Alexander Hamilton. What an asshole.

'The story of the linking of the excise with Hamilton's program is involved and at times obscure. The northern political leaders, eager to attach the moneyed class to the federal government, wanted the latter to assume the obligations of meeting the unpaid state debts.  The southern leaders, since their states had paid most of their debts, opposed the move, but they wanted the permanent capital of the nation located in the South.  There were the elements of a bargain.  Briefly, the facts seem to be that Jefferson and Hamilton, meeting a group of their respective supporters at dinner, agreed over the wine that the federal government should assume the debts of the states and that the capital of the new government should be located on the Potomac.  The next step was to raise enough money to pay the debts thus assumed, and Hamilton proposed that about eight hundred thousand dollars should be raised by a duty upon imported liquors and upon those distilled within the country.' - Leland D. Baldwin.  Whiskey Rebels.  The Story of a Frontier Uprising.  pg. 61.