In terms of today where would the founding fathers be in the rich list if they did a rich list back then?

Question

Who was the richest and who was the poorest founding father. I am just mainly interested in the first 3 presidents but you can name hamiton or madison if you wish.

I mean compared to the rest of the population at that time were they normal and not rich. Did most people own land at that time and

Would they be in terms of the walmart family?

Answer 1

During the time of the Revolution there were many Americans in the Rich Class. They opposed the British for profits (Current profits and future profits) being lost. The rich colonials along with the poor were being highly taxed by British Parliament in the Stamp Act of 1765, which the Americans protested as unconstitutional. The Parliament insisted on its right to tax colonists; the Americans claimed their rights as Englishmen to no taxation without representation.

But as to the founding Fathers here are a few Examples;

George Washington was the richest man in America, a man who enslaved 216 human beings who were not emancipated until after he and his wife had both died. Benjamin Franklin had a personal fortune worth at least $20 million in today's money. He was a champion of the Quaker plutocrats in Philadelphia and vigorously opposed the democratic western farmers of Pennsylvania.

John Hancock was an extremely wealthy Boston merchant who had made his fortune as a military contractor during King George's War (1739-1747). In 1748, Hancock engineered a merciless devaluation of Massachusetts currency as a cure to inflation, which reduced huge numbers of workers to poverty. Alexander Hamilton grew rich through his father-in-law's connections. James Madison created a large fortune with his vast slave plantations. The top 10 percent of the white male leaders in America owned half the wealth and held as slaves one-seventh of the country's people.



If you are really interested search for information about American Plutocracy.

Answer 2

You have a very "Disney" notion of your nation's Founding Fathers, I'm afraid! Whilst they were undoubtedly men of great vision & bravery, they were hardly "regular guys", and all came from VERY privileged backgrounds indeed! What most Americans seem blissfully unaware of is the reality that in the Constitution as written, the only folks who got a vote were male landowners....poor folks (ie the numerous staff, both paid Whites and Black slaves) were considered PROPERTY, not people, and as such they did not get a vote or even a "say" in anything....they did as they were told, or they were beaten!



The single exception to this may have been Thomas Paine, who had been a tax collector for His Majesty King George's British government, so was one of the very few among your Founders who had ever had a "real" job....being a 'Gentleman Farmer' does NOT, I'm afraid, qualify as ever having worked for a living!



Where on Earth did you get the absurd notion that "compared to the rest of the population at that time were they normal and not rich"?

Answer 3

Actually, most of those involved in the revolution, are not household names today. The majority lost all their land, money, many were disassociated from their families, some were executed, some imprisoned.

Answer 4

they varied. But most were opposed to any massive accumulation of wealth



"if my Countrymen should ever wish for the Honour of having among them a Gentry enormously wealthy, let them sell their Farms and pay rack'd Rents; the Scale of the Landlords will rise as that of the Tenants is depress'd who will soon become poor, tattered, dirty, and abject in Spirit. Had I never been in the American Colonies, but was to form my Judgment of Civil Society by what I have lately seen [in Ireland and Scotland], I should never advise a Nation of Savages to admit of Civilisation: For I assure you, that in the Possession and Enjoyment of the various Comforts of Life, compar'd to these People every Indian is a Gentleman: And the Effect of this kind of Civil Society seems only to be, the depressing Multitudes below the Savage State that a few may be rais'd above it"

-- Benjamin Franklin; letter to Joshua Babcock (Jan. 13. 1772)



"there are various ways in which the rich may oppress the poor; in which property may oppress liberty; and that the world is filled with examples. It is necessary that the poor should have a defence against the danger."

-- James Madison; Note to Speech on the Right of Suffrage (1821)



"MANKIND being originally equals in the order of creation, the equality could only be destroyed by some subsequent circumstance: the distinctions of rich and poor may in a great measure be accounted for and that without having recourse to the harsh ill-sounding names of oppression and avarice"

-- Thomas Paine; Common Sense (1776)



"man is the only animal which devours his own kind, for I can apply no milder term... to the general prey of the rich on the poor."

-- Thomas Jefferson; Letter to Edward Carrington (January 16, 1787)



"The great object should be to combat the evil: 1. By establishing a political equality among all; 2. By witholding unnecessary opportunities from a few to increase the inequality of property by an immoderate, and especially an unmerited, accumulation of riches; 3. By the silent operation of laws which, without violating the rights of property, reduce extreme wealth towards a state of mediocrity and raise extreme indigence towards a state of comfort; 4. By abstaining from measures which operate differently on different interests, and particularly such as favor one interest at the expense of another; 5. By making one party a check on the other so far as the existence of parties cannot be prevented nor their views accommodated. If this is not the language of reason, it is that of republicanism."

-- James Madison; from 'Parties' (1792)



"Admitting that any annual sum, say, for instance, one thousand pounds, is necessary or sufficient for the support of a family, consequently the second thousand is of the nature of a luxury, the third still more so, and by proceeding on, we shall at last arrive at a sum that may not improperly be called a prohibitable luxury. It would be impolitic to set bounds to property acquired by industry, and therefore it is right to place the prohibition beyond the probable acquisition to which industry can extend; but there ought to be a limit to property or the accumulation of it by bequest."

-- Thomas Paine, 'Rights of Man, Part the Second' (1792)



"But besides the danger of a direct mixture of Religion & civil Government, there is an evil which ought to be guarded agst in the indefinite accumulation of property from the capacity of holding it in perpetuity by ecclesiastical corporations. The power of all corporations, ought to be limited in this respect. The growing wealth acquired by them never fails to be a source of abuses."

-- James Madison; from 'Detached Memoranda'



"legislators cannot invent too many devices for subdividing property, only taking care to let their subdivisions go hand in hand with the natural affections of the human mind. The descent of property of every kind therefore to all the children, or to all the brothers and sisters, or other relations in equal degree is a politic measure, and a practicable one. Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they rise."

-- Thomas Jefferson; Letter to James Madison, (Oct. 28, 1785)



hope this helps