MADISON] A quid pro quo

[JEFFERSON] I suppose

[MADISON] Wouldn't you like to work a little closer to home?

[JEFFERSON] Actually, I would

[MADISON] Well, I propose the Potomac

[JEFFERSON] And you'll provide him his votes?

[MADISON] Well, we'll see how it goes

[JEFFERSON] Let's go

 

Hamilton cedes the capital in exchange for being able to pass his financial plan. In a nascent country, full of contradictions, power struggles, different views, etc., two tremendously influential political adversaries were able to come to an agreement, ceding positions to achieve progress on the things that mattered most to them. Today, our constitutional convention has no political force with a third of the votes. It is true that alliances can be formed and this may no longer be the case, but based on recent events, it appears that even within the opposition there is not much convergence on a number of significant issues, whether political, economic, social, etc. So negotiations will have to take place. Leaders will have to emerge and, being in the room where it happens, they will try to find the best for their positions and for the country. It is true that some of those elected seem to have tremendously radical positions, or even do not know what a political regime is, but reviewing the Convention Manual prepared by Kenneth Bunker and his team of three-fifths, they seem to be a minority not necessarily capable of imposing those ideas. It is true that there are risks, it is true that everything might not go well, but the country has not shown the greatest progress in its history during the last 30 years for nothing. That cannot be forgotten or discarded. Improved? Of course.

[1] https://open.spotify.com/track/7qfoq1JFKBUEIvhqOHzuqX?si=3f9cbb760fba4b38

[2] https://open.spotify.com/track/2TK2KSrzXD6W01qjXVjNGh?si=a01d058a2f654b2f

 

Nathan Pincheira

Chief Economist of Fynsa